Today sees the launch of Sea of Thieves' latest update, Ships of Fortune, and it's big 'un, redefining and expanding one of the core tenets of the launch-day game: trading companies. It's a fitting way to begin the multiplayer pirate adventure's third year of post-launch updates, but, of course, it arrives in strange times.
"We're lucky in that we work in a digital profession... and we get to pretty much carry on as normal broadly across the whole studio," explains Sea of Thieves executive producer Joe Neate of the studio's recent shift to working from home. "Very much during that transition and still now, the focus has been our team and how everyone is, how everyone feels... but seeing loads of people playing Sea of Thieves, hearing loads of great stories, there's a real great motivation for us to continue servicing that."
"The rhythm and that process and everything we've built around how we update has kind of put us in really good stead," continues Neate, "but this is still a big moment for us. This'll be our first update since we've shifted to working from home and I think that's going to be a really good moment for us as a studio and as a team... Not only is it our first update, it's one that has a tonne of cool stuff in, so I think it's going to have a real impact."