Sea of Stars: Throes of the Watchmaker DLC Review – From the Heart

Can you believe it’s been almost two years since Sea of Stars was released? Me neither. Since wrapping up that unforgettable journey, I’ve been itching to dive back into its world—hoping, waiting, wishing for a sequel. And while a full-blown follow-up hasn’t landed (at least not yet), Sabotage Studio has gifted us something that might be the next best thing: Throes of the Watchmaker, a free DLC that feels anything but small.

Available as a free update, here’s our review of Sea of Stars: Throes of the Watchmaker that should be available to all gamers who own the base game for free.

Or My Name Is Not Keenathan

Our tale begins with Keenathan, a beloved and boisterous member of Captain Klee’shaë’s pirate crew, whom players will no doubt remember for his unrelenting enthusiasm for saying his name. After receiving a letter, our Solstice Warriors, Valere and Zale, set off to visit the crew, only to find Keenathan in an uncharacteristically gloomy state. Why? Because he’s no longer sure Keenathan is even his real name.

This suspicion first arose during a visit to the Sky Giants’ Council at Cloud Kingdom in the original game, where no records of him existed. Now haunted by the possibility of living under a false identity, Keenathan sets out with Valere and Zale to visit the Watchmaker to commission a pocket watch engraved with his name. A simple enough request—except that the Watchmaker is an Ovate, a near-extinct race whose powers come at a steep cost.

Such a request comes at a high cost, and the price for this specific one involves the Solstice Warriors venturing off into a microworld, Horlage, and to cleanse a curse revolving around a carnival. Little do Valere and Zale know that the world they’re about to enter is one of fragmented memories and forgotten identities that will leave them questioning themselves and who they truly are. 

I won’t spoil anything else beyond that, as it’s a journey that you should play for yourself. However, with this being DLC and all, you may be wondering whether or not it’s worth playing through. To put it in a way that you can probably understand, this DLC is free, and I don’t think it should have been. Don’t get me wrong, Sabotage Studio is doing an incredible thing by giving this DLC away for free, but having played through it myself, it really could have been mistaken for a sequel. It’s shorter than the base game, with my clear-time clocking in at around 9 hours, but offering that much content for free is insane.

This isn’t just more Sea of Stars—it’s different, yet every bit as magical. Think Phantom Liberty for Cyberpunk 2077: the base story remains untouched (there’s no new ending here), but the expansion offers an entirely separate and meaningful experience that enriches the world. There are tons of new explorable areas to visit, new mini-games, playable characters, new enemies, bosses, and even new classes woven into the story. It doesn’t feel like the type of content you’d expect to see for DLC, let alone free DLC, but Sabotage Studio went the extra mile to make it feel like an actual standalone experience. The story is fantastic, filled with incredible, well-written, and fun characters that I instantly loved.  

The new classes introduced in this DLC are also pretty fun as they play into the carnival theme of the DLC, both visually and gameplay-wise. And for those who beat the game already, and are completely overpowered, don’t worry about the lack of challenge here. However, you may be saddened to learn that the DLC does this by underleveling you. Don’t get hung up on that too much, as it is explained through the story, which even has a satisfying payoff for it. 

Sea of Stars: Throes of the Watchmaker review code was provided by the publisher. You can read MP1st’s review and scoring policy right here.

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