Here's How Sea Of Thieves Is Improving On Xbox Series X

Being a first-party Xbox game, we expected that Sea of Thieves would be getting something in the way of next-generation improvements on Xbox Series X/S. Today, developer Rare detailed those next-gen changes, telling players what they'll be able to expect for the game when Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S launch on November 10th.

Indeed, it seems that these upgrades to Sea of Thieves will be available as these consoles arrive on shelves, with Rare saying in a blog post today that the optimized version of Sea of Thieves will be available to all players through Xbox Game Pass or Xbox Smart Delivery for those who own the game outright.

Keep in mind that Rare calls this an optimized game, which means that it isn't necessarily creating a new version specifically for Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S. So, while we can't expect vastly upgraded graphics, we can expect some big improvements to resolution and framerate.

Specifically, Rare says that Sea of Thieves will run in 1080p at 60 frames per second on Xbox Series S, while the game will run at 4K and 60 frames per second on Xbox Series X. Those 1080p60 and 4K60 targets are the same as many Xbox Series X/S launch titles, particularly Xbox One games that are only being optimized for these new consoles.

In addition to those boosted resolution and framerate targets, players can also expect better loading times because of increased processing power of the Xbox Series X/S. Unfortunately, those improvements seem to be all Xbox Series X/S players can expect, so don't count on anything too dramatic. Still, it's nice that Sea of Thieves players looking to upgrade right away will get something in the way of upgrades, even if those are limited to resolution, framerate, and loading times.