On the pirate adventure’s fifth anniversary.
Happy birthday,Sea of Thieves!
It was very much about what is Rare for the next decade?
What are we going to make?
How are we going to work?
What’s the culture?…
What do we think is important?
What do we think the interesting trends are?
What’s something that no one’s ever done before?…
Joe Neate:Yeah, and it turns out that’s really hard!
When you’ve got that completely blank slate, it’s actually really challenging to go do… Who are you making it for?
What’s the real purpose behind it?
The question [we always] asked was, how can we make this more social?
And I think that heart has never changed.
We’ve just built around that heart to further strengthen that.
But there were parallels.
We like that'.
And I think that conviction and confidence gets the support of those around you.
[But] we just took that all the way because we felt really strongly about it.
What does that mean to your servers and services?
And all of the things to think about when you’ve got a big scale multiplayer game.
We definitely didn’t design it for Game Pass but it definitely [works].
So now there’s a completely different sort of scenario here.
We have to start thinking about how do we educate those folks better?
How do we get them to discover what’s in the Sea of Thieves?
I remember thinking that quite acutely.
We did lots of press, we did everything else.
What was the analogy someone used internally about launch?
Absolutely, I was crushed.
RIPPING UP THE ROADMAP
Craig Duncan:Even distilling the feedback [at launch was tough].
This is weird, directionless'.
So that is just so polarising…. And what is the kind of content we think people are resonating with?'
Are they going to do more?
HOW MUCH OF YEAR ONE WAS PLANNED, HOW MUCH WAS NEW?
Very quickly we already knew the next big beats for what Sea of Thieves was.
Craig Duncan:I think in credit to the team, we weren’t afraid to change direction…
I think that was the harder route, but the right thing for the game, and our players.
Like, putting a Speaking Trumpet in was just mad!
We just put something in for people to shout at each other across the seas!
But it was just so funny.
You don’t get that anywhere else.
Joe Neate:Because that first year of development, it was hard.
And that’s what we did after [Anniversary].
There were a lot of retrospectives around that, because it was it was rough.
It was a hard year.
It’s a constant thing for us to discuss and try and find the right way to do it.
And we don’t always get it right.
Sea of Blood, as we use to kind of refer to it.
What’s the experience?
And, broadly, competition-on-demand was what we were going after with Arena.
Because we didn’t have that capability to swap servers in the way that we do now…
But as your tools evolve, more and more things become possible.
There’s always either a learning, or tech, or team capabilities.
There’s just always good growth from it every time.
And we’re still learning.
Honestly, we’re learning every year, every time.
We could go and try and build the game you’ve already built or work with you.
Can we figure something out?'
Which was just to me an awesome milestone of how far Sea of Thieves had come.
And I think we just had the request, ‘Disney wants to have a meeting with you’.
And we’re like, what about?
Go away, have a think about it, and let us know what you think'.
So speaking to Disney almost felt like the opportunity we’d created for ourselves.
It was magic but surreal at the same time.
It was such a clear thing of, like, we can go and do this amazing thing.
TIME FOR A REPEAT PERFORMANCE?
We loved [A Pirate’s Life], our players have loved it.
What teams do we have available?
What the thing we’re really excited about?
The Sea of Thieves is out there, [and anyone] could find their way there.
So Season Nine, I’d say, it’s a statement of intent.
But it’s all about camaraderie, having each other’s backs.
And this is how we should feel as a team, right?
Mike Chapman:It’s amazing… You forget easily just being so laser-focused on what we’re building.
Because I think… as a creator and a game maker, that stuff is hugely powerful.
And even with the initial reception at launch, we never stopped believing in it.
And everybody on this team loves this game like nothing else.
[But] as we’ve reinvented the way Sea of Thieves evolves…
I think we’ve just felt more confident than hopeful.
Mike Chapman:I don’t think it’ll ever be done, and I genuinely mean that.
This is the pirate game for modern audiences.
And it does something different to every other game.
And that’s what we’re focused on doing.
And now it’s kind of like that’s Sea of Thieves.
