Are we seeing the emergence of a new videogame hero? Make that heroes. And a heroine. In a year that’s given us the scowling Nariko, the irritating American-sounding assassin Altair and the gruff Sergeant Nathan Hale there is finally a PS3 game with exceedingly likeable characters. There’s none of the seriousness of Nariko’s and Hale’s fighting to save a tribe/the world and definitely no bullshit sci-fi‘ooh, he’s a memory’ rubbish going on here. Instead there’s a Boy’s Own adventure to be thoroughly enjoyed, a romp in the world of the pulpiest fiction novel and three new videogame characters to get to know and kind of love even.

The characterisation in Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is absolutely incredible. Within seconds you know them and they feel like they’ve been your friends for years, and from then on your relationship with them and the rest of the game only improves.

The story begins with Nathan Drake somewhat conning television reporter Elena Fisher into helping him find Sir Francis Drake’s coffin from the middle of the ocean. He’s on the trail of buried treasure, while she has a similar ignoble motive of making great television. Once the coffin is found, to Elena’s, but not Nathan’s, surprise it’s empty apart from a small notebook compiled by the great explorer himself detailing where to find El Dorado, the mythical city of gold. Nathan is chuffed because he gets to go on an adventure, but Elena is angry about being jipped out of an exclusive and being used by Nathan.

And with that it all kicks off and it doesn’t let up until the credits roll. Pirates attack the happy/disgruntled couple and it’s here where you’ll first get to grips with the extensive amount of shooting people in the head that takes place throughout the game. It’s all based on hiding behind cover and popping out to fire off a few head shots before Nate gets riddled with bullets and dies after the screen turns a rather dour grey and he keels over. The shooting sections aren’t very difficult; they’re tricky certainly, but they’re not difficult due to the fact you can just hide for a bit when the screen goes grey until it fills with colour again to indicate Nathan’s health returning. Sure it’s not exactly possible or true to life, but when you’re having such a good time you really don’t want the annoying facts of life and death interrupting your enjoyment of the game.

The tricky part of the shooting sections comes down to the pirates. They hate getting shot, really, really hate it. They don’t mind shooting you though, they seem to relish in it. So, while you’re concentrating on one of the pirates the others will rush forwards, trying to outflank you. They suck up bullets like a thirsty sponge when you’re aiming at any body part other than their heads and it can take around seven or eight shots before they finally give up on life and do the decent thing and die. Of course you can kill them with one shot to the head, but working out where they’re going to stick that out next is nigh on impossible. You see they’re smart, they can take cover just like you but, while you tend to stay in one place popping up now and then to empty whole clips before ducking back down again, the enemies are constantly on the move.

For example, say one bad guy is hiding behind a box, he might expose himself just above the box or leap out to the side of it and even roll on the ground to try to cap you. When you’ve got about five guys doing this it can make you worry about where to aim next and a lot of the time, just as you get the targeting reticule nicely lined up on their forehead, the buggers will yelp and duck away again. It might sound it but it never gets annoying and it feels like you’re having a proper cinematic gun battle. Even more so when the grenades start landing right next to you.

The Circle button will become your best friend over time. For one it makes Nathan use the cover available, whether it be hiding behind a log or a stone pillar. As well as that you can make him dive to the next available hiding spot and this becomes essential because some of the cover can actually be destroyed if it’s hit with enough bullets or a single grenade. You really get a feel for Nathan’s everyman personality at these points as he whimpers and panics when a grenade lands next to him and starts its ominous countdown before exploding.

If you do make it out of the way just in time you’re treated to what has to be the greatest ear-ringing sound effect we’ve ever heard. It’s subtle enough to make you think your ears are actually ringing the way they sometimes do for no explanation, and when all the other sound effects get a bit muffled you know that the sound effects guys at Naughty Dog are definitely getting a Christmas bonus this year.

One thing that is a bit strange about the gun battles though, is that while you can easily regain your health by ducking out of the way for a bit it then seems that the amount of ammunition you have then becomes your life bar. After wasting a lot of shots on the enemies bodies rather than their heads you will find yourself out of bullets, and this means you have to scramble around looking for the weapons that have been dropped by the people you’ve killed. And if there are still enemies taking shots at you it can get pretty hair-raising when you’ve got to take the risk of heading into their line of fire, just so you can make a grab for whatever is laying around.

You could always try to take them out with a bit of hand-to-hand combat, but you usually get shot to death before you close the distance. That said, the combat is incredibly satisfying. Again Nathan seems like a typical bloke with no kung fu or other fancy fighting styles to rely on, but he does have a fine array of attacks such as drop kicks, jumping punches and wild swinging blows. He has a sure-killing combo of Square, Triangle, Square, but it is very rare that you use it other than as a last resort, and only then when there’s only one enemy left on screen. Nathan can also stealth attack and break enemies’ necks if you manage to sneak up on someone, but we only managed to do this three times in the whole game. That’s not a bad thing though, because when the game moves as quickly as this you don’t want to be waiting around Sam Fisher-style for enemies to turn their backs on you.

When you’re not dealing with hordes of enemies there are the brilliant platforming sections. Once again Uncharted beats down Assassin’s Creed because you actually have to press buttons and look for ledges, rather than just holding buttons down and pushing forward on the left stick.

There’s not as much lining up to make jumps as there is in Tomb Raider and you can make Nathan leap around like an excited monkey, which, in turn, makes you quite the excited monkey. If you do slip up and Nathan falls to his death he’s reset quickly and to the exact place you were before your fall. This does have the downside of there not being enough tension when you’re teetering on a small platform or gripping on to a small ledge high above the ground, but occasionally you do get that ‘don’t fall, don’t fall, don’t fall!’ feeling that makes your heart race a little. There’s barely any time you have to repeat sections and, again, this helps keep up the pace of the game. It also means you end up playing it for much longer than you want to. We tried to stop playing it one night at about 12.30am and ended up forcing ourselves to stop at 2.30am, the ‘just one more go’ element is in abundance in Uncharted.

Also, unlike Tomb Raider, there aren’t that many puzzles. And when there are you’re not left in the dark for very long as icons appear to get you to look at some part of the scenery or to have a look in Francis Drake’s notebook for a clue. There is, however, one section quite late in the game that is a bit of a head scratcher and leaves you wondering and wandering around until you finally figure it out.

Throughout the game, aside from the shooting and jumping about, there are incredible cut-scenes driving the intriguing story. There are lots of twists and turns and it’s all acted so brilliantly that the scenes are a welcome change to all the action. The dialogue is witty and the characters show real emotions thanks to the motion capturing, not only of the bodies but the facial expressions, too.

But one of the best things about Uncharted is that it actually has an ending. No sneaky setups for a sequel, no pretentious philosophical whimsy, but an actual conclusion that fills you with a warm glow that makes you realise that most games disappear up their own arse. You can return your copy of Assassin’s Creed, you should still get some trade-in value on it, and buy Uncharted. We can guarantee that you won’t be let down.

Tim Empey