Hey there! My name is Emporthasym, and every so often, since joining The Escapist forums (today, in fact), I've decided that I want to start giving people reviews (whenever I feel the need to review something) of those crummy internet MMORPGS that you see every so often advertised on the side of a forum or game website, but without even having to click it, know that it's going to be a complete letdown.
I'm going to be making these reviews to prove that actually, not all MMORPGS are like that. Sure, there'll be a few that try and attract as much attention as possible, but I personally find that the smaller MMORPGS are actually a LOT more entertaining, behind the crummy logos and graphics.
End of rant, and on with review:
I am NOT a new player to Puzzle Pirates. I have been playing since it opened about 7 odd years ago, and it has changed a few things or another, but essentially, it's the same game. When people think of a 7 year old game, I expect most would be shocked at the thought that anyone would even still play it!
But this game, I think of it as different. It sort of holds a special "charm".
You are based in a pirate server, or "ocean" as they are referred to, which is based up of anything between 40-60 virtual islands. Now, only about 1/5 of these Islands ever get colonised, and even then, a select few are reserved for the Game Moderators, the Ocean Masters.
In order to obtain money, Pieces of Eight, or PoE, as it is abbreviated, you need to take a job at a shoppe/stall, go pillaging, Sea Monster Hunting, Attacking a Flotilla, carousing in the inn, taking a job with the navy, or foraging. This is just an abbreviated list, and I will follow on with a list of all the do-able puzzles:
1.Sailing (My Personal Favourite)
2.Bilging (My Nemesis)
3.Carpenting
4.Rigging
5.Gunning
6.Navigating
7.Battle Navigating
8.Treasure Hauling
9.Swordfighting
10.Rumbling
11.Drinking
12.Playing Hearts
13.Playing Spades
14.Playing Treasure Drop
15.Playing Poker
16.Alchemising
17.Shipwrighting
18.Weaving
19.Blacksmithing
20.Foraging
Puzzles 1 - 11 deal with "Piracy" Puzzles. With these puzzles, one can pillage, take a job with the navy, Sea Monster Hunt, or attack a flotilla. Puzzles 12-15 (as I'm sure you might have guessed) deal with carousing, (and the easiest source of PoE making, if you ask me), and the final 16-20 deal with Crafting puzzles, which deal with taking a job at a shop.
This game,has a very complex economy. In fact, it's economy mirrors that of Reality, but quite a bit simpler. Now I'm going to have to drift away from the subject at hand to tell you why:
There are currently 10 oceans. Cobalt, Ice (the test server), and Midnight (the oldest) (Subscriber Oceans - Pay for Play),Hunter, Sage, Malachite and Viridian (Doubloon Oceans - Have a second currency which is worth about 1,500 PoE each. Is the typical "gotta buy it with real money thing"), the international oceans Jade and Opal (run on doubloon system), and finally, the only ocean for people under the age of 14 - Crimson (the family ocean - runs "sort of" on doubloon system)
The Banks on any of the Doubloon oceans are sort of like the Puzzle Pirates Wall Street. In order to transfer Pieces of Eight to another Doubloon server (you can't transfer it to a subscriber server) you need to buy the doubloons for whatever they're selling for on your ocean, and then sell them for whatever the buy price for them is on the ocean you want to transfer the PoE to. Complicated isn't it? =S
On doubloon oceans, one can play for free, however, if you don't use your account at least once every three months, your account will be deleted. The only way to avoid this is by buying doubloons at least once (I'm sensing a moneymaking scheme here)... It is easy to play Y!PP on a doubloon ocean without having dubs, but it is annoying when there is something you desperatley want, and you discover that the doubloon price is about 3 times the amount of PoE you have on hand.
Right, now back to the thing about the virtual islands. As I said before, only a handful will ever be colonised, but the ones that are, players can group their crews* together as flags, some of which go on to be immenseley powerful, and obtaining large PoE numbers, sometimes of over 200,000,000! This is called Blockading, and in my opinion, it is the best Puzzle Pirates thing since the game itself. If you dare to play this game, and give up before trying at least one blockade, you have not lived the whole experience, my friend.
For those of you who think that graphics are everything, I suggest you stay AWAY from this game. The graphichs are incredibly simple, and the game can work on both PCs & Macs.
Thank you for reading and considering my review. For more information on Puzzle pirates please visit:
www.puzzlepirates.com/
OR for some guidelines, visit:
yppedia.puzzlepirates.com/Main_Page/*****
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
*Did I mention about crews?**
**I guess I didn't***
***Crews are small groups of pirates who band together to do group activities, like Sea Monster Hunting, Pillaging, etc... Crews can grow incredibly large, with the average crew size rating from about 1 - 250(ish).****
****One thing I didn't mention was Ships. There are 12 types of ships currently on Puzzle Pirates (In size order): sloops,cutters,dhows,baghlahs,junks,Merchant Brigs, War Brigs, Merchant Galleons, Xebecs,War Frigates, and Grand frigates. The smallest ship is a sloop, holding only 7 people, which is quite small compared to a HUGE Grand Frigate, which can hold 154!(Grand Frigates are virtually useless though. They're like a SUPER-expensive Sports car which you know is there for vanity and will never be used)
*****A sort of Puzzle Pirates Encyclopaedia
I'm going to be making these reviews to prove that actually, not all MMORPGS are like that. Sure, there'll be a few that try and attract as much attention as possible, but I personally find that the smaller MMORPGS are actually a LOT more entertaining, behind the crummy logos and graphics.
End of rant, and on with review:
I am NOT a new player to Puzzle Pirates. I have been playing since it opened about 7 odd years ago, and it has changed a few things or another, but essentially, it's the same game. When people think of a 7 year old game, I expect most would be shocked at the thought that anyone would even still play it!
But this game, I think of it as different. It sort of holds a special "charm".
You are based in a pirate server, or "ocean" as they are referred to, which is based up of anything between 40-60 virtual islands. Now, only about 1/5 of these Islands ever get colonised, and even then, a select few are reserved for the Game Moderators, the Ocean Masters.
In order to obtain money, Pieces of Eight, or PoE, as it is abbreviated, you need to take a job at a shoppe/stall, go pillaging, Sea Monster Hunting, Attacking a Flotilla, carousing in the inn, taking a job with the navy, or foraging. This is just an abbreviated list, and I will follow on with a list of all the do-able puzzles:
1.Sailing (My Personal Favourite)
2.Bilging (My Nemesis)
3.Carpenting
4.Rigging
5.Gunning
6.Navigating
7.Battle Navigating
8.Treasure Hauling
9.Swordfighting
10.Rumbling
11.Drinking
12.Playing Hearts
13.Playing Spades
14.Playing Treasure Drop
15.Playing Poker
16.Alchemising
17.Shipwrighting
18.Weaving
19.Blacksmithing
20.Foraging
Puzzles 1 - 11 deal with "Piracy" Puzzles. With these puzzles, one can pillage, take a job with the navy, Sea Monster Hunt, or attack a flotilla. Puzzles 12-15 (as I'm sure you might have guessed) deal with carousing, (and the easiest source of PoE making, if you ask me), and the final 16-20 deal with Crafting puzzles, which deal with taking a job at a shop.
This game,has a very complex economy. In fact, it's economy mirrors that of Reality, but quite a bit simpler. Now I'm going to have to drift away from the subject at hand to tell you why:
There are currently 10 oceans. Cobalt, Ice (the test server), and Midnight (the oldest) (Subscriber Oceans - Pay for Play),Hunter, Sage, Malachite and Viridian (Doubloon Oceans - Have a second currency which is worth about 1,500 PoE each. Is the typical "gotta buy it with real money thing"), the international oceans Jade and Opal (run on doubloon system), and finally, the only ocean for people under the age of 14 - Crimson (the family ocean - runs "sort of" on doubloon system)
The Banks on any of the Doubloon oceans are sort of like the Puzzle Pirates Wall Street. In order to transfer Pieces of Eight to another Doubloon server (you can't transfer it to a subscriber server) you need to buy the doubloons for whatever they're selling for on your ocean, and then sell them for whatever the buy price for them is on the ocean you want to transfer the PoE to. Complicated isn't it? =S
On doubloon oceans, one can play for free, however, if you don't use your account at least once every three months, your account will be deleted. The only way to avoid this is by buying doubloons at least once (I'm sensing a moneymaking scheme here)... It is easy to play Y!PP on a doubloon ocean without having dubs, but it is annoying when there is something you desperatley want, and you discover that the doubloon price is about 3 times the amount of PoE you have on hand.
Right, now back to the thing about the virtual islands. As I said before, only a handful will ever be colonised, but the ones that are, players can group their crews* together as flags, some of which go on to be immenseley powerful, and obtaining large PoE numbers, sometimes of over 200,000,000! This is called Blockading, and in my opinion, it is the best Puzzle Pirates thing since the game itself. If you dare to play this game, and give up before trying at least one blockade, you have not lived the whole experience, my friend.
For those of you who think that graphics are everything, I suggest you stay AWAY from this game. The graphichs are incredibly simple, and the game can work on both PCs & Macs.
Thank you for reading and considering my review. For more information on Puzzle pirates please visit:
www.puzzlepirates.com/
OR for some guidelines, visit:
yppedia.puzzlepirates.com/Main_Page/*****
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
*Did I mention about crews?**
**I guess I didn't***
***Crews are small groups of pirates who band together to do group activities, like Sea Monster Hunting, Pillaging, etc... Crews can grow incredibly large, with the average crew size rating from about 1 - 250(ish).****
****One thing I didn't mention was Ships. There are 12 types of ships currently on Puzzle Pirates (In size order): sloops,cutters,dhows,baghlahs,junks,Merchant Brigs, War Brigs, Merchant Galleons, Xebecs,War Frigates, and Grand frigates. The smallest ship is a sloop, holding only 7 people, which is quite small compared to a HUGE Grand Frigate, which can hold 154!(Grand Frigates are virtually useless though. They're like a SUPER-expensive Sports car which you know is there for vanity and will never be used)
*****A sort of Puzzle Pirates Encyclopaedia