Three and a half years after it first launched on Xbox, Sea of Thieves is seeing a player surge thanks to a recent Pirates of the Caribbean tie-in.

“It’s been over a month since we released Sea of Thieves: A Pirate’s Life into the wild blue yonder as part of Season Three, and since that emotional launch day we’ve been bowled over by the response from the Sea of Thieves community,” Rare’s Joe Neate notes in the announcement post. “From your reactions on social media to your fan art and stories of exploring the five new Tall Tales, it’s been amazing, and all this excitement resulted in our busiest ever month on the seas, with June seeing 4.8 million active pirates out on the water!”

Sea of Thieves has emerged as an unexpected phenomenon for Xbox, and I think a lot of the credit for that goes to Microsoft and the game maker for keeping the title fresh with an ongoing series of updates. When the title first launched in March 2018, it didn’t cause too many waves (sorry), but Microsoft’s decision to make it available day and date on Xbox Game Pass was also smart. The game got its first big update in June 2018 and sold over 1 million units by the next month. But the free updates continued, as did the rise in usage.

The “A Pirate’s Life” update was unveiled as a surprise for fans, and in partnership with Disney, it includes Captain Jack Sparrow—courtesy of a Johnny Depp sound-alike and the actor’s stunt double from the movies—and not just as a tertiary character, but rather as someone who adventures and interacts with you. Season Three is billed as the biggest in the game’s history, and it also includes two new locations, standalone missions that are cut off from other players in the game who aren’t part of your crew, new species of enemies, new weapons, and more.

Naturally, Rare promises even more updates to keep the popularity of Sea of Thieves going.

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