Uncharted: The Lost Legacy is a love letter for fans of the famed Playstation series. It checks off all the boxes that fans have come to expect from any game in the series and leaves you speechless with it’s impressive visuals, gripping narration, epic gameplay and charming character interactions. The game carries itself well right on into it’s closing moments.
The story this time around follows not the series lead, Nathan Drake (Nolan North) but his friend/past-love, Chloe Frazer (Claudia Black) from Uncharted 2: Among Thieves and hired mercenary, Nadine Ross (Laura Bailey) half a year after the events of Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End as they journey into India looking for the legendary broken Tusk of Ganesh, stop an impending war at the hands of a rebel military madman known as Asav (Usman Ally), and even save an old friend in the process.
Originally The Lost Legacy started as a download content expansion for Uncharted 4, but halfway along the way production was shifted to make this a standalone game due to it’s scope. The game, both in combat and platforming, is near identical to what was found in Uncharted 4 and anyone who has played that will feel right at home in this; however the pacing of the story is much tighter and way more condensed compared to previous entries. It almost reverts back to it’s series key roots, think Uncharted 1 or Golden Abyss, with a majority of the story taking place in one lush Indian setting and not crossing the globe like the later games.
Due to this condensed story, the game is actually less then 10 hours or so to get through on the first run, but by doing so it doesn’t over stay it’s welcome like other big budget games with unneeded padding and what not; instead it keeps you engaged and captivated. By the end of the story I was left cheering due to how good the finale was!
Visually the game still has that Uncharted anesthetics that you come to expect from the series and are equally impressive to what you saw a year ago in Uncharted 4. Everything is painstakingly detailed, this is including the distant background mountain ranges right down to the water running downriver beside you. It is all beautiful to look at and even more phone to snap pictures with, with the included photo mode.
The soundtrack itself is always wonderful to listen to with famed composer, Henry Jackman, returning to provide Chloe with her own kickass score to fight Asav’s men with. The audio even ramps up during the tense platforming moments and doesn’t let you go.
The only thing that brings the game down is the notable stealth segments — which to be fair isn’t the series strongest point ever since the first game. Enemy personals tend to be blind or oblivious to Chloe and Nadine for a good twenty seconds even though you’re in their line of sight, other times they’ll notice you before you have a chance to react! It’s very hit and miss in that department, which can lower the appeal of the game for some. But luckily by the end of the game, stealth is thrown out the window and you can easily run and gun towards the finish line.
As an added bonus, the complete multiplayer mode from Uncharted 4 is brought back for The Lost Legacy and is fully cross-play compatible with Uncharted 4 players who never bought this. So if your friends only have Uncharted 4 and you only have The Lost Legacy, you can still play matches together! Also in a recent update, the release of the Lost Legacy saw a new multiplayer mode added into both games, Survival — here, up to three players can team up on classic Uncharted maps and take on waves of enemies in a horde mode.
Both multiplayer modes retain the fundamental mechanics of combat from these two main games; but adds a bit of a Call Of Duty twist to things where the better you play, the more in-game money you make which in turn can upgrade your weapons/abilities mid-match to increase your odds of winning. There is also actual micro-transactions from the PSN store to speed up the process of unlocking weapons, extra skins, new clothes and other cosmetic goodies. Also if you picked up certain copies of Uncharted 4 that came bundled with a Season Pass, then the Lost Legacy should be a free download for you!
Overall, The Lost Legacy while not a massive game, gives a great taste as to where the Uncharted series can go post-Uncharted 4. If Chloe, Nadine and others are the central characters in Uncharted 5 then that’s fine by me, since it’s a refreshing change of pace after five games of playing as the same protagonist. Also the reduced price of The Lost Legacy, should be something Naughty Dog — and Sony by proxy — should think about doing more so for future smaller-scale Uncharted games like this. There’s a strange novelty to it all, like watching a six hour movie and getting your moneys worth once the credits roll.
In the end, The Lost Legacy proves you can have a great Uncharted game that’s not centered around Nathan Drake. More please!
