We’ve found our first clue, and that means it’s time to begin the hunt for fame and fortune.

It’s interesting to go back to Uncharted in light of the criticisms that Naughty Dog has received over the past few years regarding their style of game design. Drake’s Fortune wasn’t the game that set them on the path to “cinematic” games. (That was probably Jak 2.) It is the game that cemented that style as the studio’s identity.

The big critique is the story and plot of Naughty Dog games are segmented off almost entirely from the playable aspects of the game. Neither section contradicts the other, but neither do they complement each other. One can watch the cutscenes of a Naughty Dog game, and nothing else, and still have a strong idea of what’s going on without watching a single section of the gameplay. In a medium where the most distinguishing factor is interactivity, there’s a strong argument to be had that just making “playable movies” isn’t doing enough at this point. Maybe it never was enough, we just didn’t know any better back in 2007.

That said, I can’t deny that I loved all of these games back in the day, and still do even now. It’s nostalgic, reminding me of the old high school days.

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.

This run has gone significantly smoother than the previous one, and now we’re at end of the first syndicate. Hopefully, it will go a lot better than the last one.

One of the coolest aspects of these “boss battles” is that we have to deduce, using the profile we’ve been provided by our intel, which of our suspects is our true target. It’s similar to Elusive Targets in that we’re running on limited information, but more forgiving in that we’re left with more information than a typical Elusive Target briefing. We have a set of possible targets to sift through, rather than a whole map.

Lucky for us, once we’ve done that, we don’t need to worry about witnesses. As long as we can escape, it doesn’t matter how public our assassination is. It was a little touch and go there. But once we took care of the immediate area, we were able to stroll right out of the facility to freedom.

I look forward to playing more Freelancer.

Okay, so what if our first campaign didn’t go so well? All we have to do is try again. Maybe this time fortune will favor us.

I don’t think I could plan a better moment than realizing that the random SMG I found lying next to a dead guard’s body just happened to come with a suppressor, making it perfect for delivering headshots and destroying cameras without anyone being the wiser for it. That’s the kind of moment that can only happen when Hitman is adapted to roguelike mechanics.

It’s also weirdly liberating to play a Hitman game where I’m not overly concerned about things like getting detective or caught on camera. Sure, that will cause immediate trouble for me, but it won’t impact my score and I can always improvise my way out of a tricky situation. More importantly, it doesn’t matter if I have to kill guards in the process of getting my way out, because I’ll still get the win even if every single guard is dead at my feet.

I’m not about to play Hitman like a third-person shooter, but it’s nice.

I’ve made no secret of my love for Hitman and roguelikes. So when I heard that Hitman was introducing a roguelike “Freelancer” mode to the game, you better believe I was intrigued.

Some of the most fun I have playing a Hitman game comes from trying to salvage runs that have clearly gone wrong. Either I was too reckless and killed a target when there was a witness, or I was caught by a guard doing a naughty, or something else gave me away. Regardless, the systems have turned against me and I have to make use of my resources to turn them around.

It’s in those moments, where improvisation and quick thinking are put to the test, that Hitman generates those sequences that, win or lose, are hilarious/incredible enough to tell stories about to all of our friends. And for that reason, pairing those mechanics and systems with a rougelike structure makes perfect sense. Roguelikes are defined by the variance that comes from rolling the dice to see what challenges are generated for us. Like Hitman proper, they inspire creative thinking and force us to weigh the odds of success both short-term and long-term.

I couldn’t think of a better pairing.

This is it: The final Dreadzone campaign. Our mission is to destroy the generators powering the Dreadzone security and evacuate the heroes and audience members trapped by our insane captor.

It all comes down to this!

And that’s not just Ratchet: Deadlocked, but also the entire PS2 catalog of Ratchet and Clank games complete. I’m glad that people have turned around on this game specifically because in hindsight it’s still a well-constructed game that more than earned its place in franchise canon and gaming history.

Next week, we’ll start the Uncharted games, beginning with Drake’s Fortune. Remember, the PS3 is technically retro now.

If Dreadzone thinks that this Ghost Ship is any match for us, they’ve got another thing coming! And when we’re done here, we’re coming to finish it.

When someone like Vox sees everyone around him as a profit vector, is it really any surprise that he was willing to kill everyone in the Battledome if it meant that his peak viewership and ad revenue would go up?

Not in the slightest, which is why next time, we’ll finish this once and for all!

The last of the Exterminators has been exterminated and with that, the Dreadzone is coming to an end… or is it. I guess Vox still has a few tricks up his sleeve.

While I still think Ace’s sudden heel-face turn as he’s about to die comes off as a little rushed, in general, it serves to underline the big moral message that rests at the heart of this story, such as it is.

Even in the hypercapitalist world of Ratchet and Clank, Gleeman Vox represents a specific kind of greedy businessman, who sees everything and everyone as another avenue to generate profits. It’s telling that the moment his big star, Ace Hardlight, passes away, he immediately thinks to do the same thing to the next up-and-comer who captured the hearts of the fans, unaware that the very qualities that make Ratchet a celebrated hero are exactly why he would never agree to become another puppet.

It’s cliche, but it’s poetic. There’s a reason these old tropes still carry weight.

Only one more exterminator lies in our way: The fallen hero, Ace Hardlight. Washed up as he may be, we still need to qualify for the privilege of taking him down. Once we do, he won’t stand a chance.

Shout out to Ace Hardlight for being the only boss fight in the entire game to offer anything akin to a decent challenge. I still defeated him fairly easily, but he did manage to score a kill. That’s more than the other losers on his team can say.

One thing I can’t help but notice is that his voice seems different in his boss battle versus his cutscene audio. What probably happened is that his actor recorded the combat barks at a different time of day to the rest of the dialogue. As someone with a background in video production, something I learned is that our voices actually change subtly throughout the day. Our ears don’t notice, but when the voice is recorded it’s obvious.

Things you learn making videos.

Big Al has been shot, and Ace Hardlight (that tool) has sabotaged our escape plan. Unfortunately, we have no other recourse except to continue participating in Dreadzone, if only to buy a bit more time.

I must admit, as a child playing this game, I did not expect them to shoot, and possibly kill Al. You always assume he’s invincible because he’s your robot upgrade vendor and never takes the field. He always exists in your safe space.

But this is a reminder that our safe space was given to us by Dreadzone. We exist at the pleasure of Gleeman Vox and his empire. We are not safe.