Earlier today (Thursday, July 10th), Rare held its first-ever Sea of Thieves Community Direct, a 50-minute live stream hosted on the official Sea of Thieves YouTube channel. It was hosted by the Head of Video Production John McMurtrie, who was joined by Head of Community and Communications Christina McFairholme, Associate Design Director Shelley Preston, Creative Director Mike Chapman and Production Director Drew Stevens. The Direct, which was announced earlier this month, covered game health, upcoming changes to the Insider Programme, their evolving approach to Seasons, and more.
You can watch the full live stream below, or on the official Sea of Thieves YouTube channel.
There is quite a lot packed into this first Sea of Thieves Community Direct, so let’s dig into this bounty of news!
A Look Back
The Sea of Thieves Community Direct – July 2025 started with a retrospective look back at the previous year, covering Seasons 13 to 16, as well as all the other changes and updates that have been made to the game. “The last year has very much been about enhancing the sandbox,” Chapman said, as he recounted the content that had been added to SoT since Season 13. “Our goal has been to add more ingredients to the sandbox, new combinations of mechanics, new weapons, so each time you play, your session can play out differently“. This was in response to the player base’s feedback, claiming the sandbox was feeling stale, and it wasn’t changing enough.
They highlighted their work to provide more detail and context to players with the reintroduction of the Developer Update, fronted by Production Director Drew Stevens. The plan going forward is to hold a Sea of Thieves Community Direct every six months, with another sit-down planned for early 2026.
The team was also quick to point out where they had fallen short recently, specifically in terms of game health and performance, and especially when it comes to being reactive to cheating and the game experience on PC. “I think if I summarise it,” said Drew Stevens, “It is that we were on the back foot, and I want to get us to a place where we’ve got teams in place, we’ve got structures in place, we can just be a bit more reactive, and then get to a place where we’re proactive.”
The team at Rare has always aimed to be as consistent and transparent with their players ever since the game’s launch back in 2018, which started as a video of the now Head of Xbox Game Studios, Craig Duncan standing in front of a whiteboard explaining to Sea of Thieves fans what they had in store for coming updates. This is still a focus for the team, with Head of Community and Communications Christina McFairholme saying that they are “building a set of more robust systems to take more inputs from our players” to “listen earlier, listen better, and be more transparent.”
Looking Ahead
Rare are certainly putting their money where their mouths are regarding transparency and communication, or at least will be in the coming months, with the announcement that they will be lifting the NDA on the Sea of Thieves Insiders Programme. This will allow players registered as part of the Insider Programme to not only talk about their experiences, but also stream and capture them.
Alongside an overhaul to the programme scheduled for 2026, the devs are planning to send out seasonal surveys, referred to as Seasonal Big Listens, to get more detailed feedback from the Insider Programme members and will share the results with the community. As an example, and a knowing wink to the fanbase, they used the idea of feedback surrounding a new Ice Zone being added to Sea of Thieves. “What is it they are really asking for when they’re asking for the Ice Zone,” posits Shelley Preston, to which Christina responds, “They’re asking for us to fill a hole, and we want to find the hole, not the… ice.”
Next up, the devs talked about the restructuring of the teams working on Sea of Thieves, as well as the rollout of Seasonal content. The new approach to Seasons will be broken up across three months, and will follow a pattern as shown below:
Month 1: more sandbox features and worldbuilding setup
Month 2: headline live Event, upscaled and expanded with lore elements
Month 3: "˜call to action' moment for players, revisiting and revitalising sandbox content
There will be a transitory period as this new approach comes into effect, and all other events will continue as normal, with a Community Weekend in the first month and a Gold and Glory in the last one.
Seasons 17 and 18
You may have already caught our first glimpses of Sea of Thieves’ Season 17, which had an announcement trailer as part of the Xbox Summer Showcase 2025. Using the new plan for Seasonal content, the first month of the Season will introduce The Smugglers’ League and key features like Smugglers' Hideouts, new loot types and Smugglers' Runs. The second month will bring a headline live Event in the form of a heist, while month three refreshes the Skeleton Fort experience - a feature that's remained unchanged for some time. A community weekend to celebrate Rare’s 40th anniversary will also be held at the beginning of the Season.
Rare love giving the fans a Sea of Tease, and the Community Direct was no exception. “Season 18 has a specific focus on The Devil’s Roar,” revealed Chapman, “We added it a long time ago, it hasn’t meaningfully changed since it was added.” Season 18 will see players come into contact with a new adversary, the Dark Ancients, and discover new hidden shrines across the region. The devs intend to also link this new content to Emissary play in some way. “So [we’re] trying to thread that line between adding some new elements, moving the world forward, but then going back to beloved parts of the game, just breathing new life into them.”
That’s all we’ve got on Season 18, but the team at Rare saved the biggest news for last.
Custom Servers
Custom Servers, or Custom Seas, will be coming to the game in early 2026, as part of a new subscription model that will come with other benefits. “In Custom Seas, you’ll have a series of settings and toggles and switches that allow you to curate the Sea of Thieves sandbox as it exists, but in your way”, explained Shelley.
Subscribers can also look forward to populating their server with all their friends in Safer Seas Fleets, for maximum tomfoolery. Lastly, a cinematic camera will offer players a toolset similar to that used by Rare’s very own video team!
Those are the big takeaways from today’s Sea of Thieves Community Direct, but we recommend fans check out the original stream or summary over on the SoT website to get all the nitty gritty details.
The Future of Sea of Thieves
This first Sea of Thieves Community Direct came just days after the announcement of over 9,000 layoffs across Microsoft and Xbox, affecting studios, projects, and teams across these companies. Rare was not immune to these, sadly, and the layoffs resulted in the cancellation of their next title, Everwild, which had been in development for about a decade.
Going over what we learned today from the Community Direct, it appears Rare is doing everything they feel they can to keep the Sea of Thieves shipshape. While pleasing everybody is an impossible task, it sounds like the developers are looking to do what they can to keep their live service pirate adventure game above the waves, and not become another sunken wreck.
As Creative Director Mike Chapman puts it, “It’s striking that balance between doing the things that we believe are right for the vision of the game, but actually listening intently to what our community are asking for.”
How do you feel about the upcoming changes to Sea of Thieves? Are you interested in your own Sea of Thieves Custom Server? Let us know in the comments below.
