Here’s why I’m still playing Sea of Thieves and why you should be too

Sea Of Thieves may have been panned for being over-hyped at first release, and isn’t a fast-paced, hardcore gamer’s dream. But this is why it’s worth taking another look, writes Stephanie Bendixsen.

Yes, I’m still playing Sea Of Thieves — and here’s why you should be too.

After nearly ten years in the games industry, I’m used to the highly aggressive, often baseless opinions of gamers (not mine of course — obviously the only opinion that matters).

It’s become impossible to share love or excitement for a game without an outpouring of anger from those who don’t share the same affection for it.

— Don’t miss Screen, the brand new 32-page entertainment guide in your Sunday Herald Sun

Forget about how much fun you’re having, your fun is WRONG, apparently.

Often these opinions come from people who’ve heard negative feedback from participants in a beta; perhaps there were connection issues, a few bugs here-and-there (more on Anthem in the weeks to come).

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Stephanie Bendixsen shows you why you should give Sea of Thieves another look.

Sea Of Thieves was panned for being over-hyped.

People seem to forget that the sole purpose of a beta is to test the servers, and identify bugs. Nevertheless it’s enough to set them on a course of widespread badmouthing and vitriol towards anyone who says they had a good time and is excited for more. I find this infuriating.

Of course, the nature of the way games are being released has changed significantly from the days when we relied solely on boxed-copy games from brick-and-mortar stores.

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Games are no longer shipped ready-to-play, but rather subject to a series of updates and patches to fix issues that arise post-release.

While this is frustrating when it’s due to a rushed-out release, it’s also given way to the entirely new model of “games as a service”.

Sea Of Thieves — an online multiplayer pirate-adventure game — upon release was largely panned for being over-hyped while not providing enough content.

The base game continues to evolve with frequent content updates and DLC.

Stephanie Bendixsen and her friends have played the game for months.

True enough, the swashbuckling piracy was fun but short-lived — with only a few quests to attempt and a fairly limited world to explore.

So I do in part understand why people seem so appalled to discover that I am still playing it quite religiously more than a year later.

What they don’t understand is that Sea Of Thieves is very different game now to what it was at release.

The games as a service model works by delivering a base game that continues to evolve with frequent content updates and DLC.

Not more than a couple of months after launch, developers Rare Ltd dropped their first downloadable content update — and have continued to do so roughly every other month since.

To be clear, you don’t have to pay for these updates: I invested in the game outright at launch and haven’t paid a cent since.

Yet my friends and I have joyously plundered fictional Caribbean Islands for months; competing in challenges, exploring new volcanic zones in search of rare treasure, hunting megalodon sharks, fighting other pirate-players for loot at skeleton forts, using magical cannonballs in fights against surprise encounters with ghost ships — and so on.

Don’t let the Twitter trolls throw you off, constant updates means Sea Of Thieves is worth another look.

Your team is crew of its own ship.

I’ve never been one to fuss over patch notes in the past, but I devour the every detail of upcoming updates for this game.

It may not be a fast-paced, hardcore gamer’s dream, sure. Truthfully I’ve never been quick enough at shooters to perform well in them and that’s left me pretty limited it when it comes to online games that I could really enjoy.

Sea Of Thieves is a slower-paced multiplayer experience, but it’s also an environment I absolutely adore spending time in, kicking off my shoes, pouring myself a drink, and setting sail out over the aqua blue water while my gaming mates and I chat about our day.

It’s the most wonderful sensation of familiarity and release. But it’s hard to summarise all that in a 140-character rebuttal after some Twitter douchebag tells me how thick I must be to still be playing such a “dead and useless game”.

As someone who is very much involved in the Sea Of Thieves community — I can confirm the following: it is extremely active, we’re all in here having a great time, and it’s not my fault that you haven’t touched it since its first week of release and can’t handle others enjoying themselves where you aren’t.

There’s islands to plunder.

And oceans to traverse.

Along with booty to collect.

I’m trying not to sound petulant, sitting here passionately defending something I love (a gamer’s one true right), which I realise is a bit of a fruitless endeavour. But this newer format of game release isn’t going anywhere.

Games will continue to be released with a view to continuously add content over time, and it pains me to see people crapping all over a title before its had a chance to reach its full potential.

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There are exceptions, of course: No Man’s Sky — two years between updates was a bit of a stretch.

Not every game is suited to this model. If a single-player action-adventure game like The Last of Us 2 was to release only 80 per cent complete with a view to add new content “soon”, there would be understandable outrage.

But consider this: If you’re confused by a game’s popularity despite a shaky start, why not check back in to see what all the fuss is about, instead of piling on to the next bandwagon of hate without the experience to back it up?

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— Don’t miss Screen, the brand new 32-page entertainment guide in your Sunday Herald Sun