Even the Menu Music Changed
Small detail, but a telling one: this is the only mainline Uncharted game where the classic Nate's Theme doesn't play over the main menu at all, a quiet signal of just how much changed behind the scenes for this entry.
Uncharted 4: A Thief's End Knowledge
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Three Relics, Three Naughty Dog Franchises
Hidden throughout the campaign are three collectible 'Strange Relics,' and each one is a sly nod to a different chapter of Naughty Dog's history. Find all of them and you get a trophy just for appreciating the studio's back catalogue.
A Precursor Orb Shows Up in Chapter 12
Keep an eye out during Chapter 12 and you'll spot a Precursor Orb, the glowing collectible that drives the plot of the old Jak and Daxter games. It's just sitting there for anyone who bothers to look.
A Wumpa Fruit Hidden in Chapter 21
Crash Bandicoot's favourite snack makes an appearance too. Search around in Chapter 21 and you'll find a Wumpa Fruit tucked away as a collectible, a cheeky throwback to the game that put Naughty Dog on the map in the first place.
A Firefly Dog Tag Turns Up on a Skeleton
One of the game's more macabre little jokes is a skeleton carrying a Firefly dog tag, the same faction symbol from The Last of Us. Nobody ever explains how it ended up in a remote corner of the Uncharted world, and that's kind of the fun of it.
Nate Plays the Original Crash Bandicoot
Early in Chapter 4, you can find Nate and Elena's home console set up with a fully playable, emulated version of the original PS1 Crash Bandicoot. You can actually take control of Crash yourself, and it's mapped to the D-pad rather than a thumbstick, matching how the game was originally controlled back in 1996.
Marco Polo Makes a Comeback
If you steer your boat toward the larger of the two islands in Chapter 12, you can trigger a game of Marco Polo between Nate and Elena, a playful callback to a similar moment fans loved back in Uncharted 2.
A Comic Poster That Sparked Ellie Pregnancy Theories
In Nate and Elena's daughter's bedroom hangs a poster for a fictional comic called The Last of Us: American Daughters, showing a red-haired, visibly pregnant woman holding a revolver. Fans latched onto the resemblance to Ellie and spent years speculating it was foreshadowing for The Last of Us Part II, though that turned out not to be the case.
A Nod to Ellie's Favourite Comic
Same bedroom, another hidden reference: a poster reading 'Starlight Savage 2: Coming Soon.' Starlight Savage is the fictional comic series Ellie is obsessed with in The Last of Us, quietly tying the two worlds together on a kid's bedroom wall.
Pill Bottles That Point to The Last of Us Part II
This one went unnoticed for years. A Reddit user eventually spotted that some pill bottles you can examine in Uncharted 4 are labelled as coming from Weston's Pharmacy, a location that shows up again in The Last of Us Part II, released five years later.