Synopsis:
Seek your legacy and leave your mark on the map in UNCHARTED: Legacy of Thieves Collection. Experience Naughty Dog’s thrilling, cinematic storytelling and the iconic franchise’s largest blockbuster action set pieces. Discover lost history with the charismatic yet complex thieves, Nathan Drake and Chloe Frazer, as they travel the world with a sense of wonder, pursuing extraordinary adventures and lost lore.

Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
Reviewed on: PS5
Also available for: N/A

Cast: Nolan North, Troy Baker, Richard McGonagle, Emily Rose, Warren Kole, Laura Bailey, Claudia Black, Brandon Scott, Hemky Madera, Chase Austin, Britain Dalton, Alejandro Edda

Developer: Naughty Dog
Directors: Neil Druckmann, Kurt Margnau, Bruce Straley
Writers: Neil Druckmann, Josh Scherr, Tom Bissell, Ryan M. James, Shaun Escayg

If you’ve played either Uncharted 4: A Thieves End or Uncharted: Lost Legacy before, there’s not much reason to pick up the Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection unless you have a craving for a replay. That isn’t to say that neither of these games is brilliant. They’re fantastic action-adventure games with cinematic quality, and Uncharted 4 is one of the best PS4 games that was released for the console. However, what’s here is a very basic face-lift with content missing in the form of the online multiplayer. Considering the digital purchase of the collection comes with a movie ticket to the upcoming Uncharted film starring Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg, it all feels orchestrated.

What’s most confusing to me is the package contents. It’s the last game in the franchise and a spin-off. Uncharted 4 is available in the PS Plus Collection for PS5 owners, but there’s no inclusion of the Uncharted Trilogy released on PS4. Maybe that’s fine since this is on PlayStation and gaining access to the older games is possible, and most people probably have already played them. However, when the Uncharted: Legacy of Thieves Collection releases on PC, there’s no way to entirely explore and appreciate the journey. So much of the final game emotional journey relies on you having played the previous three, which aren’t available on PC — so it’s a little weird. 

If you haven’t played Uncharted 4 before, it again focuses on the adventures of Nathan Drake, but this time he’s thrown into an international chase to help his long lost brother, Sam, whom he has many mixed memories and emotions about. It was a beautiful game on the PS4 and remains one of the most cinematic adventures you can play on any console. Uncharted: Lost Legacy is set after Uncharted 4 but follows the story of Chloe and Nadine on a treasure hunt. It’s a shorter experience with just as much of a punch and serves as a nice epilogue for some of the characters from the franchise. 

The most notable change to the games is the graphical options available. ‘Fidelity’ targets native 4K at 30fps, it looks the prettiest, but even the locked 30fps is tough to play amongst all the 60fps games on current-gen consoles. The ‘Performance Mode’ is how I played most of the time and is my suggestion. The dip to a 1440p resolution isn’t a hugely noticeable difference, while the increase to a targeted 60fps is night and day. The third mode is an interesting one that I would have appreciated if the online portion of Uncharted 4 was still kicking around. ‘Performance Mode+’ drops the resolution down to 1080p, which is very noticeable, but it again doubles the frame rate, this time all the way up to 120fps. Of course, you do need a compatible TV to use this mode, and if you do, it’s well worth checking out. The fluidity is unmatched, but in a cinematic adventure like the Uncharted series, the loss of image quality isn’t worth it, which is why ‘Performance Mode’ is my suggested way to play these games.

Shooting on either the 60fps or 120fps modes is a significant improvement for a franchise that’s typically known to be rather sluggish. Load times take a second no matter what mode you’re playing on, and dying on crushing difficulty won’t be as painful as it was upon release. On either ‘Fidelity’ or ‘Performance Mode,’ the game looks better than ever, especially the rendering of objects off into the distance, even the finer details like the threading upon a characters clothing is intriguing enough for me to spend the time zooming into them with the photo mode. I noticed some visual bugs playing on ‘Performance Mode+’ however, often around a character’s body in motion, which I can only assume is caused by pushing this older game made at 30fps into such a higher frame rate.