I like the game, but it's missing something that the original had, or maybe a few somethings.
What this something is, is an intangible that separates a fun game from a classic game. I tend to think it's a culmination of a few things that when added together have left me a bit disappointed with this release.
I am 33 years old now, played the first on my commodore 128 back in '88. I loved that game. It was produced by microprose who's goal was to try to provide an historical context to games so that they could not only be fun, but also somewhat realistic and educational.
Enter the new pirates game.
This time around, we are treated to a more cartoony pirates game that focuses more on instant gratification and fun to the detriment of a more historical balance. All games based on history try to find this balance, I just tend to prefer ones that slide more towards history and less towards simplistic fun.
One of the problems I have with this version is that it seems that everything happens to quickly and too easily, even on swashbuckler difficuluty. Let me give some examples, that when added together make a game that is fun, but not a classic like the original.
Starting out, in the original we would often be treated with only a basic crew that could man a boat plus maybe a few others. We didn't start out with a crew of 40 that can easily take over any ship on the sea. Recruiting to start out with was minimal, generally less than 10 men per tavern, thus necessitating the increase in wealth through trading or a lucky action against an enemy ship where the contest was in question due to the low crew size. This is missing in this game. Now I can go right out, capture 10+ ships and nearly obtain a noble rank with only having to perform 1 recruit session in my starting towns tavern. Heck, I've even been 'treated' with a recruitment of over 64 men on my first go!
Now why is this a big deal to me? Well it takes away, as has been mentioned, 'suspense' of trying to build up a reputation first to attract sailors to my crew with my low crew numbers from the start. Now some will say, 'then don't go recruit'. Well that's kind of silly. I want to play the game, not myself. I want to put in my best efforts and be rewarded by 'beating' the game, not by deciding myself when I should 'merit' high recruiting numbers.
Next issue as has been mentioned is the sighting of ships at sea. There was, like in real life, tension when one saw a sail over the horizon. Could it be a pirate? Could it be a fleet ship hunting you? Or is it just a merchantmen that's actually disguised as a pirate? Well this has been removed as well. It's a shame, because it brought about a level of suspense in the original game. Should I or shouldn't I investigate this sail on the horizon. Will I get my arse handed to me by not being able to outsail a pirate vessel with 100+ crew from my beginning voyages? This has been removed. Now we get chased and the enemy can sit there an pound us at will with cannons while we can either keep sailing without being able to return fire unless we 'engage' in a ship vs ship sea action. What's worse, we can see by simply moving a mouse pointer over the ship, who it is and where they are going. So much for the suspense of that sail on the horizon.
Another issue I have is the econmy in the game. It doesn't seem to be reactive in the same way that the original game was. I can trade over and over with ports that are 'poor' or 'struggling' and I have little to no effect on the economy like I did in the original game. I used to enjoy making wealthy or properous towns out of the usually poor towns, usually after I captured them for my colonial power of choice. Now, trading is just an after thought. I don't need to engage in it at all to amass a good fortune or to improve a colony's economy.
Treasure fleet and the silver train.
Where is the silver train? What happened to chasing that elusive treasure fleet from town to town and finally catching it and receiving tens of thousands of gold pieces? In the original game there was somewhat of a challenge to hit a city at the right time to capture these large fortune prizes. How doubly exciting whenever you got a town with both of them present. No longer there, no we get to find 'treasure ships' that contain a couple thousand gold pieces. Not too exciting in my book.
Promotions happen much too easily now as well. In the original game, you'd have to find an capture many, many ships to rise in the 'noble' ranks. It seemed each rank of nobility required more feats to be obtained. Now this is still the case, but with the abundance of ships everywhere and the ease of finding them, it's made promotions too easy to obtain. The challenge and time investment (not a large one) seem to have disappeared in an effort to be 'fun'. I generally have found that in life, the things one appreciates and enjoys the most are those that one has to work for. When something is easily or readily obtained, it's value and the enjoyment derived from it are lessened. This seems to apply to the ranks system in the current version of the game.
Sea battle also aren't quite as challenging as they were before. I recall having to worry about the weather guage to ensure I could attack and capture a ship where I clearly outmatched it as it would do it's best to run to the horizon and the ever looming end of the day that would bring about the end of the chase. This again would build suspense and gave more historical flavor to the sea fights as wind direction and type of ship matter much more than it does presently. Now it seems that no matter what, ships will attempt to engage battle with me no matter how many men I have on my ship compared to my opponent. It's become a simple repeatable exercise in close, duel, gain new ship.
Repeatable isn't bad in and of itself, however when combined with a lack of suspense and reward for effort, it becomes boring and unfulfilling.
Some of the other issues will hopefully be patched, such as hunting baron raymondo over and over. These kinds of things I can tolerate assuming a patch is in the works to address them.
It's the other intangible items that when taken individually aren't much, but when added together bring about a disappointing whole. Now I've enjoyed the game, so I don't want it to sound as if I've had little fun. However, it is missing that certain something, some of those things I've mentioned in this post, that when added together stop this game from being a remake of the classic and have made it just a fun but not engrossing game like the original. When I saw the attitude on the official website that they were trying to make a 'fun' game as opposed to trying to make a more historically based game (no, I don't want scurvy, rickets, rape etc) I was concerned. It seems that they've produced a game that contains a bunch of `mini-games` (maze, duel, ship v ship, turn based land combat) but that doesn't quite tie it altogether in an engrossing way that will keep me coming back as Pirates did, first on the commodore 128, then amiga, and finally pirates gold.
What this something is, is an intangible that separates a fun game from a classic game. I tend to think it's a culmination of a few things that when added together have left me a bit disappointed with this release.
I am 33 years old now, played the first on my commodore 128 back in '88. I loved that game. It was produced by microprose who's goal was to try to provide an historical context to games so that they could not only be fun, but also somewhat realistic and educational.
Enter the new pirates game.
This time around, we are treated to a more cartoony pirates game that focuses more on instant gratification and fun to the detriment of a more historical balance. All games based on history try to find this balance, I just tend to prefer ones that slide more towards history and less towards simplistic fun.
One of the problems I have with this version is that it seems that everything happens to quickly and too easily, even on swashbuckler difficuluty. Let me give some examples, that when added together make a game that is fun, but not a classic like the original.
Starting out, in the original we would often be treated with only a basic crew that could man a boat plus maybe a few others. We didn't start out with a crew of 40 that can easily take over any ship on the sea. Recruiting to start out with was minimal, generally less than 10 men per tavern, thus necessitating the increase in wealth through trading or a lucky action against an enemy ship where the contest was in question due to the low crew size. This is missing in this game. Now I can go right out, capture 10+ ships and nearly obtain a noble rank with only having to perform 1 recruit session in my starting towns tavern. Heck, I've even been 'treated' with a recruitment of over 64 men on my first go!
Now why is this a big deal to me? Well it takes away, as has been mentioned, 'suspense' of trying to build up a reputation first to attract sailors to my crew with my low crew numbers from the start. Now some will say, 'then don't go recruit'. Well that's kind of silly. I want to play the game, not myself. I want to put in my best efforts and be rewarded by 'beating' the game, not by deciding myself when I should 'merit' high recruiting numbers.
Next issue as has been mentioned is the sighting of ships at sea. There was, like in real life, tension when one saw a sail over the horizon. Could it be a pirate? Could it be a fleet ship hunting you? Or is it just a merchantmen that's actually disguised as a pirate? Well this has been removed as well. It's a shame, because it brought about a level of suspense in the original game. Should I or shouldn't I investigate this sail on the horizon. Will I get my arse handed to me by not being able to outsail a pirate vessel with 100+ crew from my beginning voyages? This has been removed. Now we get chased and the enemy can sit there an pound us at will with cannons while we can either keep sailing without being able to return fire unless we 'engage' in a ship vs ship sea action. What's worse, we can see by simply moving a mouse pointer over the ship, who it is and where they are going. So much for the suspense of that sail on the horizon.
Another issue I have is the econmy in the game. It doesn't seem to be reactive in the same way that the original game was. I can trade over and over with ports that are 'poor' or 'struggling' and I have little to no effect on the economy like I did in the original game. I used to enjoy making wealthy or properous towns out of the usually poor towns, usually after I captured them for my colonial power of choice. Now, trading is just an after thought. I don't need to engage in it at all to amass a good fortune or to improve a colony's economy.
Treasure fleet and the silver train.
Where is the silver train? What happened to chasing that elusive treasure fleet from town to town and finally catching it and receiving tens of thousands of gold pieces? In the original game there was somewhat of a challenge to hit a city at the right time to capture these large fortune prizes. How doubly exciting whenever you got a town with both of them present. No longer there, no we get to find 'treasure ships' that contain a couple thousand gold pieces. Not too exciting in my book.
Promotions happen much too easily now as well. In the original game, you'd have to find an capture many, many ships to rise in the 'noble' ranks. It seemed each rank of nobility required more feats to be obtained. Now this is still the case, but with the abundance of ships everywhere and the ease of finding them, it's made promotions too easy to obtain. The challenge and time investment (not a large one) seem to have disappeared in an effort to be 'fun'. I generally have found that in life, the things one appreciates and enjoys the most are those that one has to work for. When something is easily or readily obtained, it's value and the enjoyment derived from it are lessened. This seems to apply to the ranks system in the current version of the game.
Sea battle also aren't quite as challenging as they were before. I recall having to worry about the weather guage to ensure I could attack and capture a ship where I clearly outmatched it as it would do it's best to run to the horizon and the ever looming end of the day that would bring about the end of the chase. This again would build suspense and gave more historical flavor to the sea fights as wind direction and type of ship matter much more than it does presently. Now it seems that no matter what, ships will attempt to engage battle with me no matter how many men I have on my ship compared to my opponent. It's become a simple repeatable exercise in close, duel, gain new ship.
Repeatable isn't bad in and of itself, however when combined with a lack of suspense and reward for effort, it becomes boring and unfulfilling.
Some of the other issues will hopefully be patched, such as hunting baron raymondo over and over. These kinds of things I can tolerate assuming a patch is in the works to address them.
It's the other intangible items that when taken individually aren't much, but when added together bring about a disappointing whole. Now I've enjoyed the game, so I don't want it to sound as if I've had little fun. However, it is missing that certain something, some of those things I've mentioned in this post, that when added together stop this game from being a remake of the classic and have made it just a fun but not engrossing game like the original. When I saw the attitude on the official website that they were trying to make a 'fun' game as opposed to trying to make a more historically based game (no, I don't want scurvy, rickets, rape etc) I was concerned. It seems that they've produced a game that contains a bunch of `mini-games` (maze, duel, ship v ship, turn based land combat) but that doesn't quite tie it altogether in an engrossing way that will keep me coming back as Pirates did, first on the commodore 128, then amiga, and finally pirates gold.
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