We've been eagerly awaiting news of the Sea of Stars 'Throes of the Watchmaker' DLC ever since Sabotage Studios first teased it in early 2024, and now, we finally have a release date.
The excellent retro-inspired RPG will land its free DLC on 20th May, adding an extra eight-hour adventure that features new characters, worlds, puzzles and a cinematic budget equivalent to that used on the main game. In short, it's quite a beefy sausage.
Throes of the Watchmaker sees Solstice Warriors Valere and Zale explore the miniature clockwork world of Horloge and the cursed carnival that threatens it. This is built as its own gameplay loop, intended to come after you've wrapped the base game's main quest, but you can expect to find the same turn-based battles and gorgeous pixel art visuals that made the base game such a belter. Heck, there are even new tracks from composer Eric W. Brown (and guest composer Yasunori Mitsuda).
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You'll find Sabotage's official rundown of the DLC and a handful of screenshots below:
- New Playable Classes for Valere and Zale. The world of Horloge plays by different rules, and for their magic to manifest, the Solstice Warriors will need to adapt. Zale will tap into his agility to become a Juggler, while Valere will harness her balance to dazzle as an Acrobat. Playing to the circus-themed curse, they will unlock a completely new set of attacks, damage types, skills and combos.
- New Playable Character: Arty. Artificer joins the party! The friendly engineer robot will finally unlock the laser-shooting capabilities of his construct, and join Valere and Zale in the fight to save Horloge.
- New Areas, Music, Dungeons, Enemies, Bosses, and Puzzles. Journey into a magical miniature clockwork world where a plethora of oddities and wonders await. The world of Horloge, where a cursed carnival threatens the innocent denizens, is filled with unique environments, NPCs, enemies and dungeons. And of course, Sabotage’s composer Eric W. Brown and special collaborator Yasunori Mitsuda return to bring a completely fresh set of tracks!
And if you want to play all of this with pals, the option for three-player couch co-op (introduced in the 'Dawn of Equinox' update) is still present and correct here. All that for the grand sum of £0? Sounds like a pretty good deal.
We had a fantastic time with Sea of Stars when it set sail on Switch back in 2023, calling it "an instant classic and a new high-water mark for modern retro-styled indies" in our review. Here's hoping that Throes of the Watchmaker keeps those good times going when it arrives in a few weeks.