Girl power
(This
review contains minor spoilers!)
Let’s be honest, did any of us
actually believe Naughty Dog when they said Uncharted
4 would be their last game in the franchise?
While they’re still sticking to their
guns that the character of Nathan Drake is retired for good (yeah right), the
series is forging on without him in its first ever standalone title: Uncharted: The Lost Legacy.
And fans of the quadrilogy will be
happy to know that despite Lost Legacy’s
shorter length and lower MSRP, this is an Uncharted
game through and through, one so good that it even manages to top some of
the franchise’s lower points and rank alongside 2 and 4 as the best in
the series.
This one-off adventure stars Chloe Frazer
of Uncharted 2 fame as she returns to
her home country of India in search of the mysterious Tusk of Ganesh. Early on
she enlists some help, which arrives in the form of Uncharted 4 villain Nadine Ross. Together the duo quests through
jungles and temples in search of the treasure, avoiding traps and insurgents
led by the sinister Asav along the way.
The story is nowhere near as investing
or enticing as Uncharted 4, but it
works extremely well for the game’s “one-off serial” feel. It never tries to be
more than a simple adventure of getting the treasure before the bad guy does,
and it’s incredibly fun to follow along. Even better, Chloe and Nadine’s
chemistry is just plain fantastic. The two bounce quips off each other
completely naturally, and you wind up loving both of them at the end of this
game significantly more than in the games they debuted in. Even when a surprise
guest star enters the picture in the last third (and no, it isn’t Nate), he
feels more or less like a third wheel in the ladies’ story.
Lost
Legacy employs a lot of the same structuring conventions as the past four
games, including puzzles, cover shoot-outs and of course big epic set-pieces.
The puzzles are some of the franchise’s best, as it seems Naughty Dog has
learned from some of the mistakes they made in Uncharted 4. At no point in Lost
Legacy do you have to look up and down from your journal to the puzzle as
you try to work out the solution. While most of them are fairly simple, there
are quite a few brilliantly designed ones slipped in, including an excellent
one involving statues and swords.
Another interesting thing the game
tries is that a lot of it is spent in an open-world environment. Naughty Dog
must’ve known how much everyone enjoyed Uncharted
4’s Madagascar level, because a good chunk of the game is spent in a car
with Chloe and Nadine finding shrines tucked away in the Indian wilderness. And
you know what? It works. This entire section of the game feels like Madagascar
on steroids, and it’s a ton of fun to ignore the objective and go hunting for
hidden areas and finding tons of Uncharted’s
ubiquitous hidden treasures.
Speaking of that, it does bring to
light the one major problem I had with Lost
Legacy, and it’s something that bugged me throughout the entire game; a lot
of the time it seems that the game would rather be “Uncharted’s Greatest Hits” instead of a brand-new experience. Don’t
get me wrong, there’s a lot of great new stuff in the game, like the puzzles
and the story, but a lot of the set-pieces feel extremely “been there done that”
for those who’ve played past games. Even the grand finale sequence bears
shocking similarities to an infamous scene from a previous Uncharted title. While I wasn’t expecting a budget title to really
break series conventions, at times I was starting to get frustrated when I’d
come across what should be an epic scene and find myself thinking “oh, they did
something like that in one of the other four games…” Thankfully, this is more
annoying than anything, as even the scenes with the most déjà vu attached are a
blast to play through, especially the later levels.
Uncharted:
The Lost Legacy has proved many things, such as the fact that the series
can and should go on even without Nathan Drake, and that even a title with a
shorter length and a smaller price can and should be able to rival the best
stuff triple-A publishers release these days. Chloe and Nadine’s story is
delightful despite its simplicity, and the puzzles might just be the best in
the series. Still, I think that the game should’ve played it a little less safe, as
a lot of times I felt like I was replaying a lot of the big scenes that made
previous installments more memorable. I also think that if you were one of the
people turned away by Uncharted 4’s
more cinematic nature that this spin-off might not be in your wheelhouse. But
if you’re a fan of the series proper, a gamer on a budget, or just someone
looking for an adventure to go on, Lost
Legacy is another fantastic addition to the must-have games on PS4.
FINAL SCORE
9/10
Amazing
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