Rare’s pirate adventure Sea of Thieves is out now on Xbox One and PC. In the ambitious Xbox exclusive, you play as a pirate in an open-world where you go on quests and encounter other players.  Unfortunately, the networking & server issues make the latter a rare occurrence.

Sea of Thieves is a 2018 action-adventure game, it is developed by Rare and published by Microsoft Studios. It is currently available on PC and Xbox One.

Editor’s Note: An Xbox One/PC review copy of Sea of Thieves was provided by Microsoft Studios in support of this review. 

Arrgh! Gather a crew and travel the seven seas in Sea of Thieves.

After four years of development and nearly three years after it’s initial reveal Microsoft’s latest console exclusive is now available. Touted as a “social gaming experience” Sea of Thieves is a pirate themed adventure which encourages players to interact with one another in naval combat, treasure hunting and more. It’s big issue however, is the commitment to the pirate theme is lacking along with some much needed variety in content & player encounters.

Sea of Thieves is the foundation of something that could be so much more.

THE GOOD: Sea of Thieves is a bit of a tough pill to swallow. It’s cartoony art is just marvelous, from the pirate models and ship models the colors and designs are really creative. The art of the water alone could have you traveling for hours just to stare at the incredible wave effects. Playing with friends and even randoms is a blast, especially if you just make your own fun and try not to take things too seriously. Sound design is some of the best you’ll ever hear in gaming. I don’t think I’ve ever been so satisfied just listening to a ship crashing into rocks and wood breaking or waves moving and splashing around throughout the sea. There’s also a large array of cosmetic items for character customization. Naval gameplay is insanely fun and even creative with ships taking water and players having to get buckets to toss out the water to save the ship from sinking upon taking big enough damage.

Sea of Thieves wants to do the pirate theme justice, but it’s far too noticeable when it doesn’t.

THE BAD: As far as actual content goes it gets repetitive very fast. In gameplay you’re tasked with jobs by three in-game factions and these task range from treasure hunts, skeleton battles, and pig searching & that’s basically. And what’s worse is that enemy variation is slim, limited to color altercations for their gear. Player to player interaction outside of your crew is also limited, feeling almost rare often times. Getting in-game currency can be pretty grinding a lot too, which makes buying the desired cosmetics a bit of a pain.

Sea of Thieves has the right tools, they just aren’t quite working just yet.

OVERALL THOUGHTS: Even with it’s current struggles Sea of Thieves can be fun on occasion, but a it currently stands it needs more than a handful of fixes and add-ons to really get it going. The potential is there, but Rare is really going to have to commit to content releases & updates to fully realize it.