A range of Uncharted 4 tips will put any treasure in your grasp and any villain far behind you. No thief can truly master their craft without a little bit of heist preparation, and even the bumbling Nathan Drake is no exception to that. From the addition of new open areas to explore, to drivable vehicles and grappling hooks, Uncharted 4 is much more sophisticated and involved than previous series entries. It’s a solid experience, and arguably the best Uncharted game to date. Now with Nathan Drake’s swansong available to all PS Plus Collection Games, there’s never been a better time to embark on the globe-trotting journey of the lifetime. Ready for an adventure? Here are a few essential tips to get you started.
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1. Expect a slow burn in the early game
After an explosive intro, Uncharted 4 rewinds time a bit to fill in a few gaps in Nathan Drake's back story. It's a pretty lengthy prologue - you'll spend about five hours or so in a handful of surprisingly quiet character-building moments, until the adventure finally 'gets going' around chapter seven or eight.
It's good to mentally prepare yourself for it now so you're not constantly asking your television set, "Ok, so when do the explosions and the breaking things happen?" But trust me, by the time you finish the game, you'll be thankful Uncharted 4 made the effort to really let you get to know these characters.
2. Exploration isn't essential, but there's still rewards
Uncharted 4 may be helmed by the creative director of The Last of Us, and it may share some of its DNA in other, more subtle ways - the reduced linearity and greater width of its environments being chief - don't expect it to be a carbon copy of Naughty Dog's post-apocalyptic adventure. You won't have to scour every room looking for broken scissors to craft improvised weaponry. It's still very much an Uncharted game, which means the focus remains firmly on exploring lush environments and shooting a lot of mercenaries in the face.
That's not to say that exploration isn't rewarded. Just like in previous games, you'll often find hidden treasure lying around in unconventional places, and these artifacts will unlock additional options and bonuses on the main menu screen. Plus, you'll also be able to discover plenty of lore notes, in addition to filling out your journal with sketches of interesting things you come across.
The important thing to remember is that you can (and should) explore environments to your heart's desire, but you should never feel pressured into thinking that you're leaving behind something important that you'll need in a combat encounter later - because there's nothing like that here.
3. It's not as open-world as you'd think, so don't worry about getting lost
So Uncharted 4 is not 'open-world', exactly, but there will be a few moments that do a really good job of giving off the illusion that it is. It's still very much a linear affair, but there’s certainly now more choice in how you get from A to B. There are often several different climbable paths that point toward a single ledge, for instance, and some later levels deliver huge open environments filled with multiple paths and loads of secrets hidden off to the side. If you’re not aware of all this at first it can feel overwhelming, but you can never truly go the ‘wrong’ way.
4. Stealth kill as many goons as possible
One consequence of having bigger, more open environments is that you have a lot more freedom in Uncharted 4's combat encounters, and the best, most reliable way to get through them is by being as stealthy as possible. The opposition numbers are massive in comparison to the previous games, and if you stick to straight cover-shooting, you'll likely meet a swift and painful end. Luckily, goons are no longer instantly alerted when you enter a combat environment, and you can often turn this to your advantage.
You can hide in tall grass to sneak through densely-guarded areas, and if you get close enough to an enemy, you can take them out without anyone noticing. You can also climb up to higher vantage points (or use your grappling hook to swing) and leap down to take guards out with a single punch, as well as climbing below them to fling them off whatever ledge they're standing on.
Pay attention to the icons above your enemies so you can stay unseen. Yellow means they're suspicious, red means they've spotted you. If you get seen and bullets start flying, feel free to go loud against the reduced numbers. But if you're really good, you can sneak off to another corner of the map and wait until the guards go back on their patrols, allowing you to continue quietly disposing of them one by one. They work on line of sight and last known location, so exploit that and disappear. You have a lot of tools at your disposal to ghost entire stages, so use them wisely.
5. Tag enemies whenever possible
The most important tool for stealthing your way through combat is by marking enemies. Hold L2 and press the L3 button while aiming at a baddo, and a little pip will appear over their head, which you can use to continuously track their movement.
Always take the time to tag enemies. You will always underestimate how many there are, and you’ll always get shot by one you didn’t know about as you push too far.
6. On that note: Don’t push too far, too fast
You’ll be tempted, because there are so many exciting things to do in front of you, but swinging in to air-punch a goon will always drop you right into the middle of a firefight if you don’t take the time to clear the others out first. There are always more goons than you think, so stay careful.
7. If you do go loud then distract enemies first
It’s also entirely possible to go loud and play evasively. If you’re smart about your angle of attack, you can use throwable explosives and the omnipresent red barrels to cause a ruckus far from your actual location, before immediately moving to another vantage point. Pay particular attention to the white circle blast-radius indicator dynamite. It’s huge, making the little red sticks of boom way more potent than the series' beeping grenades. The dust cloud is great for misdirection too, allowing you to mess with your enemies' aim, or provide a useful getaway.
8. The grappling hook is great, but still requires skill
It's seriously great. Swinging feels really good, of course, but you can use it for a lot more stuff than that. You can use it in combat situations to quickly traverse certain areas in the environment (and you can even shoot while swinging, which feels as fantastic as it sounds), you can climb vertically up and down by holding L1, and you can use it to pull certain objects from high ledges.
Though the rope has a very weighty physicality to it - don't expect any pre-canned auto-swinging, direction and momentum are all your own responsibility - and while it's magically able to latch onto certain objects with 100% accuracy, it otherwise acts very much like a rope is supposed to. Keep this in mind when you approach many of Uncharted 4's puzzles.
9. The journal isn't just for flavor and world-building, it actually helps
Not only is it filled with a ton of interesting information, great drawings, and Drake's witty notes, it's also necessary to solve many of Uncharted 4's puzzles. And there are a lot of puzzles, many of which require that you use your journal to reference newly acquired information. You'll also use the book to store any lore notes or other papers you may find, so keep that in mind if you want to go back and read some of the stuff you've picked up in your travels.
10. Turn on Photo mode to really appreciate the game
If you go into the options menu, you can turn on Photo Mode, and then activate it in game by pressing L3 and R3 simultaneously. Photo Mode allows you to swing the camera around, zoom in and out, remove characters from the scene, and more. Uncharted 4 is gorgeous and it knows it, and it wants you to go wild - take it up on its offer.
