Huge piratey factor Sea of Thieves will probably be getting customized servers as a part of a paid subscription service in “early 2026”, builders Uncommon have introduced throughout a first-ever neighborhood direct for the sport. That is removed from all the studio’s plans, with wider shakeups additionally within the pipeline.
This outlining of plans to ensure the great ship SOT is just not solely seaworthy, however can efficiently broadside the numerous different vessels competing for its gamers’ consideration comes with some miserable and un-piratey context. It follows Uncommon being one of many studios affected by Microsoft’s mass layoffs earlier this month, with Everwild being among the many variety of in-development video games cancelled as a part of the cuts.
Within the hour-ish of their neighborhood direct and accompanying Steam weblog submitUncommon acknowledged that they have some work to do to maintain of us invested within the recreation. “We all know we haven’t hit the mark our gamers have been hoping for when it comes to recreation well being and efficiency, particularly in the case of being reactive to dishonest and the sport expertise on PC,” they wrote, “We’re additionally cognisant that we may very well be extra attuned to the wishes and experiences of our participant base, and we’ll be working onerous to treatment this in future.”
Cue some modifications to how the groups engaged on SOT are structured, with Uncommon saying it is expended the crew targeted on “bettering the core playability and stability of the principle recreation”. Alongside this, the studio’s taking a distinct strategy to how they construction three-month seasons, with new stuff arriving each month so the gamers at all times have one thing recent to do.
Whereas seasons 17 and 18, each of which have been teased right here, are coming quickly, these customized servers will probably be arriving early subsequent 12 months. They will be deployed as a part of a brand new subscription’s “premium package deal”, which’ll additionally embody different advantages. You’ll tweak the seas of your custome server to fit your each whim, spawning enemies, turning off enemies, operating safer seas fleets, messing about with the devs’ cinematic digicam. The place oysters come from is your oyster.
“Though this subscription service is touchdown subsequent 12 months, we’ve taken the choice to announce it good and early in order that our Companions and artistic communities can begin planning sooner fairly than later,” Uncommon wrote, “We wish to construct this toolset in partnership with the neighborhood, and operating it as a subscription mannequin implies that we will guarantee ongoing funding into and growth of customized servers as a platform.”
So, there you go. Sea of Thieves is crusing on. Hoist the mainsail.
