We may earn a commission when you buy through links in our articles. Learn more.

Sea of Thieves’ first patch is live, but it requires you to redownload the entire game

sea of thieves patch size

Rare’s first major patch for Sea of Thieves is now live, bringing along plenty of updates to help smooth out the early server problems as promised last week. There are “in the range of 170 different changes” in this update, including bug fixes, performance optimizations, and stability improvements. The catch is that the update is 19.53GB on PC – the size of the entire game.

Get started on your pirate life with our Sea of Thieves tips.

In a new developer update video, executive producer Joe Neate explained why the patch is so big. “We had to make a decision on whether we get this out there now, or we wait a little bit of time, maybe even a few days, to get the patch size a little bit smaller. Because there’s work going on around that.

“Our ideal scenario was that we got that patch work done and we released a smaller patch. But we made the decision to get that full game up there because of all the fixes it’s got which are going to improve the experience for everyone. But it is a full game size update. Across each platform you’re going to be downloading the client again.”

They say the trade off was time – either the update comes faster, or it’s delayed a few days for certification as they reduce the size of the changes to fit in a smaller patch size. With the early server issues, Rare say it was an easy choice to get the patch out sooner.

Rare are also looking ahead toward more content-focused updates, addressing both the good and the bad of the “mixed” feedback they’ve had so far. The current focus is on solidifying server issues and patching bugs, but the broader feedback is also on their minds. They’ve already scrapped plans for a death cost based on early response.