Well I went out and bought this game anyway, mainly because I have been expecting Sea Dog's 2 for the last 1.5 years now. I would say that the most glaring problem with the game is indeed combat. I would disagree with the person that said stats were not an issue, because this is blatantly incorrect. As a matter a fact the only thing that makes combat different from one part to the next is stats. Combat is exactly like it was mentioned in the above excerpt block, occasionally dodge and fire your gun and then wait for opening and swing back. However depending on your stats you will either live or die against your opponents. This game does indeed play like an action game, and there is a bit of twitch, but stats do remain crucial. They are so crucial in fact that stats seem to be the only thing besides weapon upgrades that will determine if you character will succeed in combat or fail. The character building system is not very complicated or large, but most of the stats are for sailing, which brings us to what this game is really about. Did I mention the potions... I guess its better I don't.
Its seems that this was a pirate sim turned MW like RPG. I can't help but feel that the bulk of the design effort was made for the sailing and then they added the ability to go on land. If I remember correctly the original Sea Dog's did not have the ability to go on land. The ship combat is actually done pretty well, and for the most part it is a whole lot less annoying then combat on land. I have yet to board another ship or have to deal with something like mutiny, but this is were the strentht of the game is, IMO. The game as far as I can tell is very non-linear and pretty much set up like MW. You have a main quest but no will force you to do it. And like MW, you can pretty much have a fun time in the game without really doing any quest. For instance, if your want to play a smuggler you can just go from island to island smuggling contraband and never touch any of the quest. Well with the exception of some of the first quest that they force you to do.
I think for its non-linearity and pretty fun ability to go out and sail the game is somewhat worth the money. Furthermore I think when they converted it to Pirates of the Carribean then added more stuff to do on the islands, and in way highlighted the weakness of this game and that is combat. Still combat does depend on stats and is pretty much just as mundane and frustrating as NWN's with a whole lot less moves then MW. For crissakes they don't even have a sidestep key, and that IMO is unforgivable. Finally my last gripe is this game feels like a console port. Its not like MW, which most XBOX users felt was a port. Instead this game feels like it was a XBOX game and somebody on a tight bugdget decided to swing it over to the PC. IMO this is why the land based combat just sucks, because consoles just suck, and now the PC players are limited to what those fucks that own SatansBox have
probably have not played nearly as long as the guy from gamespy, but I would argue that its not the story of the game, or the quest themselves which try to be interesting, but rather playing the game. This is why it hurts the game so much that the land based stuff is such a sham. Sailing is indeed a lot of fun and if you are trading, what is fun is actually getting the goods, going from island to island, avoid hostilities, or creating them if that is what you do, and then making a profit. So yeah I guess he is right that there is no Baldur's Gate 2 Joinable NPC which gives you some pathetic story and tells you to go on some sidequest, they are rather normal. However, like I said I have not played this game long enough to find it boring. Who know maybe after 20-30 hours of gameplay I may find the sailing boring. Still there seems to be enough character building as well as ship improvements to keep me hooked for a while. I think I saw a total of 10 ships, which is still not as much as I was expecting but there is a level difficulty to overcome which can only be over come with the character building.
As for the combat being action oriented. Its worse then that, it might as well be phased based ala the old wasteland, because the twitch aspect really plays no role. I mean you block, jab, block, jab over and over and over again. The only thing that can give you an edge is leveling up and better weapons. So it still has that sort of thing going for it. And when I say you block, jab, block, jab I am not exaggerating, there is no sidestep, there is a dodge, which I only use to fire a pistol and any other tactical movement will most definately get you killed. As a matter a fact if this game did not have the non-linearity, rpg aspect, and the whole sailing thing going for it, it might just be the worst game ever. The land combat is that bad. However, I would at the same time say that as bad as land combat is, its no worse then NWN's, which it to had some of the worst combat I have ever seen in an RPG. I think comparing this games land portion to the NWN OC is a fair assumption. Still unlike NWN there is non-linearity, the ability to actually play a role, and a definite sense of exploration, at least early on. I can imagine that if every island looks like every other island, then I will be very dissapointed, but I have only seen three islands and so far there is not much difference, but then agains I do not know how much difference to expect in the caribbean.
Finally all the islands do not trade the same stuff, and each island has different contraband. You do not even need to go to every island to figure this out. It tells you in one of the in game FAQ screens. The guy was just blatantly telling the NON-truth. And it just hurts his credibility since a lot of his other gripes are true, and it should be sufficient to justify the score. I think this game is for someone that has a good rig, and wants some good non-linear action, likes playing a pirate, or a smuggler or a sea captain and would like to see what there computer is capable of after playing geneforge for 8 months straight. It is dissapointing, but no more then the NWN OC. And I think I can stand by that claim.
, and we have no idea how exactly they've got the uniform (if one stole it, and another bought it, it's no big deal) and how important the uniform quest is. If it's a major part of the main quest, I expect it to be done in 3-4 different ways, if it's a minor quest done creatively, then it's a good thing deserving a praise, but as it stands now, it's a mystary, and since the purpose of a review is to shed some light on a game and we are still in the dark, the review is not intelligent. Still disagree?
Happy now?
