My time with Sea of Remnants was disjointed and scattershot

Do you remember that part-catchy, part-obnoxious "Make it Loud" trailer that aired during the Summer Game Fest main stage show? That was for NetEase's upcoming free-to-play seafaring adventure RPG game Sea of Remnants. In fact, most of the game's trailers since its announcement in 2025 have been like this, usually featuring an upbeat vocal track backing quick cutscene and vista clips, with maybe a little gameplay.

Based on what NetEase has said about it in the past, I have a general idea of what the game is supposed to be. It is an "ocean-fantasy open-world RPG". According to a press release, "the game's core experience is built around a compelling 'Set Sail—Explore—Extract—Return' loop, leveraging mechanics with rogue elements to create a dynamic open world." That seems to make sense on paper as far as what a gameplay loop might look like. Head out on expeditions, return to home base, progress in the game's presumably numerous progression systems, prepare, and set out again.

NetEase also says, "Players will be immersed in bizarre and wondrous nautical discoveries, witnessing the world's transformation through themes of oblivion and reconstruction, and engaging in a compelling pursuit of the world's underlying truth." That one I'm less certain about its meaning.

In any case, a demo of Sea of Remnants was available to play at this year's Summer Game Fest Play Days. Having mostly only seen music video trailers and some press release words in my inbox, I was curious to see what the game itself actually played like. How did the demo introduce its world, characters, and gameplay systems?

The demo started with a slow, somber section where I moved a small rowboat to a light in the far distance. This was immediately followed up with a dramatic naval encounter where I controlled a large galleon ship against a kraken-like creature, adorned with crimson lighting, thunderstorms, and a high-energy soundtrack. I don't fully understand how we moved from scene 1 to scene 2, but I rolled with it. To be honest, while I was ostensibly in control of the ship, I don't know if my actions during this sequence mattered at all, or if it was all scripted.

After this, the nameless main character woke up in a scientist's lab. He's not sure how he got there, and I wasn't sure either. Here I left and entered the port town of Orbtopia, which is presumably the game's main hub. Not sure what I was supposed to do, I wandered a bit, chased a chicken for some reason, and entered a local bar. There was definitely a whirlwind pace to the demo's opening sections, and I felt like I was getting tugged in multiple directions before I was able to plant my feet anywhere.

Throughout all of this, by the way, the game's voiced dialogue (in English) frequently did not match the subtitles. It wasn't just small word differences either between subtitle and voiced scripts; sometimes the topic was different entirely. Many of the various menus also featured unkempt formatting and semi-translated English text that made it difficult to parse at times. I understand this was a non-final build of the game, and I would assume these sorts of components would be polished up before launch, but it certainly didn't help in leaving a positive impression on the demo.

The demo's most enjoyable moment came at the bar from the introduction of R.S., an energetic lady pirate obsessed with treasure. It seems like she will act as a sort of mascot to the game, as your character is otherwise player-created, and she's even featured on the game's store page art. In any case, she's causing mischief at a local bar, complete with cartoony hijinks. Her introduction trailer gives a good representation of what you can expect from her.

It was in her introduction that I think Sea of Remnants' style really came into focus, with its wooden-puppet characters and slapstick comedy, while comic-book-like flourishes and onomatopoeia dotted the screen at times (Bang, Woosh, and all that). Your character barely speaks, but don't worry, R.S. more than makes up for it.

It was here that I finally got to see the game's turn-based battle system, or at least a very quick glimpse of it. Besides the usual standard-fare turn-based mechanics, there seemed to be a system somewhat similar to Octopath Traveler's "Boost" system, where a resource could be spent to power up attacks during the present turn. There's also some sort of dice-roll mechanic where, if you roll the appropriate number during an action, you can get some sort of 'lucky' reward, such as a bonus attack action. All of this was dressed with flashy, comic-book-like animations.

After escaping from the bar with R.S., more hijinks ensue, and before I realized what we were doing, we grabbed a ship and headed to her hideout. It was here that I was introduced to a flurry of mechanics in quick succession. There was the game's turn-based combat, of course. There was boat sailing, loot grabbing and transportation, character recruitment (which features something akin to a gacha system, although I wasn't able to dive deeper into this). There is ship-building, crew favor, and homestead creation. There are a ton of minigames, at least mahjong, drinking, roulette, racing, fishing, and cooking. I saw a menu that cataloged the game's hundreds of collectible items, including Encounters, Insights, Oddities, and Maintenance - whatever those are.

After 90 minutes with the demo, by far the longest at Summer Game Fest, I felt like the game was still throwing new systems at me, all while chaotically jumping from one section to the next, complete with partially translated text and menus. The game, or at least the demo version that I played, never took a breath nor found its footing.

I came into the Summer Game Fest demo hoping to get a better feel for what Sea of Remnants actually is, but I'm not certain I was able to achieve that even after more than an hour at the demo station. 

It's very possible that this game just doesn't demo well. Or perhaps the demo was just poorly constructed in choosing how to represent a complex game in a short slice. If I was able to spend more time with it, maybe the density and variety of systems would start to coalesce into an intricate and cohesive game. Ultimately, I'm interested in the idea of Sea of Remnants, and I'm fond of its unique, comic-booky wooden-puppet art direction. We'll see how the game takes shape when it launches later this year for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC (Steam).