Uncharted is a fantastic adventure game in its own right, blending platforming and action with strong characters and an interesting storyline. But it's also a refreshing change of pace from the dark brooding sci-fi / pseudo-sci-fi first-person shooters that's dominating the console action market the last few years.
Environments are a blast to explore -- lush, detailed and filled with realistic lighting and water effects. But levels are far from open-ended. You'll never stray far from where you're supposed to go which help keeps the game focused but also serves as a constant reminder you're playing a platformer, not truly exploring the jungle.
Uncharted also does a great job balancing action sequences with platforming and puzzles. It starts with simple ledge jumping and climbing, but gets into more abstract puzzles later in the game as you're negotating how to get through ruined, collapsing buildings and dungeons. Gunplay is decent, but aiming can be a pain with the PS3 controller and the endless stream of pirates can get a little repetitive. Fights can also take a while to complete b/c the AI is pretty decent at using cover and also takes a lot of damage to put down. Getting a burst of submachine gun fire apparently isn't enough to bring down these guys, so you'll be pumping lots of lead into these champs.
Uncharted also deserves props for how well-written the dialogue is. Granted, some might find it too cheesy or similar to stuff you see on TV sitcoms, the fact that the dialogue generally feels like a real TV show or movie automatically puts it leaps and bounds beyond the stilted tripe you typically see in video games.
Uncharted is easily recommendable to anyone with a PS3. While it's not perfect, it's a worthwhile adventure to dive into and one of the few $60 console games where you definitely get your money's worth.
