3. Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception (2011)
No question about it: Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception is not as good a game as Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, but the endlessly positive reviews might well try to convince you otherwise. Although one could argue that the gameplay itself is superior in this third installment (I disagree, of course), on a purely narrative level, the game doesn't qualify for 10/10 status - in fact, the story is where this game derails in a fairly terrible way. Still, compare this thing with pretty much any other action/adventure title, and you'll probably wonder how I even found anything to complain about. But there are nagging flaws inherent to Uncharted 3 - the game is impressive, brilliant and occasionally awe-inspiring: the problem is that it doesn't gel. Hear me out, Uncharted 3 fans. Whereas Uncharted 2 hit the right balance in terms of good storytelling and awesome set-pieces, the balance is thrown off entirely in this follow-up, which tends to focus more on the set-pieces part, and less on "let's tell a coherent" story. Okay, still... games, fundamentally, are about gameplay, right? Putting the story aspects aside for a minute then, and you're left with a game that doesn't seem to know whether or not it's coming or going. I'm not going to say that I didn't have a great time with Uncharted 3, but - excusing the visual aspects t - there was a noticeable lack of polish. The levels themselves felt messy and confusing; some of them even felt as though they'd been purposely made longer to pad the game out. Are those the qualities of a game that sits in Metacritic's rankings for one of the greatest Playstation 3 games ever made, lauded with perfect scores from every gaming publication from IGN to 1Up.com? I'm well aware that we live in an age where it's so very easy to nitpick at every little thing, but the critical scores associated with Uncharted 3 made me feel as though the reviewers had been paid off with some of Nathan Drake's priceless artifacts. To reiterate: Uncharted 3 is a solid 9/10 gaming experience, but the fact that it looks far better than it plays seems to have been entirely overlooked.