What Is The Best Tall Tale in a Pirates Life - Sea of Thieves? 

    Recently during E3 2021, developer Rare announced a partnership with Disney in order to bring the famous film franchise Pirates of the Caribbean to their game Sea of Thieves. It was an announcement that shocked fans from both sides of the aisle, it came out of left field. Even the insiders who had early looks at new in game content had no idea this would ever happen. After E3 it was a grueling week leading up to the release on June 22nd lots of sleepless nights due to excitement. When the release eventually came I had completed all of them by day two. How that the update has come out there is a flood of new players as well as a couple returning fans who are wondering, out of the five tall tales which is the best one? 

    And to that I say the fourth one. This is due to many factors. Although all the tall tales have great production value I will admit that some are indeed better than others. The first one lacks in any true real content. It feels more like a ride than a entertaining and fun video game experience. This is the same with the third tall tale. Think of the first and third one more as a glorified love letter to both the original Disney ride as well as a love letter to the famous film franchise. However this still leaves us with three other tall tales to choose from. 

    Many will agree with this opinion, but the second tall tale, known as the sunken pearl is most definitely the worst tall tale in the series. This is due to a variety of reasons. Firstly and the most important factor, it is not instanced. During the conferences leading up to its release the developers had stated that these tall tales would be instanced, meaning other crews would not be able to interfere with you and your adventures. However this was not the case as only three out of the five tall tales were instanced, and the second tall tale was not one of them. This led to infuriating encounters with other crews during your experience. You had a choice, you could accept that this experience was poorly designed and join the other crews and have your immersion diminished, or you could do what I did and shoot anyone in your path, repeatedly until they rage quit and you have the experience all to yourself. 

    Another reason why the second tall tale is probably the worst out of the bunch is because of all the game breaking glitches. For example all of the puzzles in the tall tale change the environment around you. however if a crew has done the tall tale before you, there is no way to progress. If you make a mistake, you cant go backwards which means if you leave an item that you need behind, there is no way to get it back and you have to start it over, believe me because it happened to me several times 

    However at the time of writing it is important to state that Rare has delivered a patch that supposedly fixed the largest and most influential bugs in the second installment so your experience may be different than mine. And I would hope so because mine was not the best. 

    Now that we have established that the first three tall tales are not the best in the series it comes down to the last two tales. The fourth and the fifth one. However I previously stated that the fourth one is the best. This is for a variety of reasons. Firstly it is the more interactive one out of the two. It is not an on rails experience, instead it is a riveting story that includes characters from both the films and the sea of thieves lore. It is well done and very entertaining. Although the final chapter closes things nicely and is equally chaotic and fun. The fourth tall tale takes the cake due to Jack Sparrows witty one liners and amazing entrance. 

    In conclusion all of the tall tales have great production value. However I think it probably should have been playtested a little bit more before being shipped out for launch. Because of a few lackluster entries and some game breaking glitches the first three tall tales become eliminated from the race. leaving the last two as the only true contenders. And because the last two tall tales are so good it makes up for the lacking in the first three entries. 

    For info about crossplay in Sea of Thieves check out this: https://thewitlessgamer.blogspot.com/2021/06/is-sea-of-thieves-cross-platform.html

    For my review on a Pirates life click here: https://thewitlessgamer.blogspot.com/2021/06/is-sea-of-thieves-pirates-life-good.html