It’s amazing that a game like Uncharted was squeezed down to fit the scope of a PlayStation Vita, while retaining the familiar Uncharted gameplay that you would get on a PlayStation 3. The limited power of the Vita means that you will never get anywhere close to the level of bombastic set-pieces that you’d come to expect from an Uncharted 2 or Uncharted 3, so The Golden Abyss feels would be more akin to an Uncharted 1.5.

The Uncharted formula is all here: find an artifact, chase after some warlord who took artifact, hide behind cover and shoot a bunch of dudes, exclaim “woah!” a lot, realise that the artifact is nothing compared to the power of friendship, the end. The gameplay from the PS3 game translates almost without compromise onto the Vita’s controls. Being able to use the gyro-controls to fine tune the aim of a sniper rifle is a welcome feature to have.

Unfortunately, I found the minigames that use the Vita’s touchscreen and accelerometer to be awkwardly shoehorned in. Crossing over a narrow bridge? Better stop and have the player do a tilting minigame by titling the actual console. Want to throw grenades? Use your finger to drag the grenade to where you want to throw it. Found a torn-up map in the level? Use the touch screen drag and rotate the pieces to put map back together. Want to row the boat? Drag your finger across the screen to row. I’m not against Sony wanting to use the Vita’s capabilities to the fullest, but either go all in with the touch controls (like Nintendo did with the Zelda games on the DS) or go for a similar, no-nonsense game that plays like the PS3 counterparts.

Overall, the game is fine. The Golden Abyss shows off the impressive graphical capabilities of the PlayStation Vita handheld, so it's worth checking out if you own a PlayStation Vita. However, the awkwardly implemented minigames and the weak story means that I wouldn’t say it's worth hunting down a Vita for.

A pretty fun game that's fairly impressive for a Vita game.... but the fact that it's on a handheld is clearly the cause of every issue. That and the fact that Bend Studios in charge. Nate is pretty on point the whole game but most of the supporting cast is just kinda off. I will say though, the chapters with Sully were easily the best. His and Nate's chemistry was as good as it's been and it was just nice to be with him. I found it hard to really care much for Chase, but she wasn't awful. Villains were meh and the premise of the adventure was also kinda eh. Also of the touch screen gimmicks got old fast too. And I found the enemy encounters to be tedious. Don't think I'll be platting this one...

En general, tengo como regla valorar las cosas por lo que son, y no por lo que podrían haber sido, pero en todo momento jugando este juego pensaba "Y si..."
¿Y si hubiesen sacado las partes donde tenés que tocar la pantalla táctil?
¿Y si hubiesen sacado un The Last of Us después?
¿Y si Sony hubiese apoyado más la consola?

Hablando propiamente del juego, Bend Studio adapto de forma magistral la saga Uncharted a la portatil, mi inconveniente es que de por sí no disfrute los Uncharted de PS3, y un spin-off es difícil que supere de por sí a las entregas principales, más aun sin ser desarrollado por su propio estudio.

Si te gusta la saga Uncharted, vas a encontrar más de lo misma y vas a disfrutar del juego, a pesar de los incomodos controles tactiles de algunas secciones, sobre todo los dos enfrentamientos finales.

Literally Uncharted 1 but with more gimmicks than the shittiest shovelware kids game on Wii you can imagine where you braid your pet's pubes or whatever

SMOOTH, SNAPPY GUNFIGHTS OVER INSTA-KILL DEATH PITS. GRANDIOSE SETPIECES OVER CENTURIES-OLD CANYONS AND BURNING BUILDINGS. But OOPSIE SLOOPSIE the log you're on is SLIPPY WHIPPY, tilt the Vita left WOAH tilt the Vita right WOAH tilt the Vita left WO- FUCK OFF

RACE THROUGH A CRUMBLING TOMB WITH TIGHT PLATFORMING CONTROLS. YOU'RE DODGING DEBRIS. YOU'RE SCRAMBLING PAST ENEMIES. YOUR HEART'S RACING... okay but to exit the tomb you gotta point the Vita's camera at your lamp. For real just turn your lamp on real quick and point your camera at the light please. Oh and rub the dust off this ornament by rubbing your touchscreen. OOPSIE SPLOOPSIE THE LOG'S BACK tilt left WOA-

The final boss is a quick time event

Pretty good! And while Bend Studio are clearly no Naughty Dog, the writing, performances, visuals and soundtrack are all more than competent enought to make this feel on par with Nate's first outing on the PS3. That's admittedly light praise given Drake's Fortune is easily the weakest entry in an otherwise stellar series; Similar to that title, there are no major breathtaking set pieces to marvel at here but the moment to moment gameplay is fun enough to propel you onwards. A new feature, courtesy of the Vita's touchscreen, in which you can 'paint' the ledges you wish to climb with your finger is very welcome, but quicktime events that have you swiping the screen in a certain direction or rubbing to reveal a drawing grow tiresome fast.

Belle prouesse graphique que d'avoir un Uncharted sur Vita. Toutes les fonctions de la console utilisées, bien amenées.
Scénario un peu prétexte mais on se laisse porter comme d'habitude avec le petit côté pulp à la Indiana Jones. Et ça marche toujours aussi bien.
Grosse chute de framerate constaté à un moment, et des bugs de direction où Nathan n'allait pas là où je lui demandais.

C'était cool