Sea Of Thieves Is Certainly Swashbuckling But Is It Enough

In traditional E3 fashion, Microsoft brought numerous game developers on stage to share and discuss their upcoming games on Xbox One. One of those developers, Rare, revealed a new set of classic Rare games coming in a new collection called Rare Repl

But perhaps it's this deliberate restriction that lends itself to some interesting interactions between players and novel use of player skills as a means at working better together. While the skill at merely turning a map around to show others sounds ridiculously basic, it’s a clever move in context. A means to build bridges between similarly-plucked team-mates and better incentivises Sea of Thieves’ core, principle lesson in working together. Granted the perk is proven moot when, upon agreeing on a particular voyage, you simply get handed the same maps in your inventory, but the physicality of such interactivity in-game is welcome regardless. When it comes to your ship, though, all hands are most certainly on deck. There are sails to align and angle; potential hazards to flag and shout out to the player steering the ship (whom, if the sails are set at full length can’t see where they’re steering, again a nice nudging toward better relationships)…and if worse comes to worse, leaks to repair should you collide. Or even worse, cries of "FRAME-RATE!" -- as I had to do when a teammate is barking compass directions but I have no means to control the stuttering performance -- when the game (on PC) decides to nose-dive from relatively stable 60FPS to, at its worst, the high-teens -- the most notable drops occurring mostly at sea, relatively afar from shore.


"One of the things we’re very aware of is the need for the balancing to be right. After running some recent tests, we found that PC players were 4.5% more efficient at killing skeletons than Xbox players, and this feels close enough that it’s something we’ll continue to monitor. However, PvP between platforms, or more importantly device input, is the big focus point for us as a Design team, and already we’ve been working closely with the Game Experience team to change the way the guns work to be better balanced for cross play. We’ve put in a bunch of telemetry around this, and with the change to guns it’s made them feel tonally so much more fitting, as previously they felt more like laser weapons than ancient plundered-and-pillaged gunpowder-driven blunderbuss

How far will the trading concept go, will the cosmetic and customization sides be pushed, will the jolly and co-operative nature of fulfilling objectives flourish when it comes to buddying up with fellow players? That is, when the match-making is (and hopefully will be) better fortified. Without question, there’s a pull in Sea of Thieves that will win even the most jaded of lone wolves over, but is life at sea (and just the sea) enough of a justification? I commend Sea of Thieves for its attractive proposal, but with such a lacking world and over-reliance on random encounters, let’s just say Rare haven’t quite convinced me wholeheartedly on this concept just yet.

Of course, the abundance of open water does inevitably lend itself to islands to stop by and pillage -- hearkening, of course, to the more casual affairs of Wind Waker and the game does indeed share many similarities — obvious or otherwise, good and bad. But if anything, Sea of Thieves reminds me more so of Jalopy — a rather unexciting-yet-ironically-stimulating simulation of driving one’s car down a highway. And just like that game, there’s an uncanny loft of satisfaction to be had in the mundane and the repetitive. Particularly when you’re lucky enough to land yourself with a crew equally as focused as yourself...and not just there to troll or ruin the fun for everyone's sake, which sadly me and a friend got paired up with on our venturing for treasure. Disappointing as it is for some to play mutiny (albeit unintentionally) and ride your ship away from the island you’re stuck on, perhaps that’s just part of the general risk. After all, this is a game about pirates; just like the Souls games, the anarchy and unruliness of the real world bleed fittingly into the context of the premise.


A recent datamine of the game's files uncovered lots more Sea of Thieves content, including new enemies and animals such as parrots, pigs, and seagulls. The leak also pointed to lots of character and ship customization , from tattoos and eyepatches to a variety of ship hulls. With the game's microtransactions still a few months away, Rare is still working on the finer details but these datamined options do sound like the sort of cosmetic items that could be unlocked via microtransacti

While the Sea of Thieves gameplay shown yet is not necessarily what the entirety of the game will deliver, Rare didn't want to just leave fans with an idea of what the game will be. As such, Rare put together a cinematic trailer to go along with the gameplay. This cinematic trailer captures what Rare intends Sea of Thieves to grow into between now and its launch, whenever that may be. Rare didn't give any promises on that front, merely stating that the team is working very hard and Sea of Thieves Captaincy Guide|https://seaofthievespedia.com/ of Thieves is growing closer to its vision every