Sea of Thieves Beta Had an Impressive Turnout Despite Rough Start

When the Sea of Thieves beta first started, many players were excited to jump right into the shared world adventure and harness their inner pirate. Unfortunately, seas were rough and many couldn't even connect to the servers to begin with. Since the entire purpose of a beta is to stress test servers, this was a good thing to catch before launch and the team decided to further test by extending the beta period an additional two days. Despite the rocky start, the testing period had a pretty impressive turnout now that the final numbers have been tallied.

For those that participated in the beta period, you should have received an e-mail from RARE with the final results. Here's the breakdown of the pirate-y adventures:

• 332,052 total players
• More than 2,000,000 hours on the sea
• 104,240 average viewers
• 14,482,120 watched via streaming
• Reached number 1 live viewers on both Twitch and Mixer

Not bad! If you didn't have a chance to check out the beta for yourself, here's more about the game:

A Shared-World Adventure Game that lets you be the pirate you've always dreamed of in a world of danger and discovery. Explore a vast ocean where every sail on the horizon means a ship filled with real players who may be friends or foes. Form a crew and voyage to treasure-filled islands, face legendary creatures and test your mettle in epic ship battles against other pirates."

• In Sea of Thieves, every sail on the horizon is a crew of real players, but what might their intensions be? Perhaps they're seeking peaceful parley, plotting to deprive you of your hard-earned plunder or simply itching to enjoy the thrill of a good battle on the high seas. How you choose to respond may mean the difference between resounding triumph and a close-up look at the ocean floor.

• Shared-World Adventure Game created by Rare Ltd. Be the pirates you want to be in a shared world filled with real players.
• It's your crew VS the world.
• A rich, fantastical world of unspoiled islands, monsters and mythical creatures.
• Sail together on voyages to distant shores on the hunt for riches and renown. Unravel ancient riddles, face off against hordes of monstrous creatures or plunder from other pirate crews – the choice is yours!

In other beta news, while many were taking in the sights and the social aspect of the upcoming game, others were digging a little deeper to find hidden treasure.

Thanks to one data miner, we've got a closer look at what's on the horizon including new creatures, foots, enemies (hellooooo, Kraken), and more. Ship customization, new maps, and other goodies were also found regarding upcoming content come launch. To see the full list of revealed new adventures, check out our previous coverage here.

Sea of Thieves will officially set sail for Xbox One and PC on March 20th, 2018.