I've always realized that there are two types of Sea of Thieves players: those who are serious about it, and those who just want to drink grog and drift from island to island.
There's nothing wrong with the latter (as long as you don't train strangers) and I fall somewhere between the two categories myself, I often start the game with the intention of becoming a pirate legend, but eventually I'm influenced by friends who want to relentlessly hit the sea shacks with all the instruments at their disposal.
The reason I think I fall into this same grog-soaked trap over and over again is because I never really felt a connection to developer Rare's pirate adventure. Its characters often feel like passing faces, its lore is only there for those who seek it out, and sometimes the world can feel quite overwhelming for new players. It's like I've missed the boat, so to speak, rooting myself in this community.
But Rare's recent preview event might encourage me to jump back into the Sea of Thieves waters once again, and this time really get involved.
Navigate to new territory
The Sea of Thieves preview event (which you can watch above) detailed Rare's plans to make the game world a "richer and more vibrant place." As such, the developer has announced that it will "evolve and expand" the way it updates the game in the future.
You might assume that means more regular and larger seasonal updates, but the developer is going even further, with plans to add two new storytelling features to the game.
The first of these features is Adventures which, according to Rare, are "story-based live events", which will launch once a month and last for two weeks, with a cutscene starting each new one. Adventures will act as a chapter in an overarching story that takes place in the Sea of Thieves.
The adventures are "an opportunity for players to further immerse themselves in the world and story of Sea of Thieves," Rare said in the preview. "We want players to care about locations and characters." In other words, the goal is for players to have a greater emotional attachment to the game, which I have struggled with before, so that they feel part of the story and the world.
Each season of Sea of Thieves is scheduled to feature a "special" adventure that will bring various story elements to their conclusion before the overarching narrative moves in a new direction. The interesting part here is that the Sea of Thieves community will apparently be responsible for the outcome of the story (how Rare didn't exactly say), with the world, and the ongoing story, changing as a result of these decisions.
"It's integral to the fact that players are central to the ongoing narrative in Sea of Thieves and are responsible for moving the world forward," Rare said.
Tying up Sea of Thieve's narrative is certainly news to my ears. It provides the opportunity to return to the game as a relatively new player and take advantage of these changes as they happen. However, I can't help but worry that the limited time these adventures last might be a hindrance later on. What if you missed an adventure and part of the story? Will it still be relatively easy to get back without feeling behind? I certainly hope so, and ideally it's something that Rare takes into account, with summaries perhaps included between adventures.
mysteries in the sea
The second narrative element that Rare introduces is Mysteries. Influenced by murder mysteries and thrillers, mysteries are stories that players will have to work together to solve. Rare explained that it will start releasing clues, both in-game and out-of-game, with the first Mystery game for players to solve the murder of a well-known Sea of Thieves character.
The mysteries will evolve over a longer period of time than the adventures, but will still play into the overall narrative of the game.
Getting the Sea of Thieves community to put on their stalkers and start connecting the dots on these mysteries feels like a stroke of genius. After all, the game on Reddit is already full of theories, rumors, and leaks - why not put that energy into something that benefits the game itself? It's certainly a smart community-focused feature, encouraging players to get involved both in and out of the game, that looks to add an extra dimension to this dynamic world that Rare says it wants to create in 2022.
But what about the seasons?
But where do the seasons fit into all of this? Well, according to Rare, the seasons themselves, and their content, will be explained through adventures and mysteries, and will also be turned upside down this year.
The upcoming Season 6 will introduce Sea Forts, which will offer a new mini-raid experience, where players will battle captains and ghosts to unlock the fort's treasure and claim the rewards it contains. These will apparently offer a more personal experience than the regular forts already in the game.
And, again playing around with plans to build a more developed world, it will apparently explain how these forts came to be in the overall story.
Rare describes its strategy for this year as "more ambitious than ever" and it certainly sounds that way, but there is collateral damage as a result of that ambition. Arena, the game's PvP mode, will be shutting down in the coming months (although only 2% of player time is spent in the mode), with Rare halting their development efforts on the new features it outlines. I guess you can't make an omelette without breaking some eggs.
It's unclear exactly when in 2022 these changes will start rolling out, but we do know that Shrouded Islands should be Sea of Thieve's next adventure. Rare's plans are certainly ambitious, but if they can pull them off, then Sea of Thieves could be given a new lease on life - it could be the wind in their sails for another four years.