Reviewed: August 22, 2003
Reviewed by: John Carswell
Publisher
Bethesda Softworks
Developer
Akella
Released: June 30, 2003
Genre: Action/RPG
Players: 1
ESRB: Teen
9
10
8
9
9.0
System Requirements
Pirates of the Caribbean (POTC), previously known as Sea Dogs II, has virtually nothing to do with the movie by the same name. It was a happy coincidence on Bethesda’s part that they had a Pirate-based game nearing completion just as Pirates of the Caribbean’s hype train was leaving the harbor. For those unfamiliar with the original Sea Dogs, it was a brilliant-but-flawed RPG that let you take on the role of a pirate, merchant, privateer, or whatever else suited your playing style.
POTC follows its predecessor’s example by providing an enthralling, pseudo-Sailing Sim/RPG with a core story that players have the freedom to follow or ignore. Combining RPG elements, exploration, swashbuckling, mercantilism, and sailing, POTC aims to provide a deep and freeform gaming experience. Whether or not POTC’s developer, Akella has succeeded depends on your playing style. I suspect that many gamers (included myself) will be spending far too much time raising havoc on the high seas for months to come.
I was a huge fan of Sea Dogs and couldn’t wait for a sequel. Although the game felt unfinished in places, I felt that a sequel would add the polish Sea Dogs needed to become a true classic. While POTC is a huge leap forward and improves upon the Sea Dogs formula in almost everyway, it would appear that Akella has once again bitten off slightly more than it can chew as a host of new rough edges has appeared. Thankfully, as with Sea Dogs, a few quirks here and there do little to detract from an otherwise-brilliant game.
As an RPG, POTC is somewhat lopsided. As you would expect, after successfully completing a mission, surviving a storm, or leaving a battle as the victor, you gain experience points and eventually “level up”. Once you’ve gained a level, you can invest a few skill points in disciplines ranging from improved commerce skills to improved cannon accuracy and fencing skills. There are a healthy number of skills available so you won’t find yourself twenty hours into the game without room for advancement.
Even better is the Ability system, which closely resembles the PERK system found in Fallout, Fallout 2, and the recently released, Lion Heart. In essence, for each level gained, you are able to “buy” a special ability that you will retain throughout the game. For instance, a defensive player may choose abilities that decrease the amount of damage their ship takes during battle or someone who enjoys trading may choose a skill that removes penalties for trading in banned merchandise.
All of this works very well and your choices have an immediate and obvious affect. In addition, you’re able to hire “specialists” in taverns who will add to your overall sailing skills when at see. However (and much to my disappointment), you will not find a Charisma attribute since the storyline is very linear. With most modern RPG’s featuring branching conversational systems, playing an RPG where my choices and attitude are almost completely predetermined is very restrictive and gives this area of the game a “dated” feel.
The story behind POTC is something of a “Romancing the Stone” affair. You play as Nathaniel Hawke, the brash freelance captain with a heart of gold who finds himself in the service of a morally questionable English mayor. Entering on stage left is the Nathaniel’s equally brash love interest with whom he shares a love/hate relationship. Soon they find themselves embroiled in a hunt for a long-forgotten artifact that will let them put and end to a seemingly unstoppable threat. I really didn’t find the story all the interesting and due to its linear nature, my character kept doing and saying things that were the polar opposite of what I’d prefer.
No matter, if you’re like me and would rather ignore the storyline to strike out on your own, the aforementioned shortcomings become a non-issue. I was quickly doing odd jobs for whoever would have me and saving my money for a better ship. After escorting many nervous merchants across dangerous waterways and running cargo back and forth, I was able to buy my first “real” ship. That was when the real fun began. In no time, I was hiring First Mates and amassing a small army with ships we “borrowed” from pirates who mistook us for easy prey. Although I never choose do take this route, I could have become a pirate—ransacking empirical ships for their crew and cargo and even taken over entire towns and collected taxes. Instead, I opted for the civil route of protecting vessels under pirate attacks and running lucrative trade routes.
As mentioned earlier, there are many ships available in POTC. They are all given a Class rating and have unique attributes that should accommodate any playing style. I generally stuck with the more nimble craft but could just have easily chosen lumbering battle ships bristling with cannons or cargo vessels with their enormous carrying capacity. Since you can hire people capable of commanding their own ships, you could even create a well-balanced armada with a large cargo ship and a handful of escorts to form a formidable financial and militaristic force.
Of course, maintaining a fleet isn’t cheap and a skirmish or even a little rough weather can leave your hull and sails in horrid condition, not to mention many of your crew dead. Even if your trade routes go smoothly, your crew doesn’t follow your orders for the fun of it: you’ll need to pay these guys every once and awhile or risk having them mutiny against you which ends the game. Because of this, you must make sure that your excursions are profitable or risk becoming the captain of a beaten up old ship or--worse yet--dead.
Since you’ll spend much of your time sailing between islands, an excellent navigational system is called for. Unfortunately, Akella saw fit to replace Sea Dog’s rudimentary-but-functional navigational system with a distinctly arcade-like world map. Essentially, to travel from one island to the next you must pilot a little ship across a map full of storms and pirates that you must avoid or attack. The controls during these sequences are very loose and are reminiscent of old, top-down racers and do little to retain the sailing-spirit present elsewhere in the game. On its own, I suppose that the system works fine. However, in the context of an otherwise-engrossing game, it feels shallow and out of place.
For those times when combat becomes necessary (or simply beneficial), POTC has an excellent combat system in place. Although it all boils down to getting your guns pointed in the right direction and ordering the crew to fire, factors such as wind conditions, ship speed, and the number of ships that you’re up against help to keep things interesting. To give a few examples, if you’re in a solo cargo vessel and find yourself faced with three attacking pirates, you have little choice but to run. In a situation like this, you’ll need to load your cannons with knipples: a weapon made to do maximum damage to the sails of your enemies. Turning your craft in the direction that will best take advantage of the wind, you let loose your cannons and pray that you do enough damage to the pirates sails so that they fall behind, letting you make your escape.
On the other hand, should you find yourself faced with a ship that you’d rather claim as your own or whose cargo you’d like to plunder, entirely different techniques must be employed. I found that pounding the enemy ship at a distance with standard cannon balls and explosives made for an excellent opening volley. Then, knocking out there sails with knipples, I would close in on the now-crippled ship. Finally, just before grappling onto the target ship, I’d load my cannons with “grape” shots, turning each cannon into huge shotguns and tearing apart the enemy ship’s crew.
Once you’ve grappled onto and enemy ship, the game switches to the third person point of view and you engage the enemy in sword-to-sword combat, fighting your way through the ship until what’s left of the enemy crew surrenders. For those of you who have played Sea Dogs, you’ll find this process has been greatly improved since you actually run from one deck to the next and must fight multiple enemies along side your crew rather than just a one-on-one fight with the opposing captain. Once the ship has been captured, you can load its cargo onto your ship or—should you have hired someone capable piloting the captured vessel—escort it to the nearest harbor, have it repaired, and add it to your fleet.
Of course, you’ll need to land every once and awhile and--should you choose to stick with the central story--you’ll be doing so quite often. The average island will have a number of landing points, be it an official dock, beach, or hidden cove. The towns vary in size but are generally large and split up into zones to keep things manageable. While the atmosphere here is excellent, navigating a town can often become a chore. For whatever reason, Akella marked important buildings (taverns, stores, shipyards, etc.) with very small signs that blend into the buildings, rendering them almost invisible. There is always the option to “Quick Travel” to places of interest, which is effectively a teleportation system. However, this system also kills much of the town’s immersive qualities. I have no doubt that many hardcore RPG gamers will want to avoid this feature altogether which will leave them wandering around, looking for seemingly hidden stores and taverns.
POTC also lets you wander outside of town but only allows you to walk along certain paths. This allows you to explore the island, dungeon-type areas, and even move from one town to the next. In addition, if you have hired advanced crewmembers, they will follow you during these excursions and help you should a fight break out. While this is a welcome feature and allows for some exciting run-ins with robber-gangs, the limits placed on where the player can go feel out of place in a game that generally provides so much freedom. Ultimately, it’s a decent feature but I found it to be a low-point in POTC and could easily have done without it.
Sword-to-sword combat is simple but surprisingly good. The left mouse button swings your sword while the right button blocks incoming attacks. You are also able to do a basic dodge maneuver and fire your side arm. As you progress through the game and invest skill and ability points in combat, you are able to purchase and use better weapons. Again, it’s a very simple system but is also not the focus of POTC so that fact that it was enjoyable is more than enough for me.
To put it simply, I’ve never played a more beautiful game. As the screenshots will attest, POTC not only has a technically strong engine, but one that has been used to great effect. Rather than simply being a hodgepodge of eye-candy and special effects, POTC is instead a true work of art with every bell and whistle used tastefully to create a breath-taking and believable environment.
Naturally, you can’t talk about POTC’s graphics without first mentioning its water. If you’ve played Morrowind then you have some idea of what to expect. However, the water in POTC is far more convincing since it correctly reflects the atmosphere around it. On a sunny day, the water will glint and sparkle; if the weather is getting a little choppy, you can expect the sea to darken and sway your boat with its growing waves; should the sun be near the horizon, you’ll see a spear of red and yellow slice across the slightly-opaque ocean’s surface.
The weather and atmosphere in POTC are equally impressive. Whether it’s the sun hiding behind the clouds and setting them aglow, torrential rains pounding down around you, or a quiet evening on the high seas with a full moon lighting your way, POTC never fails to impress. However, the most dramatic moments come when you find yourself battling a storm. The black skies flicker momentarily with bolts of lighting; huge, dark waves lift your ship up and send it crashing back down, throwing sea spray across your bow; all of this while the silhouette of a nearby island waits ominously for you to get a too close. Being caught in a major storm in POTC is on of the few moments in gaming that I’d truly considering to be menacing.
Even on land where you’re immune to POTC’s hypnotizing water effects, the graphics still more than hold their own. Villages have a decent number of pedestrians rambling about and the buildings and cottages are well textured and have a natural feel to them. Wandering through the jungle is a mixed bag since the lack of go-anywhere gameplay removes some of the “living, breathing world” feel present throughout the rest of the game. There is also the niggling issue of below average character animation. Nevertheless, the textures here too are excellent and little touches like foliage that move underfoot or roll with the wind keeps things visually appealing.
POTC’s music is all over the place. At its best, the music either captures the spirit of the game and its period, or has a quiet, cinematic feel. At its less pleasant end reside the New Age-ish songs and even more off base, the beat-heavy tunes that would be more at home on The Matrix’s soundtrack. Overall though, the music hides in the background, quietly adding to POTC’s atmosphere.
As for sounds effects, POTC does quite well. In taverns, you will often find yourself surrounded by the outbursts of drunken sailors. Ships creak appropriately, their cannons make a satisfying “boom” and—should your ship catch fire—the growing flames crackly away as they breakdown your hull. As with the music, aside from the thundering of ships in combat, POTC’s sound effects work well at discreetly adding ambiance.
While POTC doesn’t offer the depth and replay value of Morrowind or Fallout 2, fans of exploration-heavy RPG’s will likely find plenty to do once they jump off the “rails” and just do whatever pleases them. However, if you like your RPG’s more linear with a deep and rich story then POTC might not have enough to hold your interest. Needless to say, being an eye-candy junkie or a Pirate buff helps immeasurably.
So few games let players enjoy the experience of sailing the high seas that I’m ecstatic that Akella has created such a solid title in a market devoid of competitors. I’ve already invested far too many hours in Pirates of the Caribbean and will still be playing it long after this review. Gorgeous graphics, in-depth gameplay, and a compelling environment easily make POTC one of my favorite games of 2003.
RPG fans who absolutely demand a deep storyline and rich character development may find POTC something of a letdown and adrenaline junkies will likely find PTOC to be too slow. However, if you love exploring an in-game world with a rich atmosphere or are a fan of open-ended gameplay, POTC is a must-buy. As was the case with Sea Dogs, I love POTC but view it as a flawed gem. I hope that the next installment in the Sea Dogs/POTC series will focus on refining the current gameplay rather than trying to add further features.