Highlights
- The Uncharted franchise, once the jewel of Naughty Dog, has struggled with lackluster and forgettable villains, overshadowed by charismatic protagonist Nathan Drake.
- The series has made progress in creating stronger antagonists, notably in Uncharted 4 with Rafe Adler and Nadine Ross, but there is still room for improvement.
- If a new Uncharted game is made, it should focus on building on the progress made in the fourth installment to create a formidable and memorable villain.
It's easy to forget just how important the Uncharted franchise was for PlayStation when it's not its most talked-about IP. The emergence of The Last of Us as a force to be reckoned with has perhaps caused some fans to overlook the fact that Uncharted was once the jewel in developer Naughty Dog's crown. While the series has been quiet of late with no new entries since 2017's Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, many are hoping for its eventual return. If a new title in the series does eventually come to fruition, Naughty Dog will need to address one of the franchise's biggest problems: its lack of compelling villains.
For all that Uncharted does right, of which there's a lot, there are a couple of areas where it's never quite hit the same heights. One of the most glaringly obvious of these is in the villain department. The natural charisma of protagonist Nathan Drake at times masked how bland and uninteresting most of the series' antagonists have been, but it is hard to deny that he's never really come up against anyone who could be considered his equal, at least in terms of his big personality and his on-screen presence. A new Uncharted game would do well to attempt to correct this.
The Next Uncharted Game Needs a Strong Villain
The series began with 2007's Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, a game that introduced the world to the rough-round-the-edges, likable treasure hunter Nathan Drake. While the game itself proved a huge hit, the main villains, Atoq Navarro, a Peruvian archaeologist, and Gabriel Roman, a mercenary, were forgettable, to say the least. Despite Navarro eventually usurping Roman and attempting to steal El Dorado's treasure for himself, most gamers will have likely forgotten both characters by the time the end credits are finished.
Naughty Dog followed up with Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, a markedly better game than its predecessor. Despite gameplay improvements, it fares no better when it comes to creating a worthy villain for Drake to battle. The sequel introduces Zoran Lazarevic, a Serbian war criminal. But besides a formidable appearance with half of his face scarred following a bombing that many believed had killed him, Lazarevic is unable to leave much of a lasting impression before the temple of Shambhala collapses on him.
Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception introduces the series' first main female antagonist in Katherine Marlowe. It was a huge step in the right direction in terms of villains, with the British tyrant attacking Drake both physically and psychologically using a variety of methods and driving him close to the edge.
Uncharted 4: A Thief's End, which is seen as one of the PS4's very best games, then improves on the series' villains with probably the strongest two antagonists introduced so far. The first is Rafe Adler, an old acquaintance of Nate and his brother Sam, who proves to be one of the series' more memorable baddies by the time he meets his end deep in the bowels of Henry Avery's ship. His dogged pursuit of Avery's lost treasure and his constant quips aimed at the brothers made him one of the series' better characters.
The same game also introduces Nadine Ross, the leader of a private military corporation named Shoreline. She is powerful and ruthless, and wastes little time showing Nate that she is far superior to him in unarmed combat. Despite managing to best Nate on a number of occasions throughout the game, Nadine eventually turns on Rafe, leaving him to die with the Drake brothers.
Her popularity clearly influenced Naughty Dog to revisit the character, and it did exactly that by making Nadine the secondary protagonist in 2017's Uncharted: The Lost Legacy. The Lost Legacy's own villain was fun to encounter due to how skilled Asav is in hand-to-hand combat but is also forgettable thereafter. Whatever comes next for Uncharted, if it can build on the progress made in the fourth installment, it should have little trouble crafting a formidable and memorable villain.
