Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End will hit store shelves on May 10. And while we’ve talked a lot about the single-player campaign, many multiplayer details have remained under wraps. That ends today, as we fill you in on what to expect as well as the philosophy behind some of the new directions we took with multiplayer.

Right off the bat, we want to highlight that all future maps and modes will be included with Uncharted 4 at no additional cost, and all vanity and gameplay in-game store items will be unlockable through gameplay!

This means that the Uncharted 4 Multiplayer community won’t be fragmented by different types of DLC, and that those who are loyal in participating in the community will be rewarded. Our DLC release approach will represent an entirely new direction for Naughty Dog, and we are confident it will have a hugely positive impact and keep the Uncharted 4 Multiplayer community thriving.

It was a long process to determine how all this should work. We went back and forth with how we wanted players to experience this, and we created a few core philosophies.

Fairness First: We strongly believe that players must be on an even playing field. To do this, we made Relics, a currency that can only be earned through gameplay and will be able to unlock all DLC, present and future. We will be putting future gameplay items ranging from Mysticals to Boosters into DLC Gameplay Chests. Each Chest will contain new gameplay items.

An Evolving Experience: We intend to keep the Uncharted 4 Multiplayer experience as fresh as possible for as long as possible. Over time, Naughty Dog will release a variety of new maps, modes and gameplay items at no additional cost (including Co-op), that will introduce new rules and play styles.

DLC Accessible to Everyone: It was our goal from the start to give players the ability to earn DLC items through gameplay. No DLC item is available exclusively using Uncharted Points.

Unified Community: The idea of delivering our DLC this way was greatly influenced by the goal of having a unified community. Maps and modes will be available to everyone on the same day. This will ensure that all players are kept together and experience new content at the same time.

We also feel that a unified community happens through engagement. Beyond our engagement with players through social media and our forums, we’ll soon introduce Cinema so that players can review matches and use a tool that will allow them to create custom Uncharted multiplayer footage. This has been a popular tool in previous Uncharted multiplayer games, and we are excited to make it available in the near future.

How It All Works

We considered a number of systems for our multiplayer DLC economy and have refined them to keep things as simple as possible. The core component revolves around acquiring Relics.

You acquire Relics by either completing daily Challenges or winning matches, and you can spend them on DLC Chests. You will be able to pick between a DLC Vanity Chest or a DLC Gameplay Chest; when you open it, you’ll earn new items. Neither chest type will ever give you a duplicate item.

Triple Pack

For those of you who purchased the Triple Pack (also included in the Digital Deluxe Edition), you’ll gain future access to:

• The first-ever single-player story add-on for the Uncharted series
• Two multiplayer packs to enhance your multiplayer experience:

MP Pack #1
– Long Gun
– Booster
– Skin
– Hat
– Taunt

MP Pack #2
– Pistol
– Booster
– Mystical
– Hat
– Taunt

Roadmap

You will see in our roadmap graphic below that we have full intention of supporting Uncharted 4 Multiplayer for some time, and want to be clear with those intentions. We are going to release quite a bit of content this year, including gameplay items, modes and maps.

More about Uncharted 4's MP at http://blog.us.playstation.com/2016/05/02/uncharted-4-multiplayer-guide-2/

so they went the halo 5 route by having free multiplayer maps , while the revenue come from the microtransactions, considering that i didn't touch the multiplayer in the previous games i don't care either way, however i can see both sides how this could be good or a bad thing (though to be honest i am pretty sure there would have been microtransactions with or without this model)

Bump. Need a catchier thread title :)

This is way better than how they handled Last of Us MP, which was ruined by pay to win premium weapons that were ridiculous good.

But these microtransaction systems are designed to entice people to fork over money, so we'll see just how quickly you can unlock the stuff with in-game currency compared to how easy it is to just buy it. Everyone having access to the same stuff doesn't erase the pay to win factor if it takes forever to unlock things.

Seems like every single MP game now is embracing that random loot stuff. But it also seems more and more are embracing that free maps stuff too, so in the end it's a good thing for gamers.

Typo on the roadmap pic, it should be winter 2016

Great news. Thank you naughty gods!

I like this new trend of the maps being free. Battlefront has done it with some big and small maps and rainbow 6 is giving away all its maps for free. Good to hear.

Sounds good to me! :D

Checked a few forums to see the reactions, which most of them are good........and I must say I am jealous. The Uncharted community is very supportive.

Unlike the toxic Halo community..........which Halo 5 kinda has been doing this approach since launch. REQs fund free DLC, and people just complain that its pay to win, when its all earnable. Even though the arena portion is unaffected, people still complain. ND says these are all free updates throughout the year........people complain that all Halo 5 updates post launch should have ALL been day 1 (sigh). Forge should have been day 1.....but everything else is pure DLC and people just complain that it should have been day 1.

Sorry for the rant. It is frustrating to be apart of a entitled fanbase and here I see another developer take the same approach and have their fanbase actually be reasonable in their reception.

Understandable man...I am not even a Halo fan or player but I have mad respect for the game. And when I saw the reactions to the Halo 5 DLC and microtransactions it was sad smh.

gaming forums are filled with entitlement and toxicity.  i hate it too but it is fucking rampant these days.

but i'm kind of pissed now.  happy about what ND is doing but...

Triple Pack

For those of you who purchased the Triple Pack (also included in the Digital Deluxe Edition), you’ll gain future access to:

• The first-ever single-player story add-on for the Uncharted series
• Two multiplayer packs to enhance your multiplayer experience:

MP Pack #1
– Long Gun
– Booster
– Skin
– Hat
– Taunt

MP Pack #2
– Pistol
– Booster
– Mystical
– Hat
– Taunt

...piss off i pre-ordered the digital deluxe version.  i want the single player experience but fuck those MP packs.  fucking worthless.  i'm going to be so mad if the single player dlc launches at $15 bucks.  here is what i thought i was buying.

• UNCHARTED 4: A Thief’s End
• UNCHARTED 4: A Thief’s End Triple Pack: Includes future access to three pieces of content: the first ever single-player story add-on for the UNCHARTED series and two multiplayer packs that will unlock new multiplayer content
• Instant unlock to two multiplayer character items

that didn't realise that meant unlocking some cosmetics stuff that i could earn in game just by playing the game.  being in-line with story DLC and above "instant unlock" it certainly makes it seem like something more substantical.  i want a refund now that 2 of the 3 bits of extra content are fucking worthless.  i'd rather just buy the single player dlc when it launches.

still hyped for U4...