Rare’s Sea of Thieves uses a relatively loose structure for its progression, requiring players to reach a rank of 50 with the game’s three factions before they can become a “Pirate Legend” and see the endgame content. We were expecting it to be weeks before anyone managed to achieve this, but Twitch streamer Prod1gyX proved us wrong.
Once Prod1gyX was able to reach top rank with the Gold Hoarders, Merchants Alliance, and Order of Souls, he spoke to the Mysterious Stranger character located in the rear of the game’s tavern, at which point he received a new outfit as well as the “Shanty of Legends” song. Playing the shanty in front of the Mysterious Stranger opened the Tavern of Legends up, a new area that offered special “legendary” voyages — though these appear to just be combined versions of the game’s other three voyage types.
This is fairly disappointing, especially considering the potential for more narrative and world-building in Sea of Thieves. Hopefully, future content updates will add more of this type of content, or at least a larger variety of missions to complete.
Though Prod1gyX didn’t cheat in order to level up his rank with the three factions so quickly, he did rely on the help of his viewers. By sending them out to find treasure as he played elsewhere, he was able to boost his rank faster than if they weren’t in the game at all. Some within the community have called him a “landlubber” and criticized his ethos, which is a little ironic given the game’s subject matter. They’ve even started using the hashtag, “#NotMyLegendaryPirate” to voice their disapproval with how he reached top rank.
“The dude doesn’t even know where to sell [items] in the game, and where to equip items,” one Sea of Thieves Reddit user said. “This is the guy who gets credit for being the first Legendary Pirate?”
Upon joining the game for the first time, ourselves, we were placed in a group that was already about to complete a high-level voyage, giving us a substantial rank increase before we actually did anything.
Sea of Thieves is out now on Xbox One and PC. More than 2 million players have already tried it out.