Port Royale 2

I have tried every suggestion online on how to get this game to run past the menu screen but nothingworks. I have tried compatabilty modes, running as admin, etc,etc and all I ever get is a black screen whenever I try to even start a campaign or free play mode. I can hear the background noises (birds the waves crashing) but the screen stays black and I am forced to ctr + alt + del to bring up the task manger just to be told PR2 not responding.

I've spent at least 600 hours playing this game from my childhood till now. It's fantastic.

PR1 had a lot of gamecrashing bugs. This is fairly stable.

Port Royale 2, like its predecessor, is set in the Caribbean of the XVII century. It is an age and place where one can earn large sums of money if he's got the right skills and knows how to put them to good use... or lose the same amount of money if he doesn't pay attention to the events enfolding around him. It is part of a series of games developed by Ascaron Entertainment, consisting of the Patrician and Port Royale games, and if you haven't played any of them previously, this is probably the best one to try first, as it is a fair bit easier than any of the other games. Basically, the premise of the game is this: you get a ship and a certain amount of money, and you're free to do with it as you please. And there are a number of things to with it, but first, you'll most likely have to stick to trading. There are 20 types of goods (divided into five categories, namely basic goods, raw materials, products, colonial goods and import goods) in the game, you can trade in any of them, and, if you know where to buy them cheap, can make quite a fortune. Every settlement in the region has certain goods it produces most efficiently, which is partly determined by its type - for example, colonial towns produce raw materials (such as corn), which have to be transported to the governor towns which make the appropriate finished product out of it (in this case, meat). The fact that you can only find raw materials and colonial goods in colonial towns and finished products and import goods in governor towns creates a strong dependency between the cities, and guess who has the (well-paying) duty of supplying towns with whatever they need? That's right, you, and your fellow traders! (This separation of towns into two categories is one of the reasons this game is easier than the first Port Royale or any of the Patrician games.) An interesting possibility players have is that of building your own business. That's right, with the proper money and raw materials, you can have your own plantations/industries running, provided you also bring some free settlers into the town from other places to work in them AND provide them with housing (which gives the game some extra depth). However, trading isn't the only way to invest your money. Once you have some wealth accumulated, you can invest in new ships, either to expand your trade empire or to wage battle on others. There is a fair number of ships in Port Royale 2, each with its own strengths and weaknesses, and you only have to choose one that suits your needs from those currently available in the port. The governors, mentioned already in the title, have very important roles. First, you can pick up missions from them. These come in a variety, from supplying a town with everything for a given amount of time, to capturing enemy fleets, to rescuing the governor's wife's puddle from an enemy city (no kidding!). These are a good source of income, and also increase your reputation with the country whose governor entrusted you with them. Higher reputation means the towns of the country will have more favorable prices for you. Since the era of the game isn't exactly a time of world peace, you can also buy letters of marque from the governors (which are an other way to blow your money, as they cost quite a bit, but can also yield high profits), meaning that you'll be their buccaneer, giving you the possibility of hunting down enemy ships without having to suffer global disdain for it. Above these, governors can give their daughters' hands to you in marriage, which means access to some exclusive pieces information (such as the prices of the four most sought goods in a certain country or the location the pirate who poses the greatest danger for the town was last spotted). As you accumulate your wealth, you gain ranks, meaning you can have ever more fleets and building permissions (needed to build buildings in a town). This is the other area where Port Royale 2 is easier than its related games: you only need money to advance in ranks. If you choose to do combat (either with pirates or an enemy nation), you just have to equip a good number of ships with powerful cannons and ammunition, then go hunting. Unfortunately, battles are quite a weak point of the game, because you can only ever have one ship under your command against a fleet of 1-5 enemy ships, with your other ships called in when the previous one is captured/destroyed/forced to flee. It doesn't mean battles are impossibly difficult (with the proper ships and tactics they are still doable), but it can get incredibly frustrating. The other not-so-great feature of the game is that once you have a considerable amount of money and very powerful fleets, it can get somewhat repetitive. Sure, you can always open new businesses and you have to pay upkeep after your ships, but it can still lead to a monotonous game experience. All in all, despite its shortcomings, Port Royale 2 is a very well-made and interesting sandbox-style game which gives players many things to do. I can recommend it to both new players of the genre and veterans who've played the Patrician games and/or Port Royale.

Got it to work when Compatibility Mode was set to Windows 95. Under Compatibility-Settings "Disable visual themes" was marked (by gog default i assume). Hope it works for others.