Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception (2011)

What Nathan Drake does to Sony is truly like Mario does to Nintendo or Sonic to Sega. He is certainly Playstation's long-lost lover and once found, inseparable. He was born from the same womb that gave birth to the once-considered-Playstation mascot, Crash Bandicoot.

Uncharted series prove to enjoyable in all its iterations, and every new release gets better charm upon the previous. As you might expect, Uncharted 3 is the best among the whole series. The graphics and gameplay are naturally the most gorgeous, the actions are engaged and virtually non-stop, but the biggest improvement in UC3 is its amazingly diverse settings. If you got bored of running in the woods just like in UC1 and some in UC2, worry no more, UC3 got you explore a lot of gorgeous landscapes: from the bleak underground, remote castle ruins, market, airport, seaport, desert, and even a ghost town. Not to mention, the game also has the longest time to complete, in fact it was so long that I remember when I finally finished the game, I recalled playing the early chapters like it was years ago.

With all those cramped in a single disc, you might not notice that UC3 has the largest data size ever released as a video game to date - over 50 GB! Finally, a game that justifies the sheer capacity of blu ray disc! I can't imagine if it is not a PS3 exclusive, how many discs it will come on PC or Xbox 360.

One glaring omission out of the box somehow is the movie viewer feature! In past UC games, I really love viewing the cutscenes I've passed over and over again through movie viewer feature to admire the scenes and as an enjoyment bonus (in fact, I do think that the movie feature is among the feature you love in UC series, right?) Now in UC3, with all those major overhauled in graphics and others, can't you imagine the passion to watch it over and over again? And this time, Naughty Dog has removed that lovely feature, do you believe that? I wonder if they were too busy finishing the lengthy gameplay that they forgot to include this. Fortunately, Naughty Dog realized this and through patch 1.03, they returned this little nice feature. If you own the earlier version (just like me having the 1.00 version), you will only need to update the game. No big deal indeed, unless you have no proper internet connection. Unlucky me, I am among the second one. Oh well...but OK, this should not ruin the whole UC3 experience..But if you purchased the game recently (or just plan to purchase) chances are good that you will get the updated version, which means the feature is already available out of the box.

Move over Indiana Jones. Nathan Drake has come to claim his crown. His adventure is not over, there's still plenty to do out there, UC series could continue as much as tenth of iterations. Let's just imagine what mad quest he will engage next..Or, get this...how about he meets Lara Croft and they venture together (and eventually, maybe get married?)? They are surely match made in heaven. Sounds really unlikely, but hey...it's cool!