Embargo lifted! See what the press has to say about the forthcoming Mega Update on 30th April!

We've created a thread here to collect the articles and press coverage of the recent visit to Rare and experience of the new updates incoming to Sea of Thieves on 30th April, see what they have to say!

First off - Windows Central -

We went hands-on with the first mission in Rare's "Tall Tales" feature, which is the studio's ambitious attempt to bring cinematic story experiences into Sea of Thieves' multiplayer world.

If you're already a fan of Sea of Thieves, you're going to love the Anniversary Update. If you're skeptical, April 30, 2019, will be the perfect time to jump on with a friend and give it another look.

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Daily Star

Sea of Thieves' first-anniversary update is going to add so much more to the game, it's almost embarrassing to other service-based models that share the same space. Here's what you need to know.

https://www.dailystar.co.uk/tech/gaming/770988/Sea-of-Thieves-Anniversary-Update-fights-season-pass-FOMO-and-recaptures-Goldeneye-s-magic

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Polygon

The anniversary update is full of new content, but its meant to be accessible to “day one” players, and will add new ways to get to the best parts of the Sea of Thieves experience.

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Eurogamer

Sea of Thieves is, I think, a phenomenal story generator - and excels in delivering the kinds of unpredictable encounters that can so frequently turn a routine play session into a genuinely unforgettable one.

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I was a little apprehensive when Rare first announced that its multiplayer pirate extravaganza would be getting a new competitive-focussed standalone mode....

Based on the handful of matches I managed to play at a recent Sea of Thieves press event, Arena Mode is astonishingly good fun.

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Shacknews

Players will be able to get into Sea of Thieves, experience a rich narrative, go on an epic adventure, all while experiencing the foundation that made the game so appealing to so many players.

It’s worth noting that Chris Allcock, the author of Sea of Thieves’ first novel, Athena’s Fortune, has been involved in the writing of Tall Tales. This should speak volumes to the kind of story players can expect, not just a few lines of dialogue from a character, but an actual narrative arc spanning multiple play sessions. Interestingly, Mike Chapman hinted that there might be some references and nods to between the two stories, Shores of Gold and Athena’s Fortune.

Shores of Gold isn’t the only story coming to Tall Tales. While we didn’t discuss specifics of future stories, during my interview time with Senior Designer Shelley Preston, she was able to talk to how Tall Tales functions as a tool for the developers, “Each of the earlier campaigns, like The Hungering Deep, was its own fudged-together story whereas Tall Tales is a tooling set that designers and artists – everybody – can use to create content. We’ve got that tool set now, now it’s just what we do with it.”

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Interview with Shelley Preston and Joe Neate -

I didn’t think it was possible, but I walked away from the interview, and the day, even more excited about the future of Sea of Thieves than I already was. The passion and dedication of the team at Rare is palpable and their commitment to Sea of Thieves and their community is unmatched.

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“It is competitive, but we’re hoping it’s a much more accessible competitive to a much broader audience,” Shelley Present, Senior Designer, explained to me during our interview time. “Kind of like how Adventure was a more accessible online multiplayer game – we saw it was a lot of people’s first multiplayer game or some who thought they didn’t like multiplayer but they enjoyed it in Sea of Thieves. We’re hoping that Arena can do that for the competitive side of Sea of Thieves.”

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Telegraph

This is the kind of thing that Sea of Thieves, Rare’s emergent multiplayer pirate adventure, was made for. Those stirring campfire tales of teamwork, peril and victory.

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PCGamer

With April 30th's anniversary update, though, it feels more like the game I hoped it would've been at launch, bringing a 10 hour+ story campaign and an uproarious, nerve-wracking PvP Arena mode.

There's a lot to deepen players' investment in the game, then, and I'm impressed Rare was given the leeway to keep building Sea of Thieves into what it always deserved to be. It's no small thing to add a whole campaign, with entirely new systems and voice acting. Sea of Thieves spent a year finding its stride—now it's got most of the pieces in place for an exciting future.

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IGN - lots of piratey nsfw language ;)

In the long term, perhaps what’s most exciting here is the language Rare uses to talk about Tall Tales and Arena. They aren’t referred to as new modes, or options - they’re “platforms”, ideas to be built on. Tall Tales could extend to whole new campaigns, or one-off event episodes. Arena could become more than a single mode, or throw in daily challenges for those with less time to jump in and out of at their leisure, without the commitment required from a full quest line.

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The Sun

Everything we've seen of the anniversary update suggests that there really has never been a better time to take to the high seas.