Uncharted: Drake's Fortune Review – The Start of a Legend

🎮 Introduction

🗺️ This review is part of the Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection – play Drake’s original trilogy in order.

This is where it all began. Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune introduced the world to Nathan Drake, a hero who felt less like a super-soldier and more like a guy who was just really good at getting into trouble. Playing it today, you can feel the DNA of every cinematic game that followed.

For a dad, this is the perfect “popcorn gaming” experience. It’s not trying to be an open-world time sink. It’s a focused, linear adventure that wants to tell you a fun story about pirates, gold, and betrayal. It’s the gaming equivalent of watching Raiders of the Lost Ark on a rainy Sunday afternoon.

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Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection (opens in a new tab)

The best way to play the original trilogy. Remastered 1080p/60fps visuals make Drake's Fortune feel smoother and look sharper than ever.

🌍 Story & Atmosphere

The premise is classic pulp: Sir Francis Drake’s coffin is found empty, leading Nate and reporter Elena Fisher on a hunt for El Dorado. The writing is sharp, witty, and surprisingly grounded. Nate isn’t a stoic hero; he stumbles, he jokes, and he gets scared.

The atmosphere is what sells it. The transition from sunny jungle ruins to dark, claustrophobic bunkers is masterful. You feel like you are in the movie. The banter between Nate and his mentor Sully is the heart of the game, establishing a father-son dynamic that carries the entire franchise. Even years later, the “twist” in the third act still hits with a creepy effectiveness.

🕹️ Gameplay & Mechanics

Let’s be honest: the gameplay has aged. It’s a cover shooter from 2007, and it feels like it. The shooting can be a bit floaty, and the enemies are sometimes “bullet sponges.” But you know what? It doesn’t matter.

The mix of climbing, shooting, and puzzle-solving creates a rhythm that keeps you engaged. The puzzles are never too hard—just enough to make you feel smart (like checking Drake’s journal). The “Quick Time Events” (QTEs) are used sparingly to add cinematic flair to fistfights or escapes. And yes, the jet ski section is still annoying, but it’s a rite of passage!

🎨 Graphics, Audio & Performance

If you play the Remastered version (in the Nathan Drake Collection), it looks surprisingly good. The water effects—Naughty Dog’s trademark—are still impressive. The jungle feels lush and dense.

The audio, however, is timeless. Greg Edmonson’s score is iconic, swelling with brass and percussion every time you pull off a daring escape. The voice acting by Nolan North (Nate), Richard McGonagle (Sully), and Emily Rose (Elena) set a new standard for the industry. They sound like real people, not cartoon characters.

👨‍👧 The Dad Perspective

• Session Length: Perfect. Chapters are short. You can play for 20 minutes, hit a checkpoint, and stop.
• Pause Factor: You can pause anytime, even in cutscenes.
• Kids: My kids loved watching the climbing sections (“Don’t fall, Dad!”). The violence is constant but bloodless. It’s very “TV-14”.
• Difficulty: Play on “Normal” or “Easy” if you just want the story. “Crushing” is frustrating and not recommended for a relaxing dad session.

🎭 Why Nathan Drake Mattered

In 2007, the action-game hero was usually a grizzled space marine or a silent, stoic killing machine. Nathan Drake changed that. He was the everyman hero — a wisecracking, slightly out-of-his-depth treasure hunter who grunted when he climbed, panicked when ledges crumbled, and cracked jokes to cover his fear. He felt like a person, and that was revolutionary. Nolan North’s performance — improvised, naturalistic, genuinely funny — became the template that the entire industry chased for the next decade.

The obvious comparison is Indiana Jones, and it’s apt: globe-trotting, ancient treasures, Nazi-ish bad guys, and a hero who takes a beating and keeps grinning. But Drake’s Fortune also redefined the relationship between player and protagonist. You weren’t becoming a power fantasy; you were tagging along with a likeable rogue who was making it up as he went. For dads who grew up on 80s adventure films, it scratches exactly that itch — the joy of a hero who’s competent but fallible, brave but mortal. That charm is why the character endured across four mainline games and a film adaptation, and it all starts here, fully formed, in the first ten minutes.

🧗 The Naughty Dog Formula Is Born

Drake’s Fortune is the blueprint. The now-famous climb-shoot-puzzle-setpiece rhythm — scale a ruin, survive a firefight, solve a journal puzzle, then escape a collapsing structure in a scripted spectacle — was codified right here. It’s a structure so successful that it didn’t just define the Uncharted series; it directly inspired the 2013 Tomb Raider reboot and a whole generation of “cinematic action-adventure” games.

What makes it work is pacing. Naughty Dog understood that variety prevents fatigue: you’re never doing one thing long enough to get bored. A tense gunfight gives way to a quiet climbing sequence, which opens into a vista that makes you stop and stare, which leads to a light puzzle that makes you feel clever. For a busy parent, that rhythm is gold — every 20-minute session delivers a complete little arc of tension and release. The studio refined this formula across the sequels (the gunplay especially got far better), but the fundamental DNA — that perfect adventure-movie cadence — was nailed on the first try. Playing it today is a lesson in why Naughty Dog became the most respected studio in the business.

🏝️ The El Dorado Mystery & That Third-Act Turn (Spoiler-Light)

For most of its runtime, Drake’s Fortune plays as grounded pulp: a race against rival treasure hunters and a private army for the legendary lost city of gold. It’s Raiders with a PlayStation controller. But Naughty Dog had a trick up its sleeve, and the third-act turn is still talked about today.

Without spoiling specifics, the hunt for El Dorado curdles into something darker and stranger — a tonal pivot toward survival-horror that genuinely unsettles first-time players. Cramped corridors replace sunlit jungles, the music turns ominous, and the enemies become a lot more frightening than mercenaries with rifles. It’s a divisive choice (some players find it a jarring gear-shift), but it’s also a bold one, and it gives the climax a real sense of dread. It established a recurring series motif: the legend is always real, and it’s always more dangerous than the gold suggested. Knowing it’s coming doesn’t ruin it — if anything, it makes the slow-burn build more enjoyable on a replay.

📀 How to Play It Today: The Nathan Drake Collection

If you want to revisit (or discover) Drake’s Fortune in 2025, skip the original PS3 disc and grab Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection. This remaster bundles the first three games, bumped to a crisp 1080p at a smooth 60fps, with improved textures and lighting. It transforms Drake’s Fortune from a slightly clunky PS3 relic into something that genuinely holds up — the higher frame rate alone makes the dated combat feel noticeably better in the hands.

The Collection has also been a frequent PlayStation Plus freebie and is regularly discounted, making it an absurd bargain: three full cinematic adventures for the price of a couple of coffees. For a dad building a backlog of “play in short bursts” games, it’s one of the best-value purchases on the platform. (Note: the Collection covers the original trilogy; Uncharted 4 and The Lost Legacy come in the separate Legacy of Thieves Collection on PS5 and PC.) However you get to it, the remaster is unquestionably the definitive way to experience where the legend began.

🆚 How It Holds Up & Where to Start the Series

Let’s be honest about expectations going in. Of the four mainline games, Drake’s Fortune is the roughest — it’s the studio’s first attempt at the formula, and you can feel the seams. The combat arenas can drag, the enemies soak up bullets, and the back half leans harder on shooting than the sequels do. If you came to it straight from Uncharted 4’s polish, the gap would be jarring. So set your dial to “charming origin story” rather than “modern blockbuster,” and it clicks.

That framing also answers the most common question: where should a newcomer start? Our recommendation is simple — start here, in release order. Yes, the gameplay is dated, but the entire emotional architecture of the series (Nate and Elena’s chemistry, the Nate-Sully father-son bond, Drake’s wisecracking charm) is established in this game, and the sequels hit far harder when you’ve lived through the beginning. The good news is it’s short — 8 to 10 hours — so the “rough” entry is also the quickest to clear before the series hits its stride with the magnificent Uncharted 2. Think of it as the pilot episode of a show that gets better every season: essential viewing, even if it’s not the peak.

There’s also a real charm in playing the trilogy back-to-back and feeling Naughty Dog level up in real time. Drake’s Fortune is where you see the raw potential; the very next game is where it becomes genius. As a complete-the-saga project for a dad working through evening sessions, starting at the source makes the whole journey more rewarding — and at the Nathan Drake Collection’s bargain price, there’s no reason to skip the foundation. It earns its 10/10 not as a technical showcase, but as the irreplaceable first step of one of gaming’s great adventures.

✅ Pros & Cons

📌 FAQ — Frequently Asked Questions

Do I need to play this to understand Uncharted 2?

Strictly speaking, no, but you should. The relationship between Nate, Elena, and Sully is built here. Uncharted 2 hits harder if you know where they started.

Is it too hard for a casual gamer?

Not at all. The “Explorer” difficulty makes combat a breeze so you can just enjoy the climbing and story.

How long is it?

Short! You can finish it in about 8-10 hours. It’s a perfect weekend binge.