This probably isn't a very unique question, but is the game any good?
I heard bad things about this game on release but I'm guessing it's one of those titles where they just kept improving things.
If you break Sea of Thieves down to its components most of them are passable at best. It's mechanically shallow and on the whole a bit clunky. The combat mechanics were and are the lowest point which is a major shame because fighting skeletons is one of the most common activities in the game, and because while ship combat is quite strong, it's hard to finish a PvP battle without killing your enemies face to face. With both melee and gun combat it feels like Rare developed things without serious reference to contemporary games that do those aspects so well. In an era where a lot of genres of game consistently do combat well, Sea of Thieves is a painful outlier. It's not just the shooting and slashing, the enemy variety and AI is extremely lacklustre.
The sailing mechanics are much stronger. There's a lot of stuff here that you just don't find in other games. Maneuvering the ship is awkward but satisfying. Navigating through map and compass and, frankly, a lot of yelling over mics, is great fun. Manipulating sails to catch the wind to maximise speed can be the difference between life and death. In combat there's much more with repairing, bailing, loading and firing the cannons, as well as newer elements like the harpoon that have been added since launch. My only real criticism of the on-ship gameplay is that there isn't quite enough to do, at least outside of combat. Once you get the core mechanics down the reality of Sea of Thieves is a lot of downtime. Some individual mechanics are a bit dull too, there's a lot of "hold button down for many seconds".
Aside from the sailing I always appreciated how non-gamey Sea of Thieves is. There's something about searching for buried treasure using a map, a compass, a lantern and a shovel, trying to figure it out based on obsevation and communication that is very fresh. It's simple... but Sea of Thieves finds the joy in simple, organic mechanics. The major downside on this front is that objects don't scale much in terms of challenge or complexity. They'll throw more enemies at you, or ask you to gather more and more stuff, but it doesn't evolve pleasingly in my opinion.
There are a couple of areas where Sea of Thieves is truly phenomenal. The water tech, the weather effects and time-of-day shifts are stunningly beautiful and meaningful in gameplay. You wouldn't call the game a technical powerhouse, but in areas it's stunning.
Other than combat my biggest criticism of the game is the progression. There is something to be said about the way Sea of Thieves doesn't feature vertical progression such that you can jump in now and still be dealing with a level playing field. But the lack of progression in other respects is a problem when it comes to longevity. There isn't much about the game that means your 50th hour with the game will differ from the first. Mission structure doesn't evolve, additional options don't unlock, and most aspects of gameplay don't have much depth to master. For some people what is there is fine and engaging over a long period, but a lot of people will run out of steam fairly quickly once the unique content dries up and repetition is the only thing left.
Even so, when you put it all together.. Sea of Thieves has an X-Factor. It's a game where things rarely go to plan and the cascade of consequences that play out when you're carrying out what seem like mundane tasks lead to truly memorable moments that are completely your own. In that particular respect there's nothing like it. Not every session will be so memorable, but if you have a good group to play with the fun times will come.
When Sea of Thieves came out the response was pretty negative. It sits below 70 on Metacritic. It deserves somewhat more now that it has been improved and added to in various ways. The addition of Tall Tales gives the game the kind of bespoke content it was sorely missing initially, even if the game still relies too heavily on procedural content which quickly gives up its secrets. Skeleton ships and the megaladon add threat in the waters. Fog adds another dimension to the weather mechanics. The extensions to the map add new mechanics and threats that are missing from the relatively plain original parts. Still, it's a real mixed bag. At times it's brilliant and unique, a true 10/10. At other times it's every bit the 5-6-7/10 critics denounced it as back when it launched. It's a game that could be massively improved, and a game with ridiculous potential that has only partially been realised. Its burgeoning popularity could be the tip of the iceberg for Sea of Thieves as a franchise. It's grown into a big game, but it could be a behemoth. Perhaps we'll need a Sea of Thieves 2 for that, because while Rare have
added a lot to Sea of Thieves since launch they haven't overhauled much.
