Thoughts About: Pirates of the Caribbean
Normally games that are licensed and released to coincide with a movie theatrical release are… “less than spectacular”. Pirates of the Caribbean is no exception. It was exactly what I expected to be be. Mediocre.
Pirates of the Caribbean
The game play takes you through the events of the third movie with some ho-hum side quests added in for good measure. Throughout the game, you get to take control of multiple characters from the movie, not just Jack Sparrow. This was fun, cause its always nice to see Kira Knightly… even in digitized form.
Game play consists mainly of running around tapping swords with bad guys and pulling levels to open doors. The enemies don’t present too much of a challenge either. After clashing swords with any given foe a few times, he for no reason complete drops his guard, accepts his fate, and waits for you to run him through. The only break from this monotony is finding the occasional knife to throw or black powder pistol to shoot.
What Was Good:
What I really enjoyed about the game was the optional treasure hunting meta game. In each level there were 7 items that had to be collected that related to the level, and one item in each level to be collected that related to the game as a whole. The items weren’t hidden in your direct path, some required a decent amount of ‘back-tracking’ through a level, but at the same time they weren’t overly frustrating to try and fine. That healthy balance keeps you searching and finding these items nets you unlock-able special features about folklore behind the movie and a generous amount of Xbox Gamer-score Points.
Pirates Of The Caribbean: Jack and Will
What Was Bad:
The most frustrating aspect of the game is the duel system. This is pretty much a “press the button that appears on the screen” encounter. On paper I’m sure this seemed like a good idea, but it was implemented very poorly, literally to the point where if you don’t press the featured button the second it appears on the screen, you could lose, and the whole agonizing process would start all over again. I’m still not sure how I completed most of the duels in the game. I’m chalking that up to luck.
After my 12 hour long play through, I wouldn’t say that Pirates was a bad game, but it lacks any kind of staying power or replay value. Add this together with the mindless combat and tenacious duel system and this will make the game not worth playing for most gamers. But I’ll go a little easy on it because, as I mentioned before, it is exactly what I expected it to be. Final score: 4/10
