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What do Uncharted levels look like in real life?
As Nathan Drake’s final outing lands, we look at some of the previous levels in the series, IRL.
While much of the plot for Uncharted 4: A Thief's End is still a mystery, it’s safe bet to expect plenty of Indiana Jones style globetrotting. The series has already played host to some breathtaking levels, many of which are based on real world locations. With that in mind, we’ve taken a look through the locales in the original trilogy to see how they compare to their IRL counterparts. Enjoy.
Uncharted
Panama
Above: The central American coast has lots of convenient cover shooting locations, apparently.
It’s unlikely you’ll find a more stunning backdrop
© Robert Snow/Red Bull Content Pool
Our Uncharted story starts off the coast of Panama, where Nathan Drake and journalist Elena Fisher find the coffin and diary of Drake’s ancestor, Sir Francis Drake. Uncharted has been a poster boy for the graphical power of Sony’s home console for a while now, and whilst the original Uncharted looks a little dated these days, Naughty Dog got the beautiful coastal waters of Panama spot on – just check out this stunning photo from Red Bull Wakecation 2014 in Nitro City, Panama, if you don’t believe us.
The Amazon
Above: The Amazon jungle serves as the setting for the majority of the first game.
The lost city of gold: Unlikely to be up that tree
© Fabio Piva/Red Bull Content Pool
Time to ditch the treasure and go diving?
© Fabio Piva/Red Bull Content Pool
The Amazon
© Camilo Rozo/Red Bull Content Pool
Later on in the game, Victor ‘Sully’ Sullivan rescues the two from a pirate attack and an exploding boat (get used to both of those, by the way), but Drake and Sullivan then ditch Fisher and head for the Amazon – the location of the fabled El Dorado, according to Francis Drake’s diary. The pair journey through the rainforest as they search for the lost city of gold, and whilst the PS3’s creaking Cell processor doesn’t quite do justice to the real majesty of of the world’s most biodiverse rainforest, it was pretty jaw-dropping stuff back in 2007. If Drake wasn’t so obsessed with treasure, maybe he could have taken an hour out to throw himself into the Amazon River, like Colombian high diver Orlando Duque at Red Bull Amazon Diving in 2014.
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves
Istanbul Palace Museum
Above: Istanbul serves as the location for the game’s tutorial level.
Is this the key to finding Marco Polo’s lost fleet
© alex.ch via Flickr
Old and new tech collide in Istanbul
© Dean Treml/Red Bull Content Pool
Istanbul in Uncharted
© Roberto Alegria/Red Bull Content Pool
Naughty Dog stepped things up for the sequel, widely regarded as one of the PS3’s greatest games in any genre, working in many more locations. Two years after the events of Drake’s Fortune, Drake is approached by old friend Harry Flynn and ex-girlfriend Chloe Frazer with a plan to steal an old Mongolian lamp from the ‘Istanbul Palace Museum’ – the key to finding Marco Polo’s lost fleet. Drake has yet to realise that everything he touches turns to explosions, and foolishly agrees, getting himself arrested and locked up for three months when Flynn double-crosses him. Although we only get to see some of the museum’s beautiful courtyards as Flynn and Drake sneak their way around, the Istanbul Palace Museum is likely based on Istanbul’s Topkapı Museum – an old Ottoman palace that was converted into a national museum in the 1920s.
Borneo
Above: Trekking around Borneo is beautiful, though seldom this dangerous.
Borneo is a long way from civilisation
© Paul Mannix via Flickr
After Frazer and Sully bail Drake out of a Turkish prison and a re-enactment of Midnight Express, they track Flynn to Borneo where he and very, very angry Serbian war criminal Zoran Lazarevic are looking for the lost fleet. Eventually they find a tomb that leads them on to Nepal, but not before some lengthy trekking around the tropical rainforests of Borneo. Dark, dense and foggy, Uncharted 2’s take on Borneo is a thing of beauty. As you wade through the swamps on the hunt for Lazarevic and Flynn, cracks of sunlight pierce the jungle canopy, eventually opening up into glorious lush rainforests. It’s also home to the game’s first real gun battle, and it’s Borneo where gameplay and graphics combine to first give you the sense that Uncharted 2 might just be one of the best games ever made.
The Himalayas
A Tibetan village provides a brief moment of respite in the Uncharted 2 rollercoaster ride.
Drake certainly picks stunning locations
© Kin Marcin/Red Bull Content Pool
You won’t find anybody speaking English
© Denis Klero/Red Bull Content Pool
Tibet in Uncharted
© Kin Marcin/Red Bull Content Pool
A hell of a lot goes down in the Himalayas, and judging by the pictures, it doesn’t look a bad place to be all things considered. Drake and Frazer head off to Nepal initially, but it’s Tibet that is home to one of Among Thieves’ best and most iconic moments. After tangling with Flynn on a Himalayan train, Drake is rescued from a snowstorm by Tibetan villager Tenzin – a character surely inspired by Edmund Hillary’s sherpa, Tenzing Norgay. Tenzin brings Drake back to his village, and though no-one speaks a lick of English, the joy of interacting with this bustling Himalayan community – complete with a gorgeous mountain backdrop – sits beautifully in juxtaposition to the intense gunplay that makes up much of the rest of the game. As mountaineer Andrzej Bargiel found it, it’s a beautiful, spectacular place, when not being blown up by fictitious Eastern European tanks and attacked by yetis.
Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception
London
Above: The view Drake enjoys after climbing up a Southwark warehouse is impressively authentic.
St Paul’s Cathedral always stands out
© Laurie Burke via Flickr
Script-writer Amy Hennig starts the third game out in a slightly less exotic environment than the previous two titles, opting to build up suspense with a tense stand-off inside a London pub so East End it’s a wonder Nathan Drake doesn’t slip over in jellied eel liquor. Drake is there to meet a mysterious man named Talbot, who wants to buy Francis Drake’s ring off him, since apparently neither has heard of eBay, and things quickly go south from there. Though the pub is fictional, it’s quite clear from the skyline visible once you clamber on top of a nearby building that it’s located somewhere in the borough of Southwark, on the south side of the river, though the Shard skyscraper, which opened two years after the game released, is conspicuous by its absence. Southwark is perhaps most famous for the shanty town climax of Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist, but it’s not quite so cockerney as Naughty Dog would have you believe these days: instead of a shootout with mercenaries hell bent on acquiring magical jewellery, you’re much more likely to start a fight by knocking over an office worker’s flat white in the morning rush. Pretty views of the Thames, though.
Cartagena, Colombia
Above: Young Drake is daring, though even he wouldn’t risk a 27m leap into water.
The perfect location for Red Bull’s Cliff Diving
© Camilo Rozo/Red Bull Content Pool
Let’s see you do this, Drake!
© Romina Amato/Red Bull Content Pool
Cartagena in Uncharted
© Fabio Piva/Red Bull Content Pool
We then jump back two decades to a flashback scene in which a teenage Drake roams a museum in the beautiful coastal city of Cartagena de Indias, looking for his famous ancestor’s ring. It’s here that he meets Sully for the first time and is introduced to the gung-ho world of antique dealing with guns. Naughty Dog could not have picked a more pristine spot to introduce young Nathan Drake – in fact, its port also served as the location for the first stop on the Red Bull Cliff Diving tour last year. Check the pictures above to see the the city from up high in real life.
Yemen
Above: Sana’a is never named in the game, but it’s clearly the inspiration.
The ideal location for a spot of artefact hunting
© Step/Flickr
Yemen’s Old Town is a hive of activity
© *SHERWOOD*/Flickr
Yemen in Uncharted
© *SHERWOOD*/Flickr
After a Macguffin points the team in the direction of the Middle East, Drake and his entourage arrive in Yemen. Though the city in which the action takes place is not named at any point, it’s likely the ancient capital of Sana’a or based on it, if the architecture is anything to go by. A UNESCO World Heritage site, it’s the perfect place for a spot of intrigue and priceless landmark destruction in pursuit of the next Macguffin. Things take a decidedly fictional twist soon after this, with a collapsing desert and an underground city which are very much not drawn from real world locations, but at least there’s that awesome escape from the cargo plane, which we’re just going to embed because it’s fantastic:
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