Deal | Free to try on Steam: This pirate hit has been sailing strong for years

A pirate without a ship is really just a poorly dressed outlaw. That's why almost everything in Sea of Thieves revolves around the player's own floating vessel. Aboard a sloop, brigantine or galleon, players sail across the ocean, explore tropical islands, hunt for treasure and battle the undead. The game works best with friends on board, when steering, sails, cannons and repairs all have to be coordinated at the same time – whether PvE enemies or other pirates are causing trouble.

Things get particularly exciting thanks to the shared game world: Other crews can appear at any time, attack and steal any loot that hasn't yet been sold. Those who prefer a more relaxed experience can opt for Safer Seas, a mode with a stronger PvE focus, although it comes with restricted content and reduced rewards – and, of course, it still won't save anyone from sea monsters.

Overall, Sea of Thieves is less of a traditional story-driven game and more of a massive pirate sandbox. While the various factions offer their own missions and storylines, player freedom remains at the heart of the experience: Whether the crew follows a treasure map, hunts other players or simply sets sail without any particular goal is entirely up to them.

The Steam community particularly praises Sea of Thieves for its immersive pirate atmosphere, its depiction of water and weather as well as the teamwork within a crew. According to many reviews, ship handling and unpredictable encounters with other players also provide some of the game's strongest moments. However, the latter can quickly become a source of frustration: Players who are sunk by an experienced crew after spending several hours filling their ship with loot can lose everything they have collected. Solo players in particular therefore report a high frustration factor. There are also complaints about toxic players, a difficult learning curve, bugs and occasional server issues.

Overall, however, the average rating remains very positive: 88% of more than 372,000 user reviews recommend the game. On Metacritic, Sea of Thieves fares considerably worse. It has a Metascore of 67 and a user score of 5.7. However, this shouldn't be given too much weight: Many of the reviews there are quite old and date back to a time when the game had significantly less content – and there are also far fewer reviews than on Steam.

Free weekend on Steam

Sea of Thieves normally costs just under $40 on Steam, but it can be played completely free until September 21. After that, the pirate adventure will remain 65% off at $13.99 until September 27. According to SteamDB, this matches its previous all-time low, which was last reached in August. And thanks to its Steam Deck Verified status, handheld gamers can easily set sail on the go as well.

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