Since 2018, Sea of Thieves has reigned supreme in the pirate game genre. The open-world title, which offers a simulation experience that is unmatched in this field, recently received a release on PS5 after years of only catering to Xbox and PC players. While many were concerned that ending exclusivity could have long-term financial repercussions for Microsoft, it seems that this release was a thunderous marketing coup.
Sony revealed today that Sea of Thieves is the most downloaded game on PS5 internationally for the month of May. There were few major releases to compete with during this period, but it is still an honor for Rare's game. The audience on PlayStation was there, just after the lifting of anchor of 40 million players on the other platforms. The updated figures have not yet been revealed, but to be displayed to be the top 1 most downloaded game on Sony's console, it needs at least a few hundred thousand additional sales on the counter.
Worldwide
The best part is that Sea of Thieves puts everyone in agreement. While the rest of the ranking is completely different from North America to Europe, the Xbox title is the first choice for all players. Europeans go for the safe bets GTA 5 and F1 24 for second and third place on the podium, while Americans prefer their Madden NFL 24 and Modern Warfare III.
Further down the ranking of the most downloaded games in May, we find Grounded, also a former Xbox exclusive that has landed on PS5. It is one of four games that has received this treatment, along with Pentiment and Hi-Fi Rush. Grounded has been available on the platform since April 16, a fortnight before Sea of Thieves, but has not met with the same success as the pirate game.
Other games to come?
We don't know what the next step will be for Xbox, but the company is definitely not going to backtrack on its opening up to competing consoles. This allows it to generate completely new sources of revenue, not only at the purchase level, but also in the long term with micro transactions and purchases of DLC of all kinds. We already know that the next Call of Duty Black Ops 6 will also be released on all platforms, as Microsoft promised when it bought Activision Blizzard.
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