The verdict was rendered almost immediately, this is not a great game, BUT..... I propose to you, as disappointing as it was, it is on a level of sophistication anc executed in such a way that represent an exquisite achievement and near perfection in the context of comparison to Skyrim.... Ultima 9 was generations earlier and totally wipes the floor with every single elder scrolls game by any metric. Boosh. 🏆🥳 I'll go further and say that d&d in general is definitely a juvenile, unexceptional offering, disappointing in the way a disney movie is disappointing to an adult who isn't indulging children but is expected to take it seriously.
You want to know why this game sucks? Well, thereby hangs a tail. I have never researched the development background but my intuition from playing the game is that there were very talented and desirable people involved on creating this title, however, nearly nearly every decision made at every step in production was ultimately unfortunate. The background story and intro very standard but perhaps a little better than average. If you've ever encountered pirate content of any kind you're familiar. Broad appeal was surely the goal and they were successful for what that's worth. The rolling waves and pitching deck of the ship were thrilling. The details of cannons and gunnery were interesting and had the sparkle of authenticity. There was a learning curve that was respectable. However, once mastered, all those seemingly desirable highlights were so much useless weight on a very banal offering. In the long run all the impressive advances brought by the 3d presentation were meaningless decoration. Eventually you would realize that the much more effective method of play was to use the 2d mini map rather than first person, skipping ahead to relevant momenta rather than slog through the nightmare of sailing simulation, and autofire your cannons with the spacebar rather that aim in first person. Everything that was supposed to add value was dead weight using far more resources on your pc than was necessary or appropriate. At the core there was almost nothing about this game that wasn't done roughly equally well by literally every other pirate game ever. The only novelty that stuck out in my mind was really nothing to write home about. What if steamship, essentially. An exponentially superior game of the era and genre that is a better investment of your time is called (I believe) Sid Meier's pirates. A couple years newer of I remember right and worthy of praise.
I picked up a copy of this game from a friend's younger brother around maybe 2005 or 2006 when it was no longer new. I squandered my time fully completing this game offline for no reason and deriving modest enjoyment. I never want to be near a copy of this software again. This game is not cool and does not play fair. I remember a lame lizard guy boss who was a former ally or something that you had to fight to the death for some reason that was surely absurd for the prize of his dumb signature grenade launcher. I remember it was so ridiculous the only method was to irl metaphorically "use the force" because there was no legitimate way to know what was going on, such was the baffling confusion of gameplay. Just shoot where it would be nice if they suddenly appeared so you could move on. I'm suppressing recall of how many attempts were required, but I know I played the game through at least twice. Ultimately, rejoice in the fact that Fortnite is free to play and represents a utopia for the unfortunate souls who had to amuse themselves with garbage like red faction 2 in the bad old days.
