Explore the Caribbean sea and towns in the predecessor to the best open-ended buccaneer game of all time! In this one your goal is to become the Governor. You can choose between 4 different character nationalities from English, French, Dutch or Spanish. Along the way you decide your character's career path, and live an adventurer's life, where you will follow all assigned missions and tasks. You will be able to buy maps to hidden treasures, find secret pirate hovels, trade between all 60 available cities, build up your own business or become a pirate! And whatever you choose sooner or later you will participate in beautiful sea battles.
Port Royale places the player within real historic locations. You are given the option to choose between 4 different times in history – 1570, 1600, 1630 or 1660. Each of these timelines has direct influence over the game play. You will witness wars, disasters and much more in this rich and dangerous world. So be prepared for everything and ready your cutlass and pistol – the adventure awaits!
Age requirements: ESRB Rating: TEEN with Alcohol Reference, Mild Violence. PEGI Rating: 7+ with Violence.
Minimum system requirements: Windows XP or Windows Vista, 1 GHz Processor (1.4 GHz recommended), 256MB RAM (512 recommended), 3D graphics card compatible with DirectX 7 (compatible with DirectX 9 recommended), Monitor (or display scaling tool) capable of displaying a 1024x768 resolution, Mouse, Keyboard.
Average customer rating 4.0 out of 5.0
Differences between Port Royale & Port Royale 2
(by
ufo7)
In owning Port Royale and enjoying it a lot, I decided to buy Port Royale 2.
Think Sid Miers Pirates!, but less swords and more economy and trading. Setting trade routes and making products to sell is where this game excels. Sure, you can make easy cash by attacking anything near you on the high seas and then selling off the boats you capture, but making your own pirate hideout/town... full review is so much more satisfying!
Whilst PR2 has much better control mechanisims and overall a much more fluid and easier to control game, PR1 looks better graphics wise as it is able to be run at a higher graphics setting within the game. PR1 has a graphics control menu that is far more customiseable than PR2, and anyone interested in puchasing either game needs to consider the obvious graphics quality difference in the two titles if youre a running a relatively modern computer.
I have a 21" monitor and native setting is 1600x1200. PR1 takes advantage of this and looks A LOT better than PR2 (which doesnt have anywhere near as much customising in display settings and is actually locked at a lower resolution than this and is unable to be changed).
Gameplay wise, both are very similar. PR2 is perhaps a little easier to play as controls/keyboard shortcuts have been improved somewhat. Both are worth owning- but again, those with higher specced machines need to decide whether they sacrifice a little bit of control for a much better looking game, or go over to PR2 which is has updated controls but looks bad on a 1600x1200 system (as its locked at 1024x768). If you are playing on an older machine- go PR2.
One last major consideration or difference between both games is the sea battles (if you are like me and enjoy taking full control of your fleet)... PR2's battles are much more simplified (a little too much), where they limit you to only 1 ship to control. In PR1, you can pause and give orders to multiple ships- very handy when you have smaller boats trying to take on a frigate or 2. If you prefer to just "Auto Battle", then dont worry about it!
Also, make sure you have up to date nvidia graphics drivers if you happen to be running 2 graphics cards in SLI mode, as I initially had display issues seeing world map. Overall a great game... and very easy to sink lots of hours into.
I like games and movies about pirates. Port Royale is one pf the better representative of theese games.
Game takes place at Caribbean seas and islands durring 16th - 17th century.
You are dropped in middle of this mess so you can have life full of glory. Trade peacefully or angage in piracy - it's your choice.
Game has some elements similiar to Sid Meire's Pirates!... full review but I think some things can't be done different in different games so there is career mangement, real-time combat between ships, treasure maps and side missions, including searching for lost famili members...sounds familiar? ;-).
There is one large difference. Port Royale is imho pretty harder but fortunatelle tutorial provides some help. You don't have difficulty setting for game (overall) but instead some smaller options and settings because ow which game can be made harder or easier.
There are four nations to choose with - England, France, Holland and Spain. Choosing one of them determines your starting port and reputation/hostility from other ones.
Ship battles are made in 3D, rest of game is nice old drawn 2D, detailed and crisp. Sound effects are done good enough, so the music which helps to pass hours of playing unnoticed :-).
So put Jolly Roger on mast and prepare for boarding!
Fight, trade. Caribbean seas are waiting for you!
(by
espritgo)
Port Royale is next, after Patrician II QUest for Power, game developed by german company Ascaron Software and as title states brings you to seas and islnds od the Caribbean in full bloom of piracy time durring XVI - XVII century.... full review
You start with one ship, hometown; depended of which main power you choose (France, England, Spain, Holland) and rest of of Caribbean is waiting for you to explore it. Each nations has different buildings, ships and anrchitecture types. You get missions from your starting nation (transport or combat ones) so you can improve rank and fight in defend of your country and king.
You can also trade (20 different goods, dynamic economu model), improving or hurting reputation at different towns, start your own manufacture or plantation, even pick up a storyline and follow it (finding lost family members).
Main focus in game is ship to ship combat. You can command up to ten 'fleets', each with max 10 ships so you can command even 100 ships so sometimes combat may be little messy...
Graphic side is well made, good drawn. Main view of map and towns is in 2D while ships combat is 3D, all good animated.
One final word about learning curve. Game sometimes can be little hard and frustrating, it's definetely not the one you can just sit and play. For example you build a plantation, warehouse and establish a trade route. Suddenly you are star loosing money instead of earning and you can found why yourself because game isn't helping you. So game is good but be aware that you have to be good 'essentially' prepared to playing... Economy model in game can be hard, don't forget Ascaron made Patrician ealier...
ufo7)
zigfried77)
espritgo)