This is final evolution of Sid Meier's Pirates! series. The formula used in previous games is polished to maximum. New additions are "cinematographic duels", items (which you need to buy but they'll stay with you for all your career once purchased) and dancing with governors' daughters (which will be a very boring/very nice to different people, but they are completely optional). Very nicely done game. Fully recommended for the fans of Pirate-themed games.
It's not a criticism, but rather an important note to potential buyers. There is a limit to your turns per mission - if you cannot win within this limit, you loose. It is a very important thing for some people like me, who loves to play multipass military operation.
To buy or not buy? There is no such question: these games are MUST BUY stuff. They are not perfect at all. They are not original at all. But the gameplay, the atmosphere and visual style are top-notch stuff. Core mechanic is taken from Zelda games, i.e. these are part platformer puzzle-solving, part slasher. The puzzle part can be tricky for some people, but it is not "for hardcore platformer gamers only". Darksiders II is superior to the first game in all aspects but one: the story. The story in first game is simple, and the ending twist is perfect. Second game is more predictable. But the controls are better, combat is more fun, horseback combat is present (in first game there is only one location where you can fight riding your steed). The character building in second game is more satisfying as you have 2 vastly different builds with different combat flow. First is melee combat burst-damage build - you jump to your enemy & start chopping him to bits. Second build is Necromancer, based on minion summoning. Keep in mind, that after getting a certain weapon from one of DLC (Demon-Lord Belial) you will became practically immortal as that weapon steals huge ammount of health from the enemies. The games do not have high-resolution textures so they can be run on old & slow machines without problems. For some people it will be a huge drawback, for some - huge advantage. Darksiders II have a Game+ mode so you can replay it on higher difficulty with all unlocked abilities & weapons. And the last important part: Darksiders I is not very friendly to keyboard+mouse controls. You can finish the game with keyboard + mouse but be prepared for some rough times. Darksiders II, on the other hand, is very good and easy with keyboard + mouse controls.
