Welp, embargo has been lifted.
I'm not going to post a review here because it's hard not to dive into spoilers, however minor they are. The game is filled with story trinkets, so there's that.
All everyone needs to know about the story is that it is quite a fleshed out one, meaning it will take time for it to build up, explode and be like... hot damn.

I'll instead just talk about gameplay, visuals and audio.

The shooting mechanics are quite a bit different from UC2 for one, remember back when UC3 came out and people didn't quite like how UC3 went for the more "realistic" shooting style, with weight and gravity in play? People liked the UC2 mechanics more for it is less arcadey than UC1, but not as slow (and at times clunky) as UC3. So with Drake's Collection, all 3 games were adjusted to using UC2's mechanics.
With UC4, ND once again has gone for the UC3 pace, but instead it's a lot more fluid, and more importantly it blends better with melee attacks (which ND desperately tried to do with UC3 but couldn't). I wouldn't say going from shooting to melee is seamless, but take what TLoU had and put a little more speed in it, that's mostly how UC4's combat mechanics are. The difference is of course, you'll have a lot more ammo and shooting is still the preferred way almost throughout the game. That said, the game will encourage you to put Nate's melee skills on test which brings me to the next thing: stealth.

UC1, 2 and 3 had horrendous stealth. Let's be frank, the stealth mechanics in the first 3 games were poorly implemented and was mostly useless except in some areas on the Crushing difficulty. In UC4, stealth has been improved. Is it at TLoU's level? I don't think so, but that's due to the nature of the layout I'd say. But stealth WORKS in UC4, you can mix and match, and certainly a pure stealth approach in some areas can be done (which was damn near impossible in any of the previous games).

So visuals, kind of a bummer that it isn't in 60fps. But I know sacrifices had to be made, so we have a 30fps game. How well does it hold up though? Pretty good. There are a few areas where there will be dips (usually very large dynamic explosions). Some particle effects can also seem a little bit low in quality in relative comparison to the game (smoke for example).
But otherwise, UC4 is the best looking PS4 game easily. It's also one of the best looking game on the market (soon), that's on a measely outdated PS4. It's amazing how the artists poured all their effort into bringing their concept art to life (something very rare in games btw), the animations for example will simply put Until Dawn to shame (which remember, was a rather pretty game with great overall character animations). The lighting is pretty damn advanced, not as good as I'd say Quantum Break, but it has an amazing balance of when and how to reveal the bad and good stuff. Cinematography is something perhaps still need a bit of work though, but otherwise this is as close to a big-budget movie you can get.

People talk about downgrade so much these days but ND held up and improved on what their reveal was. And yes, that Nate teaser a couple of years ago where he got up from the swamp? Yeah, it's as amazing as it looks back then and still is now.
Finally, audio. People who know me knows I'm a big audio guy. I'll say this; the audio mixing techniques in this game is exemplary stuff. THIS is how a game should be recorded, THIS is how a game should be mixed, THIS is how you cast voices and THIS is how you achieve an amazing soundtrack.
PLAY UC4 in a decent 5.1 setup (and I'm talking a proper 5.1 setup, not HTIB or soundbar bs) and I guaran-damn-tee you that you'll have your jaws on the floor after every action sequence. I'm not kidding, it's THAT good. UC4 is a soundcase show stopper, something I wouldn't mind playing again and again with my eyes closed just to hear everything.
If I had to nitpick, I wished the game supported a proper 7.1 mix, I wished it had DTS:X and Dolby Atmos support. I think my ears would cream everytime if that were the case.
See you guys May 11th for MP.

Welp, embargo has been lifted.
I'm not going to post a review here because it's hard not to dive into spoilers, however minor they are. The game is filled with story trinkets, so there's that.
All everyone needs to know about the story is that it is quite a fleshed out one, meaning it will take time for it to build up, explode and be like... hot damn.

I'll instead just talk about gameplay, visuals and audio.

The shooting mechanics are quite a bit different from UC2 for one, remember back when UC3 came out and people didn't quite like how UC3 went for the more "realistic" shooting style, with weight and gravity in play? People liked the UC2 mechanics more for it is less arcadey than UC1, but not as slow (and at times clunky) as UC3. So with Drake's Collection, all 3 games were adjusted to using UC2's mechanics.
With UC4, ND once again has gone for the UC3 pace, but instead it's a lot more fluid, and more importantly it blends better with melee attacks (which ND desperately tried to do with UC3 but couldn't). I wouldn't say going from shooting to melee is seamless, but take what TLoU had and put a little more speed in it, that's mostly how UC4's combat mechanics are. The difference is of course, you'll have a lot more ammo and shooting is still the preferred way almost throughout the game. That said, the game will encourage you to put Nate's melee skills on test which brings me to the next thing: stealth.

UC1, 2 and 3 had horrendous stealth. Let's be frank, the stealth mechanics in the first 3 games were poorly implemented and was mostly useless except in some areas on the Crushing difficulty. In UC4, stealth has been improved. Is it at TLoU's level? I don't think so, but that's due to the nature of the layout I'd say. But stealth WORKS in UC4, you can mix and match, and certainly a pure stealth approach in some areas can be done (which was damn near impossible in any of the previous games).

So visuals, kind of a bummer that it isn't in 60fps. But I know sacrifices had to be made, so we have a 30fps game. How well does it hold up though? Pretty good. There are a few areas where there will be dips (usually very large dynamic explosions). Some particle effects can also seem a little bit low in quality in relative comparison to the game (smoke for example).
But otherwise, UC4 is the best looking PS4 game easily. It's also one of the best looking game on the market (soon), that's on a measely outdated PS4. It's amazing how the artists poured all their effort into bringing their concept art to life (something very rare in games btw), the animations for example will simply put Until Dawn to shame (which remember, was a rather pretty game with great overall character animations). The lighting is pretty damn advanced, not as good as I'd say Quantum Break, but it has an amazing balance of when and how to reveal the bad and good stuff. Cinematography is something perhaps still need a bit of work though, but otherwise this is as close to a big-budget movie you can get.

People talk about downgrade so much these days but ND held up and improved on what their reveal was. And yes, that Nate teaser a couple of years ago where he got up from the swamp? Yeah, it's as amazing as it looks back then and still is now.
Finally, audio. People who know me knows I'm a big audio guy. I'll say this; the audio mixing techniques in this game is exemplary stuff. THIS is how a game should be recorded, THIS is how a game should be mixed, THIS is how you cast voices and THIS is how you achieve an amazing soundtrack.
PLAY UC4 in a decent 5.1 setup (and I'm talking a proper 5.1 setup, not HTIB or soundbar bs) and I guaran-damn-tee you that you'll have your jaws on the floor after every action sequence. I'm not kidding, it's THAT good. UC4 is a soundcase show stopper, something I wouldn't mind playing again and again with my eyes closed just to hear everything.
If I had to nitpick, I wished the game supported a proper 7.1 mix, I wished it had DTS:X and Dolby Atmos support. I think my ears would cream everytime if that were the case.
See you guys May 11th for MP.