The film opens with Nathan Drake hanging outside a plane, tangled up in fallen cargo.
He attempts to climb back up inside, dodging henchmen and more falling cargo.
Just as he makes it back to the top, he gets hit by a car falling out of the ramp.
As Nate falls, a hand reaches out to grab him. Cut to a flashback, 15 years earlier in Boston.
Nate and his older brother Sam are breaking into a museum to steal the original map of Ferdinand
Magellan’s expedition, as the legend states that Magellan’s whole voyage was to find hidden gold.
The brothers are caught by security, and because this is Sam’s third strike, the orphanage that
houses both boys is kicking Sam out and forcing him to stay elsewhere, away from Nate. Nate goes
to their room and catches Sam sneaking out to be on his own, but he promises his little brother
that he will return for him. Sam leaves him with a ring belonging to their ancestor Francis Drake,
with the inscription “Sic Parvis Magna” (“Greatness from small beginnings”).
Present Day – Nate works as a bartender. He serves a snooty rich girl and uses an
opportunity to swipe her bracelet when she’s not noticing. Nate is observed by a fortune hunter
named Victor “Sully” Sullivan. He offers Nate a chance to work together, but Nate declines.
He soon finds that Sully swiped the bracelet from him and left him his business card.
Nate goes to Sully’s office to get the bracelet back but then comes across other artifacts in
Sully’s possession, including the same map that he and Sam were trying to take.
Sully reveals he used to work with Sam and knew that Nate was his brother.
They discuss Magellan’s voyage and how it was bankrolled by the Moncada family, responsible
for various atrocities throughout history. Sam had helped Sully steal the diary of Juan
Sebastian Elcano, with clues that can lead them to Magellan’s fortune. Nate is initially unwilling to
help Sully finish any work that he and Sam started, but Nate looks over postcards that
Sam had been sending him throughout the years, and he soon changes his mind and calls Sully.
Sully informs Nate that they must acquire a golden cross that is one of two keys needed to finding
Magellan’s gold. He has the first one, and the second one is being held for auction at a museum.
Sully knows that Santiago Moncada will try and buy the cross since he feels it is his birthright.
The duo make preparations for their heist,
with Nate doing some background checking on Sully to know who he’s working with.
The two go to the auction, where Sully is unsettled when he sees a woman named Jo
Braddock there. He knows her as a mercenary and has had run-ins with her in the past.
Braddock approaches Sully, indicating she knows he’s there for the cross as well.
Nate is set to go kill the power as the auction commences,
but he is caught by Moncada’s big burly Scottish henchman.
Sully has to buy time by attempting to outbid Moncada,
despite knowing he doesn’t have the money for it. After evading the Scotsman and another thug,
Nate eventually causes a diversion by dangling from the chandelier and creating a commotion.
Sully grabs the cross and makes his exit, but is nearly intercepted by
Braddock until other guards show up, and she deals with them violently.
Nate escapes the other security guards and gets into Sully’s car to ride off together.
Nate and Sully take the cross and travel to Barcelona to meet with Sully’s associate, Chloe
Frazer, who is in possession of the second cross. She doesn’t trust Nate being there with Sully,
but she proves her own untrustworthiness moments later by swiping the cross
out of Nate’s bag. Nate and Sully chase after Chloe, but although she nearly gets away,
Nate reminds her that she doesn’t actually know where to find the treasure without their help.
Based on clues that Nate had studied in the diary, he figures that they have to start by going to a
church, Santa Maria del Pi. While they stay in a hotel room overnight, Chloe brings up something
that Sully isn’t telling Nate about Sam. At the Moncada Foundation Headquarters,
Moncada is upset to learn that his father Armando is donating the family fortune. He
tells Santiago that he is not worthy of inheriting it. After having one last chat with his father,
Moncada has Braddock kill Armando before taking the money to set off on his own expedition.
Nate, Sully, and Chloe go to the church and find the secret passageway underground.
Using the crosses, they try to open an entrance,
but they accidentally set off a booby trap thanks to Sully misreading the instruction in the diary.
Nate and Chloe go down the entrance with one key while leaving the other with Sully.
Down there, Chloe says she mistrusts people because her own father took off with money
from a discovery she made and abandoned his family. They end up in a nightclub with the
next passageway hidden behind the bar. The Scotsman and another goon of Braddock’s find them,
while Braddock herself is tailing Sully. Nate and Chloe manage to
create a diversion and fight off the Scotsman before making their way through the entrance.
Nate and Chloe come across a trap door, using their cross to try and unlock it. The room then
begins to fill up with water, with Sully needing to use the other cross to help get them out.
He is ambushed by Braddock just as he finds the other keyhole is in the
wall of a restaurant behind glass. Sully fights Braddock and throws
her against the glass to break it open and help free Nate and Chloe before they drown.
Once they are clear, the two find another room where both crosses are needed to unlock the door.
Sully throws his cross down, and Nate and Chloe find giant urns where they think the
gold is hidden. Instead, they are all filled with salt, and they each break.
Nate finds a map hidden among the salt, indicating that the treasure is in the Philippines.
Unfortunately, Chloe takes this opportunity to deceive Nate and take the map for herself.
She tells Nate that Sully is keeping the truth about Sam from him before
she pistol-whips him and knocks him out. Sully finds Nate, but when he wakes up,
he asks Sully what happened to Sam. Sully admits that he and Sam were ambushed by Braddock,
who shot Sam, and Sully had no choice but to run and leave him behind,
leading them to believe that Braddock killed Sam. Nate angrily walks away from Sully.
Braddock meets with Moncada, who reveals that he had hired Chloe as part of his team,
and she brings him the map. He makes preparations to head to the Philippines with his crew.
Nate and Sully reconcile and plan to stowaway on the plane by hiding in the trunk of Moncada’s car.
In the plane, Moncada gathers his crew and talks about how he feels that Magellan’s
crew betrayed his family, and that the gold they were supposed to find belonged to the Moncadas.
Braddock then betrays Moncada and slits his throat in front of the crew,
then takes charge of them. Nate and Sully sneak out, but Nate’s pride gets the best
of him and he makes his presence known to confront Braddock about shooting Sam.
He lets the cargo chutes open, leading Sully to fly out of the plane with his own chute, while
the henchmen are thrown from the plane. Chloe gets in the car with the map that knocks Nate
out, and the two manage to grab onto a cargo load with a parachute and land in the ocean.
They float until they reach an island resort. Nate and Chloe get a room and try to look over
the map, but they find that it doesn’t pinpoint the treasure’s exact location. While Chloe sleeps,
Nate uses one of Sam’s postcards and lights a flame under it to show a hidden message,
saying “The keys are your compass.” Nate uses the crosses and finds the exact spot on the map.
He writes down fake coordinates, knowing Chloe will see them and run off them them.
She does, and Nate pulls out the right coordinates.
Nate uses a speedboat to head to the location, just as Braddock and her goons arrive as well.
Sully finds Nate, who comes across the cavern with two intact ships. The gold also happens
to be inside the ships. Just as Nate and Sully are helping themselves to the treasure, Braddock
has the ships airlifted out of the caverns, since the ships themselves are worth billions.
Sully climbs up to one of the choppers and knocks out Braddock’s goons.
She notices him in the other chopper, and her men begin to attack.
Nate and Sully fight the men on the ship, knocking them into the ocean.
The Scotsman ends up crashing his chopper and one of the ships on the side of a giant rock.
Braddock attempts to go after Nate and kill him herself.
As Nate tries to climb to the chopper, Sully has to make a choice over saving him
or the gold. Sully throws the bag of gold at Braddock, sending her falling into the ocean.
He pulls Nate up, and the second ship drops right on top of Braddock, crushing her.
Nate and Sully start flying away, with Nate revealing he saved some gold.
They look down and tauntingly wave at Chloe on her speedboat, knowing she has been tricked. The pair
then fly off together on their next adventure. Before the credits roll: We cut to a prison
where we see that Sam is still alive and is writing another postcard to Nate.
Midway through the credits: Nate is meeting with a man named Gage over acquiring an
item for a man named Roman. Sully is also sporting a mustache, which Nate makes fun of.
Just as the guys think they are making their escape, they are ambushed by gunmen.