Back To Basics #1: Sid Meier's Pirates
For those who haven't played this classic need to get a little understanding of it first, for those who have just skim until you see STOP in big bold letters then start reading again, got it? Good.
Basically its pirate galore, buy a ship then a fleet get a better hat and woo the pretty ladies its a pretty simple game but it technically has a story line but only the pros follow that and its usually by accident. As all RPG's ...ever ... you start shit dn build up. On creation you get this tiny sloop of war and have to sign up with one of the 4 countries - Spain (they attacked britain so dont pick) Germany (attacked britian so dont pick) France (att... oh read above) and England (who technically have attacked england with the whole civil war thing but geez we still won ... technically ... a little bit). Theres no real benefit to picking any unless your in the later period cos thats when britain start to dominate.
You then set out with your little boat and your countries pride only to find that every ... EVERY other ship out there is much bigger better and carrying many more troops than you. Fun right? wel no not really, the only good thing is the AI is shit so even a little tactics will get you around there better ships then you can take them and claim it as your own - you didn't think that you'd actually need to buy ships, its a pirates game - i dont think you can even buy ships.
After a good few months of sailng around and blowing up any poor ship foolish enough to cross your path you end up with a stockpile the size of a small country and a fleet that would scare the spanish. Even this gets a little tiresome so you pull into cities to find more pointless and slightly repetative tasks to do, talk to the governer, dance with his daughter, get a funny hat (no joke, promotions get you better hats untill Duke when you have the hat of hats) and buy something worthless of the strange man at the back of the tavern - only thing worth buying is the dancing stuff (means you dont have to do all the work in the hardest part of the game).
Upon leaving the tavern you may happen to talk to the barkeep, who will tell you of an evil man and where he lies, naturally he has kidnapped you family and you have to hunt him down. Now the only setting this makes sense on is the easiest where you kill him once and you get the map. On any other difficulty you have to capture and sink his ship like 4 times,think the evil guy must get tired of that ... especially seeing as you have to rescure four members of your family resulting in this poor 'villian' being assualted and mugged 16 times thats just downright rude. Saying that though, its almost impossible to get round to your uncle (i think he's last or maybe its mother, not sure) as it takes ages to get the first guy (your sis, i know taht one fo sho) and when your crew complains you have to sail to the nearest freindly city and divide the plunder - even when your the best pirate on the sea you have to give away your millions to your crew and they take all your other ships - which not only takes your money but also takes away about a year of your lifespan. YEAH LIFESPAN, this game will cut off your campaign if you reach the grand old age of 80, admittably this is fair cos the sea is no place for a pensioner with the sharks and suchlike but surely being the youngest of the family by 60 the rest are all going to be dead. Its the 1600 for god's sake that era's not known for its longlivity! - probably a word, look it up - its known for wars and quite a bit of notlonglivity - defintly a word, honest.
Anyway back to the game. In essence the game is good, its addictive with enough repetative tasks that you forget there repetative - right up until your fucking crew whine at you for the umteentrillionth time then the anger quit kicks in and you lose the last 3 hours of game in one fit of rage. That happened to me and the game now sits in my bin, in half with what looks like a footprint on it waiting to be taken away by the bin men.
Summery: Annoying but alright in small doses (should come with hooker in the box for stress relief after)
- - Silver Out
... oh and STOP - that'll teach you to skim read my review!
For those who haven't played this classic need to get a little understanding of it first, for those who have just skim until you see STOP in big bold letters then start reading again, got it? Good.
Basically its pirate galore, buy a ship then a fleet get a better hat and woo the pretty ladies its a pretty simple game but it technically has a story line but only the pros follow that and its usually by accident. As all RPG's ...ever ... you start shit dn build up. On creation you get this tiny sloop of war and have to sign up with one of the 4 countries - Spain (they attacked britain so dont pick) Germany (attacked britian so dont pick) France (att... oh read above) and England (who technically have attacked england with the whole civil war thing but geez we still won ... technically ... a little bit). Theres no real benefit to picking any unless your in the later period cos thats when britain start to dominate.
You then set out with your little boat and your countries pride only to find that every ... EVERY other ship out there is much bigger better and carrying many more troops than you. Fun right? wel no not really, the only good thing is the AI is shit so even a little tactics will get you around there better ships then you can take them and claim it as your own - you didn't think that you'd actually need to buy ships, its a pirates game - i dont think you can even buy ships.
After a good few months of sailng around and blowing up any poor ship foolish enough to cross your path you end up with a stockpile the size of a small country and a fleet that would scare the spanish. Even this gets a little tiresome so you pull into cities to find more pointless and slightly repetative tasks to do, talk to the governer, dance with his daughter, get a funny hat (no joke, promotions get you better hats untill Duke when you have the hat of hats) and buy something worthless of the strange man at the back of the tavern - only thing worth buying is the dancing stuff (means you dont have to do all the work in the hardest part of the game).
Upon leaving the tavern you may happen to talk to the barkeep, who will tell you of an evil man and where he lies, naturally he has kidnapped you family and you have to hunt him down. Now the only setting this makes sense on is the easiest where you kill him once and you get the map. On any other difficulty you have to capture and sink his ship like 4 times,think the evil guy must get tired of that ... especially seeing as you have to rescure four members of your family resulting in this poor 'villian' being assualted and mugged 16 times thats just downright rude. Saying that though, its almost impossible to get round to your uncle (i think he's last or maybe its mother, not sure) as it takes ages to get the first guy (your sis, i know taht one fo sho) and when your crew complains you have to sail to the nearest freindly city and divide the plunder - even when your the best pirate on the sea you have to give away your millions to your crew and they take all your other ships - which not only takes your money but also takes away about a year of your lifespan. YEAH LIFESPAN, this game will cut off your campaign if you reach the grand old age of 80, admittably this is fair cos the sea is no place for a pensioner with the sharks and suchlike but surely being the youngest of the family by 60 the rest are all going to be dead. Its the 1600 for god's sake that era's not known for its longlivity! - probably a word, look it up - its known for wars and quite a bit of notlonglivity - defintly a word, honest.
Anyway back to the game. In essence the game is good, its addictive with enough repetative tasks that you forget there repetative - right up until your fucking crew whine at you for the umteentrillionth time then the anger quit kicks in and you lose the last 3 hours of game in one fit of rage. That happened to me and the game now sits in my bin, in half with what looks like a footprint on it waiting to be taken away by the bin men.
Summery: Annoying but alright in small doses (should come with hooker in the box for stress relief after)
- - Silver Out
... oh and STOP - that'll teach you to skim read my review!
