Sea of Thieves Season Four now live, vastly expands the ocean floor

Sea of Thieves switched to a seasonal content delivery plan in 2021, and has since brought new types of voyages, Trade Routes, a Pirates of the Caribbean crossover, and more to the pirate adventure game. Now, the title is officially in its fourth season of major content updates, and this one is all about reworking the bottom of the sea to be more alluring.

Instead of further expanding outward by adding new islands as before, Season Four is deepening the existing map by populating the oceans with fresh undersea adventures, which had so far remained largely barren apart from an ancient civilization's ruins for decoration. Well, those structures aren't just decorations any longer.

Scattered throughout the world and found by seeking the marked spots on the map are six unique Siren Shrines, which are exploration- and puzzle-focused strongholds. Pirates diving down to these expansive locations will find hidden treasures and a good dose of lore. The second type of new locations are the Siren Treasuries. These are an underwater spin on Forts, tasking players with taking down waves of Ocean Crawlers, Sirens, and Coral Skeletons for unique Coral Treasure rewards.

Catch this developer deep dive from Rare to get a rundown of the new underwater locales and missions:

There is also a new type of washed-ashore bottled Coral Message quest type, a loot saving mechanic for when exploring underwater dungeons, mysterious journals to seek out for more information on these latest underwater discoveries, as well as new commendations and cosmetic rewards to achieve. Head over to the release notes page to check out the full extent of the update and the horde of bug fixes that come along with it.

Being a new season, another 100-level battle pass levels to climb for free — containing Gold, Doubloons, cosmetics, and even Ancient Coins — as well as a refreshed premium Plunder Pass are also available.

The Sea of Thieves Season Four 2.3.0 update is now available, and it weighs 6-7GB depending on whether the game is on a PC, Xbox One, or Xbox Series X|S. The servers are already back up as well, so pirates can jump in and try out all the new features right now.