Pirates of the Caribbean

"A so-so movie adaptation with nothing to do with the movie"

Graphics 9 out of 10
Overall the game is visually pleasing especially in the open sea and sailing scenes. On land the graphics are good but offer very little variety there are a few different skins for the NPCs and buildings but the few that there are are done quite well.

Controls/Interface 7out of 10
The controls and menu interfaces leave a little bit to be desired, on land the fighting is a fairly straightforward, however on menus such as merchants buying and selling and ship purchasing and repairing take some getting use to.
Sailing is difficult to control and get used to.

Gameplay 6 out of 10
On land combat lags and it overly difficult at times. Fighting gets old quickly and sometimes is buggy. Sieging a ship can be a sometimes fun and sometimes frustrating, usually the later and sometimes I encountered a glitch were after defeating the first deck of enemy crew I could not advance to the next and was stuck on an empty deck, forcing me to reload. Another glitch was falling though a dock into the water and getting stuck, again forcing a reload. You character jogs at a fairl reasonable speed on land although I think he should move a little faster. Sailing quickly becomes a tedious chore. When you are not in combat or in a storm you sail in a map mode where you have an overhead view of your ship and can manuver quickly, however the game has no map and no way of mapping, so you have to memorize the locations of the islands this was by far one of the most annoying freatures of the game. The RPG element of the game are ok. You play as Captain Nathaniel Hawk and you can gain experience by fighting and sailing, you can distribute it into various categories that increase different stats. You can choose to do missions for different governers that represent different European nations. You can also hire officers with different skills that act as a party, however these bland characters have no personality and conversation with them is limited.

Story 5 out of 10
The game has almost nothing to do with the movie except for a few tie ins and the game is not nearly as good as the movie, the story basically revolves around you captaining a ship running errands for governers and merchants.

Overall:

The game could have been improved by having more diverse and in depth characters and locations, all the ports and jungles were basically the same. Also an in game map would make the game much better. Some more character customization options would have been nice as well. Maybe even if you could be Captain Jack Sparrow or at least if the game had to do more with the movie. The movie's title seems to have just been used to interest people who enjoyed the movie. The general concept of the game with a lot of tweaking would make a good title without the Pirates of the Caribbean name. The combat system should also be improved apon and weapons that make more of a difference in combat damage/blocking. I guess it is an OK deal now at the 20 dollar platinum hits price but I would not recommend it unless you really enjoy sailing/pirates, etc.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 05/23/05