Uncharted 4: A Thief's End has finally gone gold, will be released on 10 May

After several delays and two years of waiting, the highly anticipated Uncharted 4: A Thief's End has finally gone gold, according to a tweet via the official Twitter account of developer Naughty Dog. A Thief's End will bring the adventure of fortune hunter Nathan Drake to a close for the series, which began in 2007 with Drake's Fortune.

"Going gold" is a term used in game development, which means the main development has been wrapped up and the game is sent for disc manufacturing and distribution. It is also a good indicator that the game is on schedule and is unlikely to have any more delays.

The game was originally announced at the E3 2014 for a 2015 release. In March 2015, Naughty Dog revealed the game needed more development time and postponed the release for Spring 2016. In August 2015, Uncharted slated the game's release for 18 March. However, the release date was moved to 26 April in December 2015 and was delayed again to 10 May earlier in March.

Naughty Dog made the welcome announcement on Twitter on 18 March. "Uncharted" director Neil Druckmann also celebrated the milestone on Twitter by tweeting a photo of a copy of the game.

"Uncharted 4" co-director Bruce Straley also amped up the anticipation by calling the upcoming action adventure "the most visually stunning game ever created".

One of the most-anticipated titles coming to consoles this year, Naughty Dog assured fans the delay would be "worth it". On 16 March, Naughty Dog released a behind-the-scenes mini documentary titled "Growing Up With Drake", where developers and voice actors shared their thoughts on the franchise, growing up alongside Nathan Drake and other Uncharted characters as well as the game's themes and storylines.

"All we can really do as a team is make something that's really personal to us [and] use everything that we've learned in the past to... elevate the medium one step further, to challenge ourselves to go into areas that we're uncomfortable with, and we do that with every game," Druckmann said in the video. "And hopefully we come out on the other side with something great."

"Uncharted 4: A Thief's End" will be available for purchase starting 10 May for PS4.