Sea of Thieves Review

"A True Pirate's Life"

Multiplayer

Sea of Thieves is the ultimate pirate fantasy and adventure, it's about open oceans and looting treasure. There's something truly special about it and while the purpose is open, I love it. It's not directly telling you to do anything or even holding your hand, you go out there and be a pirate. It simulates that life style perfectly by offering a freely open ocean to sail across with friends and do whatever you'd like.

The lack of structure may not be for everyone, but in this type of game it's perfect. You're able to take quests from a number of agencies and then head out to complete the goals. You can do this in a couple squad options and it's a seamless never ending adventure of finding new pirate friends along the way.

It's been such a refreshing and nice mix as players actually seem to work together with in-game mics, it feels nostalgic to the past days of Xbox Live. That's really the game, you go out and loot or battle, just enjoy things. It's less about what you're supposed to do and more about just having fun.

I never feel like I'm accomplishing anything, but I'm having a blast with friends or random people. It's funny, entertaining and straight up epic at times. Ship battles are insane as wood splinters, people frolic and I run to the tip of my ship to board their sinking vessel, it's glorious. It does feel rewarding to finally get a chest back after a long voyage, but I don't mind if we lose it on the way in some fun mix-up.

Gameplay

There's a lot of depth in the world and the base mechanics. Sailing takes coordination and skill as your whole team needs to pitch in. Raise the anchor, cast the sails and do smaller tweaks to properly engage with the wind. Shoot yourself out of a cannon to land on an island or swim while being chased by sharks.

Battle skeletons, get bitten by venomous snakes and loot whatever you can as you dig for treasure. You get a simple crude map and need to figure it out across a large mass of area. This is where I get into a questionable aspect of the game, will this get repetitive? I do feel it can be light on content and this game won't be for everyone. If you love the core concept, then it's perfect. If you don't, it'll feel slightly empty.

There's variation in the skeletons and animals you come across, but I can't help but feel there should be more. Combat is good and random, the ship battles are so epic. I love how you can repair the ship or just play an instrument while it sinks.

Sea of Thieves is gorgeous, it carries a distinct realistic yet cartoon style that works well. The water is next level visuals being ever so dynamic and full of life underneath. It's a true technical wonder there, I did however experience a number of screen tears on Xbox One X which was disappointing. They don't wreck gameplay, but they shouldn't be present.

The Conclusion

Sea of Thieves truly is the ultimate pirate fantasy and adventure, it does however really come down to how much you like the core gameplay. I personally love it and I've had a blast sitting there for hours with friends just joking around.

Even with randoms it's been great and I haven't come across this friendly of a people in such a long time. Some lock you up, but most just want to work together to get loot. The loot let's you grab in-game items and I'm very surprised they didn't microtransactions this to the seven seas.

I find there to be a lot of depth in what you do here and I haven't gotten bored of any gameplay elements. It continues to be fun with the new friends I come across though in the long term it may have problems. At this point, I've enjoyed every minute of this as it's the pirate game I've always wanted.

The options for cross-play are great, it's definitely helped build out the community as I've run into so many on their PC and I've noticed no issues with the connections. The Sea of Thieves really is the type of game that's perfect for those that want to just be a free pirate.

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Sea of Thieves Review on Xbox One X & Windows 10
Review Code Provided by Microsoft

Rating Overall: 8.0