Sea of Thieves Cross Play to Become Optional

Rare has revealed that a future update coming to Sea of Thieves will make the once hailed cross-platform play optional for players.

While Sea of Thieves has had no issues with players playing on either Windows 10 PCs and Xbox One consoles, in fact at launch it was one of the more celebrated features of the game as PC and console players could come together as one. However, that might all be about to change with the arrival of the PvP Arena mode.

Due to the obvious differences between PC and console, the upcoming PvP Arena update will also make cross-platform play an optional experience, meaning players will soon be given the option to either play solely with console players if they’re on console, PC players if they’re on PC, or both.

“We’ve been discussing this at length internally and we’ve arrived at a solution and we are starting work on the implementation. We want to make sure to give that option before Arena arrives. If you’re playing on console and you’re using a controller, you’ll have the option to only matchmake with other players on console using a controller.

“There will be two pools and you’ll be able to change that option depending on who you want to play with, your circumstances at the time…”

Of course, while some received the news well, others are worried that the player base may become diluted. Fortunately, Rare’s Craig Duncan was on hand over on Twitter to hopefully calm any stormy seas.

Wanted to address a few concerns we see some folks have about our future #SeaOfThieves plans. Rest assured our goals are ALWAYS to do the right thing by our players and community; there broadly seems to be 4 key points that needed clarity:

— Craig Duncan (@Gamerboss) February 3, 2019

1/ We aren’t removing crossplay; we are adding an option for console players using controller to opt out of crossplay if they choose. We expect most players, especially in Adventure, to still play using crossplay, but this is important option to add with The Arena coming

— Craig Duncan (@Gamerboss) February 3, 2019

2/ The crossplay option is not coming in the February update, see Joe’s last dev update for more info, the team is working now on implementation of the option settings & our goal is to have this in & tested prior to The Arena

— Craig Duncan (@Gamerboss) February 3, 2019

3/ Servers will still have the same density they do today as we spin up Azure servers as players join & backfill new crews into live servers. Our server density is architected to not be affected by the size of our player pop, but to vary the player encounter frequency & stories

— Craig Duncan (@Gamerboss) February 3, 2019

4/ Our player population is super healthy on both PC and Xbox & has been since launch. While we don’t tweet usage data reactively, we will figure out how we share more stats on this soon to give context why players don’t need to worry about our live player or platform populations

— Craig Duncan (@Gamerboss) February 3, 2019

As I said at the top, we have always strived for everyone to enjoy #SeaOfThieves whether you are a brand-new player or someone that has been with us from the start, we prioritise all players & all platforms together – thanks!

— Craig Duncan (@Gamerboss) February 3, 2019