Sea of Thieves players are pouring one out for an iconic location: "Goodbye Golden Sands, you will be missed"

gamesradar.com:

Golden Sands Outpost is one of the most recognizable locales in Sea of Thieves, a place most players have spent many hours turning in loot, stocking up their ships, and fishing by the docks after a long excursion. Logging in today, however, those same pirates will find the island unrecognizable, and they won't even be able to locate it by the same name on the map anymore.

Rare has been gradually updating Golden Sands in recent months based on player activity, dramatically changing its appearance to the point where it now resembles a fortified military base, and with the most recent update, the transformation is complete. From now on, Golden Sands is officially Port Merrick, and the Sea of Thieves community is bittersweet.

"Goodbye Golden Sands, you will be missed," reads one of the top posts on the Sea of Thieves subreddit (opens in new tab). Replies are filled with fond memories of the island as well as excitement for its replacement.

"Recently went through some of my screenshots from year 1," reads one Redditor's comment. (opens in new tab) "Man this game has changed a good bit. So many great memories made no other game could capture. Thank you SoT and Rare."

"Well as I tried to blow it up I obviously have mixed feelings here," admits another. (opens in new tab)

"Golden Sands, you will be missed... But in the same vein: Port Merrick, you are loved! I seriously adore Rare's work on the new place. It's beautiful and cozy and it is a great way to honor the work we did as a community in stopping the Reapers!" wrote No_Author1526 (opens in new tab), referencing Merrick's successful fight for Golden Sands.

While Golden Sands is no more, at least it still exists in some form, whereas if the Servant of Flame had won the