I don’t brand this site or my YouTube channel as nostalgia/retro focused, but it’s no secret that a lot of games I play here are from my childhood. As a completely unrelated fact, the PS3 came out in 2006, making it technically old enough to be considered a retro console.
Additionally, that means titles like Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, a game from my high school years that happens to be the one we’re starting today, are also considered retro. Do you feel old yet? I certainly do.
What stands out to me open this opening section of Uncharted is that it wastes no time telling us everything we need to know about our central cast and their relationships with each other. Within the first fifteen minutes, through a combination of well-structured lines and excellent performances by the central cast, each of them forms a strong identity that carries them throughout not just this game, but the rest of the franchise going forth.
We’re immediately introduced to the central hook that Nathan Drake is allegedly descended from Sir Francis Drake, who was after a treasure that will be the focal point for our adventure. His early dialogue about pirates and his lack of permits also introduces the roguish mischievousness of his character and his ability to handle himself in tight situations.
By contrast, Elena is almost his polar opposite. Working a legitimate job as a journalist, she’s visibly out of her element, yet perceptive and flexible enough to figure things out and do what she has to as she goes along. Though Sully has less screen time in the first scene, our trek through the jungle with him does a good job of establishing who he is and how he’s more interested in the financial rewards than the archeological. None of this is expressly said but nonetheless made clear and obvious simply by how the characters react to the situations they’re in.
Props to both the writers and the actors in pulling that off.
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