Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

"Another bad game made after a movie."

Introduction

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest for the Nintendo DS follows the basic plot of the movie with the same title. For those of you who haven't seen Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, here's the story.

Jack Sparrow has been captured. He must return to his ship, Black Pearl. Once aboard the Black Pearl, he has even more dilemmas.

In the meantime, William Turner has been captured for helping Jack Sparrow escape. He must retrieve an item from Jack Sparrow; if he fails to do this, he and his fiancée, Elizabeth Swann, will be faced with the gallows.

Gameplay: 5/10

For each stage, you will play as a different character; you will play as Jack, Will, or Elizabeth. The controls are the same for each character, though their attacks appear different on screen.

The game is formatted into stages. The goal in each stage... is to reach the end of the stage. There is a lot of fighting and the stage proceeds in a very linear manner. You may have to burn down a barrier with a torch or put out a fire with a bucket of water, but other than that, this game's focus is beating up every enemy you encounter. It's not difficult, especially with save points within each stage, but it gets quite boring after a while.

It was interesting to play as different characters, but when all you do is fight, it gets boring very quickly.

Story: 6/10

The story is only present at the beginning and end of each stage. Occasionally you will speak with a non-playable character, who will divert you or give you some new goal to accomplish, but that's the only in-stage interaction with the story that you'll get. This game's focus is fighting, not the story, and if you've seen the movie, you know the story by heart and you'll even laugh at the omissions made.

Graphics: 2/10

Honestly, I have seen better graphics on a Game Boy Advance game. Many objects in this game, including people, structures, and other objects, are clearly a bunch of shapes put together to resemble what they're supposed to represent. It's nice that realistic pictures were used for the text boxes, but everything else is polygons.

Also, because you cannot control the camera in this game, some situations can become difficult. For example, you could be playing the mini-game Boom Barge and not be able to see one of the wooden crates because it's just barely to your left, but concealed because the side of the ship is right between yourself and the crate. Also, you could be fighting a horde of monsters, step behind a tree, and no longer be able to see what you're doing. For the most part, the camera chooses a good angle to view the character from, but there are a few scenarios where you might have to move yourself to see well.

Sound: 8/10

Again, for a DS game, I would expect better, but at least the background music does a good job of setting the mood. The sounds the enemies make (as well as the character you're playing as) when attacking and getting hit are neat, but after a while, it gets mildly annoying.

Play Time/Replayability: 5/10

This game took me three days to complete. I imagine it will take other people a lot more time to finish the game, but any game that takes less than a week to finish isn't a good game in my book.

There are some neat things to purchase with the gold you earn in-game, such as concept art, new outfits, weapons, and unlockable characters, but other than that, there's not really much more reason for a person to play this game over and over. It may be cool to play as Jack Sparrow, Will Turner, and Elizabeth Swann, but that feeling will wear off quickly once your eyes have stated at the terrible graphics long enough.

Final Recommendation

If you really like the movie, and you can overcome the mediocre graphics, constant fighting, and lack of story, you might enjoy this game enough to buy it. Otherwise, I would stay away from it. Play a friend's copy or rent it, but don't buy it.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 08/15/06