A big hole has mysteriously appeared on an uncharted island in Sea of Thieves

Shiver me timbers! A big hole has suddenly and mysteriously appeared on one of Sea of Thieves' uncharted islands. The hole was spotted after the most recent update, Black Powder Stashes, which arrived yesterday—though it appears at the moment to be unrelated to the update's new voyages. It may, however, have something to do next month's update, which is called Dark Relics. Or, perhaps it has something to do with an update even further in the future. At the moment, we just don't know. Mysterious.

The island in question is located on the border of map coordinates I-12 and J-12, unofficially called "Killer Whale Island" due to the wreck of Merrick's ship, The Killer Whale. The island already has some cool features: the shipwreck, an underwater shrine and archway, a cave, and Merrick's amusing journal (located in the crow's nest of the wreck).

And now, there's a mysterious hole! Perhaps it's not as arresting as Fortnite's wandering cube or giant eyeball, but it's still an intriguing little mystery and makes me wonder if some other map changes have been made to hint at future adventures.

The hole was spotted by Reddit member and pirate Jetamo, and I just jumped into the game to check it out for myself. According to the Reddit thread, the circle of stones around the hole may also have been added in an update prior to the hole—though I can't confirm this.

There's also a grave on the island near a dead tree that another poster says is new. You can see my picture of the tree and grave below, but again, I can't say for certain it wasn't there prior to the Black Powder Stashes update.

As for the hole itself, I performed some half-assed investigation while I was there: I tried digging in the hole but only unearthed some grubs, and I also threw a few buckets of water into it, but nothing exciting happened. Then a galleon sailed over, fired several cannonballs at my sloop, missed, then scuttled itself. The crew swam over and climbed on my ship and stared at me in silence for a while as I asked them what happened and then offered them a ride. Then they attacked me with swords. That's no mystery, that's just business as usual in Sea of Thieves.

Chris started playing PC games in the 1980s, started writing about them in the early 2000s, and (finally) started getting paid to write about them in the late 2000s. Following a few years as a regular freelancer, PC Gamer hired him in 2014, probably so he'd stop emailing them asking for more work. Chris has a love-hate relationship with survival games and an unhealthy fascination with the inner lives of NPCs. He's also a fan of offbeat simulation games, mods, and ignoring storylines in RPGs so he can make up his own.