It’s long been believed that Naughty Dog isn’t done with Uncharted. I hope that’s the case, as the franchise is utterly beloved by everyone. All the games are great, and an insider believed an Uncharted Remake was on the cards as early as 2018.
The Uncharted series is rightfully revered and launched a new, exclusive franchise for Sony PlayStation consoles. An ‘Oh Crap!’ here and a sprinkling of Sully cigars there; a lost, mythical city or two as well. Uncharted has constantly performed, and it’s a shame we haven’t had a new game in years—but an Uncharted Remake would do, kid.
Uncharted Remake Was ‘Considered’ by Naughty Dog and Sony
A while back, I covered the Uncharted 4 documentary about Amy Hennig’s original vision for the game.
This followed reports that Naughty Dog almost shut down Uncharted 4 because it ‘Sucked.’ The final game certainly did not suck, and it was yet another example of Naughty Dog’s drive and ambition to create all-time single-player, narrative-driven experiences.
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Go back to the beginning, and it started with Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. If you ask most fans, it will probably rank near the bottom of ‘best’ lists, but it’s still a phenomenal game that kick-started what came later.
So, it’s interesting to hear from Thekempy, the dataminer responsible for the Uncharted 4 documentary, talking on the Last Stand Media podcast (with Colin Moriarty) about an Uncharted Remake and how close it was:
“Well, it’s interesting, they were remaking it [Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune] at one point in 2018 or 2019. There’s a studio at Sony called the Visual Art Support Group, and they’re a support studio for the rest of the studios. I think Jason Schreier is the one who wrote this story. I’m not going to pretend like it’s mine, but before The Last of Us Remake was a thing, they [Naughty Dog] wanted to do Drake’s Fortune.
They actually made a tiny little slice of the game, and I know which bit they made, because some of it ended up in the files of The Last of Us 2, because they were using the same engine. It’s the cutscene; Nate and Elena are going to the island in Sully’s plane, and they get shot down, and they have to parachute out.
They remade that, basically with Uncharted 4’s graphics as a test, and they presented that and went, ‘We could do this.’ I don’t know if they got approved or not, but then they realised, ok, Uncharted 1 needs a bit more modernization in terms of the levels and set-pieces. So they decided, ‘No, we’ll not do that, we’ll do one that needs a little bit less modernizing,’ and that’s how they ended up with The Last of Us [the remake].
They were certainly considering doing that; I don’t know if they ever picked it back up, or if they’ve any interest in doing that, but they have at least tried once in the past, so I could see them trying to do it again.”
Naughty Dog was not only allegedly interested in remaking Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune then, but even put together a little taster of what the full game could look like!
However, as Moriarty explained at one point, the first Uncharted hasn’t aged as well as the other games, and it would probably require a lot of fine-tuning and improvements to fit into the current climate.
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The bit about Uncharted Remake files is likely accurate, as it was reported a couple of years ago that the plane section that was remade was discovered in The Last of Us Part 2’s game files.
This gives even more credence to this report, and now it poses one question: Will Naughty Dog pick up where they left off and remake the first game? Or is it already in the works? We’ll have to wait and see.
Please check out 1:08:00 onwards for Thekempy‘s thoughts on the remake and events surrounding it.
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Andy is Insider Gaming's Senior Evergreen Editor and has been in the games journalism sphere in one way or another for over 7 years. His video game taste is as…
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