Sea of Thieves 2024 (Steam) PC

Sea of Thieves is an action-adventure game set on the high seas, where players embark on voyages across a stunningly rendered ocean. The interplay of light on the water is beautifully captured, and simply sailing around while waiting for your friends can be an enjoyable pastime.

About the Game

Players can take on the roles of either pirates or regular sailors from a first-person perspective. As a sailor, you are provided with a ship, some companions if you’re playing multiplayer or co-op, and minimal instructions such as: “Sail to an island and bring back something valuable.” Playing as a pirate, as you might imagine, is more lawless and potentially more fun! You can track other ships, attack them for their gold and loot, and take it back to port to cash in for yourself.

When playing as a sailor, the premise is straightforward: accept a mission and sail to an island using the onboard map for navigation. Once on the island, dig up treasure, fight skeletons, or solve riddles, all of which reward you upon success. Then, return to the home port with your loot and accept another mission to set off again.

Extras

For an extra special treat, look out for shipwrecks, which you can explore to retrieve crates of sugar and tea for trading. There are also sea creatures to overcome, such as krakens and megalodons, including a super-rare megalodon known as the “Shrouded Ghost,” which must be lured from the depths by throwing your previous treasure overboard.

The loot you successfully bring to port can be sold for gold, which is then used to make (mostly cosmetic) improvements to your ship’s hull and sails, and to your weapons. You can bypass intermediaries by raiding skeleton forts or attacking other ships to seize their gold directly.

Skeleton forts are signaled to every player in the game by a skull-shaped cloud hovering above the fortress, attracting the attention of everyone: regular sailors and pirates alike, leading to a chaotic free-for-all when the action starts!

The game features a fun, cartoonish style and an exaggerated physics engine that allows players to survive the most unlikely stunts – like being shot out of a cannon! Test your limits and see what tricks you can make your character perform.

Four Ways with Weapons

Players are given four weapons at the beginning of the game, and these cannot be upgraded, keeping the focus on fun rather than combat scenarios. You are also given a small amount of ammunition, after which you’ll need to find ammo boxes to reload – except for the cutlass!

The four weapons are a blunderbuss, a flintlock pistol, a sniper rifle (sneaky for pirates!), and a cutlass.

Ways to Play

Players must learn to steer the ship, navigate to the right spot, hoist and lower the sails, and fire the cannons when necessary. There are, broadly, three ways to play:

Solo Play

This method can be rather quiet as the game is designed for multiple players. The solo player must manage the sails, anchor, navigation, defense, and attack all alone. In other modes, part of the game’s charm is the random decisions made by other players, adding excitement. Without this human unpredictability, the game can feel a bit flat, although you do have complete control if that’s what you prefer. Solo play offers a smaller ship, a one- or two-sail sloop, as one person cannot operate the larger three-sail ships.

Cooperative Play

Work as a team with your friends in this mode, which requires teamwork! The player steering the ship cannot see the map, so the navigator must provide directions in time to avoid islands, rocks, and other ships full of players eager to attack you!