Check out the noise Rare’s piracy made even before release: the closed beta of Sea of Thieves, in late January 2018, became a craze on streams and boosted pre-orders for the Microsoft exclusive for Xbox One and PC.
The test opened on January 24 and was due to end on the 29th, but technical problems blocked part of the crowd from getting in and Rare extended the test. Entry went to those in the Sea of Thieves Insider program before December 1, 2017 and those who had pre-ordered.
The numbers Rare released afterward are impressive: 332,052 different players joined the beta, 25,563 streamers broadcast the game, and the average was 104,240 viewers throughout the test, totaling more than 14.4 million hours watched. The game reached number one on Twitch and Mixer, Microsoft’s streaming platform at the time.
For those who didn’t follow, the pitch is simple and arrived with a bang: you and your crew, of up to four pirates, control a ship on an open sea shared with other players, hunt treasure, fight skeletons and trade cannon fire with whoever crosses your path. You can play solo, but the fun is the group chaos.
According to executive producer Joe Neate, just seeing other people play made the audience want to jump in, and the beta pulled in reservations while it was live. At the time, we published that the game was sold out on Amazon; we found no record confirming this, so here is the correction.
What came next
Sea of Thieves came out on March 20, 2018, straight on Xbox Game Pass, and passed 1 million players in two days. Critics complained about the lack of content at the start, but the updates, such as the Anniversary Update and the crossovers with Pirates of the Caribbean and Monkey Island, turned things around. It reached Steam in June 2020, PS5 in April 2024 and hit 40 million players. Still a good fight today.
Where to buy
Source: Rare, Xbox Wire.
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