UC4 feels like a parent and Nathan Drake is their loud, abrasive and annoying toddler. UC4 will often put Nathan on the proverbial "naughty step" to think about his actions but just as quickly it'll be shoving ice cream down his throat and telling him what a good boy he is. Whilst it's admirable that UC4 even approaches some level of introspection its non-committal attitude manages to damage the game by leaving a game that is confused in its messaging and outreaching its grasp. The confusion could be attributed by the change in key staff during its development
The Last of Us influence is achingly apparent in UC4 and that is almost certainly down to both the success of TLoU but also Neil Druckmann taking over from Amy Hennig. Druckmann was the creative director of TLoU and UC4 never feels wholly consistent with its tone. Not only within its own game but also with the rest of the series.
Uncharted, up until 4, had been loosely connected swash buckling adventures that mainly stood on their own. Characters would sometimes re-appear from game to game but this was about all you got. UC4 tries to retcon in a brother, called Sam, for Drake. Up until now their have been 4 uncharted games and not once was a brother mentioned.
The game tries to get away with it with some incredibly limp cop out about drake not wanting to talk about it, but I just find it incredibly difficult to believe that it never would have come up, between Drake, elena and Sulley. This is combined with the fact that it also completely messes up the timeline of events for the Uncharted games with UC4 implying that Nathan and Sam were together through everything yet UC3 had a younger Nathan meet Sulley and their was no mention of a brother.
That timeline gripe is a minor thing, but it's an illustration of the complete lack of overall focus that UC4 seems to exhibit. There's no cohesive arc for Nathan during the series or the game. Early on in the game, Nathans wife, Elena, tells Nathan to go on an adventure since she can tell he is somewhat bored with a domesticated life. Nathan insists he isn't yet within a short space of time Nathan lies to Elena and jets off to help his newly created brother. If their were any sort of consequences for this it would have been an interesting moment for Nathan. Realising he can't get away with everything he wants, that people have feelings and they will get hurt be his selfish actions, however Nathan and Elena just have a bit of a slide in some mud and they are back to being normal.
This pattern repeats itself time and time again. The game pretends to have some deeper message about how Nathan is more fucked up than Freddy Kreuger, that he does struggle with the idea of having murdering a small town in Englands worth of people and destroying countless millenia old artifacts as well as peoples homes but it doesn't. It lies, it is still a game about celebrating Nate as some average joe hero.
Nathan never gets his comeuppance in the story he always ends up on top and this grates against the admittedly brave attempts at character development. The game even creates the perfect chance for some self-reflection with the awkwardly shoe-horned in brother character. Sam is older and often a good indicator of where Nate could end up. Yet despite his obsessive behaviour, Sam is still in the end rewarded in the story. He basically gets off scott-free ready to adventure on with Sulley. The games story would have been better served by killing off Sam. By showing Nate than intense obsession has its consequences.
Instead, the only character who does get punished in the story is the Villain, Rafe. That may seem like an obvious point, but the character of Rafe is just a mirror for Nate and Sam. All he is is an obsessed glory seeker. Yet the game likes to pretend that Rafe is somehow worse and that his methods are much more deplorable that should die but Nathan and Sam deserve to live, happy. I would bring up Nadine but her character is such a non-character that she might as well not have even been in it. She's a completely wasted opportunity offering absolutely nothing.
The ending for UC4 is the worst offender for this limp attempt at introspection. Nates life ends up rosy with a kid and a beautiful wife (not weird to fancy pixels, don't judge me.) His days of treasure hunting behind him. Their is absolutely no hint that he has been affected by his adventures and instead is more than willing to tell his daughter all about the time he murdered thousands of people for a single gold coin that no good Tesco will accept.
For the game to have any weight, any meaning Nate needed to either end up dead or barring that a completely broken man. The ending of UC4 needed to end in a way that it could have perfectly led into Max Payne 3. I concede that this might have been too dark and nihilistic for a game like Uncharted 4 but also, that means that UC4 tries to have its cake and eat it. It flip-flops between Nathan being a borked human and him being something of a hero and that confusion leads to a completely wasted and disappointing adventure.
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