With four main games released between 2007 and 2017, Sony Interactive Entertainment’s action-adventure series Uncharted continues to be a supremely popular title among Playstation users. Marked by increasingly innovative gameplay and graphics with each new entry, the Uncharted series also tends to become more and more outlandish and unrealistic, leaving players often scratching their heads over some inconsistent parts of the game that do not always add up.
As such, Uncharted has not been able to avoid a host of accurate internet memes, many of which amuse while also pointing out factual contradictions and inconsistencies within the venerated gaming franchise.
A bolstered fandom ineffably means more Uncharted memes, and, while few aspects of the franchise are worthy of real ridicule, it’s still great fun to point out some obvious oddities and inconsistencies.
The Real Treasure Hunting Game
One of the most accurate criticisms of the superb action-adventure franchise is that it’s little more than an amalgamated Tomb Raider and Indiana Jones knockoff. In a perfectly articulated meme to this effect, the so-called realism and authenticity of Drake are crushed by the comparisons to Tomb Raider and Indiana Jones LEGO.
The notion that both Drake and Lara Croft are ersatz replacements for Indiana Jones couldn’t be more on point, as even a plastic LEGO version of Indy has more originality as the impetus for an entire genre of video games. Not even a lifelike copy can eclipse the plastic original.
Prepare To Die
‘Uncharted’ Is A Misnomer
Sharp-eared linguists and etymologists are sure to take umbrage with the factually inaccurate title of the mega-popular Playstation mainstay. In a spot-on description of a ridiculous oversight, one can’t help but chuckle at the simplicity of the poorly-worded title.
Indeed, Drake traverses a so-called “uncharted” island by using an extremely detailed treasure map that has literally charted out all the areas in the region. For a game called Uncharted, Drake spends nearly the entire game following his trusty treasure map with intricate directions.
Chest-High Walls
Suspicious level layouts and environmental details are a common occurrence in many modern games. Come across a stockpile of ammunition and healing items? Something has to be afoot. Encounter a large, circular room that’s completely empty? There’s probably going to be a boss fight. Find a perplexing amount of chest-high walls scattered across an area in a cover-based shooter? Prepare for a firefight.
While the combat in the Uncharted game is often exemplary, gunfights are often inadvertently telegraphed far in advance. The best part is when enemies take Drake and company by surprise despite the fact that the player had probably been gearing up for the battle for quite some time.
Always Late To The Party
One of the most telling logic memes highlights the inconsistencies in Drake’s superior exploration skills. In the franchise, Drake is presented as a one-of-a-kind explorer who uses advanced expertise, historical resources, physical prowess, and geographical contacts to find the most clandestine and exotic locations, many of which should be used in the Uncharted movie.
Yet, scores of slovenly out-of-shape villains with far less knowledge and know-how show up either immediately before or after Drake does. It’s a funny, albeit true reminder of how silly video game logic can hijack a storyline and render the entire plot.
Give Me A Boost
Many Uncharted levels begin with Drake adventuring with one or more companions, and the developers have to come up with some sort of contrivance which causes them to be separated. Often, this means that Drake boosts someone over a high ledge, and then is forced to find another way around.
Given how athletic and adept and climbing Drake and his crew are, this is completely ridiculous. He may not quite have the mountain goat-like abilities of an Assassin’s Creed protagonist, but Drake is more than capable of scaling most walls on his own.
Inconsistent Fatality Modes
Speaking of easy-to-kill bad guys in Uncharted, the brilliantly-stated meme underscores the hilarious discrepancy between the various death modes in the franchise. Drake can only seem to dispatch an enemy by a quick blow to the midriff or unloading an entire clip, with seemingly zero methods in between.
The meme calls to mind a similarly-themed one that accurately described the polarity of killing a bad guy from the supremely easy to nearly impossible, where even when Drake is ordered not to kill anyone with a firearm in the museum, he can simply toss an enemy off the roof with equal results. It’s another head-scratching bit of illogic that typifies the franchise.
Hard Entry, Easy Exit
There has already been a meme or two underscoring the glaring inconsistencies in Uncharted regarding ingress, but what about egress? Indeed, one of the most common elements of the game is the polarity between entering and exiting a lost hidden location.
Uncharted always presents extremely taxing missions in order to gain entry into a sacred secret location, yet invariably makes it just as easy to escape a completely open and exposed entryway. At this point, Drake should try to enter every interior in the game from the rear entry and save a lot of time and trouble.
Isn’t That Convenient…
Nathan Drake is certainly adept at scaling tall structures and clinging to cliff sides, but a significant amount of his platforming prowess seems to be a result of his ridiculous luck. On several occasions, he’s narrowly escaped collapsing buildings because falling debris more or less outlined a perfect path for him.
Obviously, this is a consequence of marrying a fairly serious narrative to an over-the-top video game, but it still comes across as pretty silly, especially when a huge story moment is directly followed by a completely implausible escape sequence.
That Dang Jet Ski
Anyone who’s played the original Uncharted or the Nathan Drake Collection knows all-too-well how painfully vexing the jet ski/exploding barrel portion of the game is to conquer. All anyone wants to do upon hopping onto the jet ski is push the pedal to the metal, yet the only way to succeed is to move at a sloth’s pace.
The meme perfectly illustrates how downright intimidating it is to take on the nightmarish jet ski barrel run and how it continues to haunt players to this day, 15 years after the game was released.
So Casual About The Cache Of Loot
Despite all of the blood and sweat Drake puts into finding and securing priceless hidden treasure left around the globe, it sure seems like very little effort has been taken to protect the cache of riches in the franchise. One meme speaks to the sheer absurdity of the number of treasure hunters compared to the lack of fortified security.
So much of the game relies on secrecy, hidden knowledge, finding hints and clues, and using them to locate buried treasures around the world. Yet, when Drake happens upon a cache of loot, it’s often casually exposed with scores of hunters ready to pounce. The grand irony of searching for lost treasure lying in plain sight is the essential crux of the Uncharted franchise.
