Risen 2: Dark Waters
Risen 2 is a third person open world action roleplaying game made by Piranha Bytes, the team that gave us the Gothic games and of course the first Risen game. It’s hard to talk about Risen 2 without referring to their previous games, which I’ll call ‘PB games’ for short.
To summarize: Risen 2 sometimes feels like a ‘PB game lite’ but it’s certainly not completely dumbed down from previous PB games. The atmosphere and the ‘feel’ of the PB games is there, so I’ll enjoy playing this game more than I would 9 out of 10 similar games. The fact that melee combat is almost as bad as it was in Gothic 3 and the absence of ‘real’ magic are the only two problems that certainly knock off some points in the final score for Risen 2.
– Real player with 74.2 hrs in game
Read More: Best Pirates Open World Games.
It is very difficult to recommend this game because depending on your personal preferences, it can either be a wealth of unpleasantness or it can, as I have in the end perceived it, be a gem of extraordinary substance and enjoyment although in a wierd way.
Warning: This will be quite a lenghty review where I try to outline in detail the great drawbacks of the game as well as the great features about it.
First off, I will state all of the unpleasant aspects of this game and if anything I mention seems unacceptable, better to stay away from it as it is a game that not everyone will enjoy and it can be difficult to grasp.
– Real player with 69.2 hrs in game
Blood and Gold: Caribbean!
Tl&dr: whatever you expect from this game (M&B battle style, trading), search for it somewhere else, it is not difficult to find something better.
Mount & Blade engine, extended trading system, naval combat, main story… sounds perfect, what could go wrong? These were my thoughts when I bought this game and I got my answer very quick.. too quick. Everything can go wrong.
Honestly, it feels like someone took Mount & Blade, Sid Meier’s Pirates and Port Royale, stripped all the good parts from all these games and then mashed them together.
– Real player with 130.7 hrs in game
Read More: Best Pirates Naval Games.
Ok, so my review is basically a bug list that needs fixing from the devs:
Crashes when trying to retreat during special missions. Being able to see the battle play out is ok, but your maps often mess up the pathing, and then it can take forever. There’s no way back to the menu screen then.
Not being able to control your men during special missions. If you ask me to do a 31 v 31 skirmish with native gear against armed enemies, then letting me use the basic mount and blade commands would be nice
– Real player with 100.3 hrs in game
Sea Dogs: To Each His Own - Pirate Open World RPG
Heads up, this review is LONG. There will be a TL;DR at the bottom.
This game is a gem, covered in a pile of shit. If you’ve read negative reviews for the game I hate to say that most of them are very much accurate. This game is very unwieldy, hard to learn, harder to master, and really doesn’t teach you anything. The closest this game has to a tutorial is essentially a few hours of being stuck on one island doing small quests to make enough money to buy a small ship. Unfortunately, this means you likely won’t know if you want to keep the game or not until after the refund period has passed.
– Real player with 663.4 hrs in game
Read More: Best Pirates Naval Games.
Very OLD Akella Pirates game player here when “dinosaurs ruled the earth”.
I basically played the entire game in Russian (no DLC) before it was released in English offline.
I recently went back and have been playing the DLCs online, and my immediate review is still valid in any case.
The game series has been around since 2000. Published by Akella, and eveloped by various studios. This is actually the SIXTH game in the series. Sea Dogs, POTC (Sea Dogs Modification, SD2, the bad disney production), Age of Pirates (AoP) , Tortuga - Two Treasures, AoP2:COAS (City of Abandoned Ships) , and POTEHO (SDTEHO). Black Mark Studios has most of the original modders and designs from the original games. SDTEHO has MANY of the same landmarks as COAS and similar quests. Personally, I am partial to COAS for many reasons, but predominantly the freedom to do whatever the hell you want very early.
– Real player with 504.8 hrs in game
Sid Meier’s Pirates!
Facts:
One time I played this game instead of studying for midterms. I never did better on midterms in my life.
Opinions:
This game is minigame-based-game-making done right. Sailing, naval battles, land battles, swordfights, dancing, sneaking into and out of town, and searching for treasure are each done in distinct minigames which are (except for sneaking and searching) engaging enough that I never think, “Aww, dang, THIS again. If only I could skip this.” (and sneaking and searching are only needed rarely enough to be a nice change of pace 90% of the times).
– Real player with 227.4 hrs in game
“SAIL HO!
The lookout reports a sail on the horizon.
Shall we?”
…
I don’t know how many times I saw that phrase in the past. I must tell you, that I’m in an easy, yet really hard position to share my view about this game. Because how could I write a subjective review, while being an ultimate fan of “PIRATES!” C64 version? Just look at my avatar here… :)
Some reviewers here already shared some really useful and detailed information about certain parts of the game… “pros and cons” are known for now… so for this time, let me please share my feelings, impressions, and express my passion for the game with you instead. Hence this won’t be a “generic” game review.
– Real player with 76.2 hrs in game
A pirate quartermaster
Don’t overlook this curious little gem of a game! Do yourself a favor and give it a try. I’ve never played anything quite like it.
As an added bonus the developer is very active and present, and has already provided several bug fixes and added improvements.
Edit 16th of October:
An earlier version of this review mentioned that the game needed some serious rebalancing, as it was very difficult to keep going for any significant amount of watches. The developer has since changed a number of things, and it is now much, much easier to progress in my experience.
– Real player with 92.0 hrs in game
This game is truly charming.
It has got style and character and a great atmosphere (it does not struggle to create a feel-good one).
You gotta love the music, absolutely enjoyable and this goes for most everything of this game.
It also has very good achievements that are desirable but seldomly quick to get.
They let you know there is more adventure for you in this game sort of in addition to the already
solid watch to watch “routine” of being the quartermaster.
Make smart decisions (one of them is not to think “1 portion” ought to be enough when there is no better reason to skimp there other than saving a few coins when that is not crucial) and you can sail a fearsome, capable pirate ship you will mourn to ever lose. This might even entail mourning the loss of your former captain (I admit that happened to me ;-) ).
– Real player with 54.1 hrs in game
Girls' civilization 2
Before the game launched I had it on my wish-list since it was announced, When the game first launched I tried the Demo, the game used to drop you in the ocean with a chest and it was hard to pick everything up. it was very frustrating that it put me off from buying the game. I tried the Demo again today after it updated, now you start the game locked up. I like the game now and It finally got my interest to buy it. some of the things you can do in the game is better then I hoped for when I first heard about the game.
– Real player with 9.3 hrs in game
Fun but optimised by drunk monkeys.
the game itself can be pretty fun, funny a times too when you forget the button to interact and end up punching someone, only to end up on the receiving end of a musket volley.
stuff like having to manage your ammo supplies by adding bullets to magazines or trying not to starve to death gave it a surprising bit of difficulty.
but all this is under one big issue, performance, more specifically the morphing blurs when you move. it isnt at all bad when playing desktop mode but it makes playing in VR a bit of a challenge.
– Real player with 2.5 hrs in game
Man of the World
It is possible to become a famous musician, take part in medieval battles, earn a fortune from trade, become a thief of women’s hearts or an avid duelist. The game allows you to do all this.
Peachleaf Pirates
Playing status: 51/52 achievement, finished the game (I don’t know how to get the last achievement)
Grindy Achievement(s): Yes (~10 achievements which can take ~20.6h to finish).
Optional Achievement(s): Yes (~41 achievements).
Difficult Achievement(s): No.
Intro
The farming sim genre has been on the rise recently. They usually have similar mechanics as Harvest Moon, although other games try to mix it with other genres. Seeing that Peachleaf Pirates is a combination of point and click and farming sim elements, I become curious about how the result will be, especially since both don’t seem to be similar in the control scheme.
– Real player with 40.1 hrs in game
UPDATED ***
Thanks to the developer for letting me know about the information, i now finished the game.
I really enjoyed the farming side of the game, the combat was also fun, but i found the click and point side of the game a bit repeditive, just like the last part of the game i had to criss cross the map i think 4 times just to finish in 1 day.
Overall 6/10
after 20 hours i give up on this “point and click RPG” parts of the game, its not clear at all what to do , i see multiple side quests but they aren’t logged on the journal , i spend 40 minutes to complete a quest to save a parrot only to find out it didn’t continue the story at all and only gave me a discount at a shop i no longer need to use. Another i found a “winning ticket” to a casino which wouldn’t let you into the casino and i assume its for voodoo but the voodoo woman has dissappeared. Once this game has a properly designed walkthrough to help you when you get stuck this game is a big thumbs down. I really was enjoying all of the other elements of the game but the “point and click problem solving” needs a lot more “problem solving” from the developer. A hint system or something and ad all the minor things to quests and let us know what actually moves the story forward and what is a side quest like the parrot mission.
– Real player with 22.4 hrs in game
Sea Dogs: Caribbean Tales
I like the freedom to just do what ever you like in the game as far as pirating/trading/missions. And the open world aspect and the way you can capture ships to upgrade/sell or add to your own fleet.
– Real player with 123.4 hrs in game
a nice game, good game play. i really enjoyed it. I cannot confirm the bug reports. The game was stable at all times.
– Real player with 26.6 hrs in game
Sea Dogs
Yes it’s old, but it places its emphasis in sea battles on sailing and strategy. You can’t just load guns in 3 seconds and then switch from solid balls to grapeshot without going through another reload. Turn rate and speed are crucial to monitor. And the story line is fun, too.
– Real player with 94.4 hrs in game
Fascinating game. It was great years ago, and I finished it again with great pleasure nowadays. And that’s not a call of nostalgia. There are many old games which didn’t age well, but I can’t say such a thing about this one. Yes, it’s graphics will not impress you these days and some gameplay mechanics are rather old. But the game brings an enthralling non linear story, great music and atmosphere as well as interesting albeit little clunky gameplay.
The game is 20 years old, but it has unique walkthrough for 4 different nations and unique dialogs for all characters, not just secondary ones, but even unimportant ones. For example, there is no copy-cat tavern keepers or store owners with standard phrases. Each one has his own character, story or even quest. And a word about quests. There is no copy-paste quests as well. Each one is unique and there is a lot of them. Believe or not, but it is the only game where I still remember the names of most of the characters after so many years.
– Real player with 41.5 hrs in game