Pixel Piracy (2013)

I liked Pixel Piracy. The idea of the game was fun, and I enjoyed the first couple of hours playing the game. I will admit a certain level of infantile glee every time my pirates pooped and the noise echoed throughout my room. Their grunts and 'Aaarrrhhs' were cute. Ship building was satisfying as my ship took on a life of its own, becoming a sort of Frakenship as I added hovering levels and offshoots that went nowhere.

And then mid game hit.

At least to me, it felt like there was no good challenge/reward cycle. Sure I received new decoration blocks, but the gameplay remained largely the same. Earn money, travel, blow stuff up, buy, earn money, etc.... There wasn't enough 'rewards' that altered game play to keep me interested.

Add to this subtle bugs such as finding a hobo and sending five pirates to the island, just to have them all get stuck and then drown trying to get back to the ship, or having so many decoration blocks that I couldn't see them all in the ship building screen and no visible (or non-visible) way to scroll the left panel to see them all. And then as my ship became bigger, performance crawled to a molasses-pace while I was in the building screen.

Since I personally had stopped enjoying it as much, and the world appears VERY large, I'll probably table this game. If they make a substantial update to it I may take it off the won't finish shelf, but until then I'll keep the first couple hours in memory and remember it fondly.

AH THE POOP DECK THE HEART OF THE GAME ME HEARTIES. SWABBY THE DECK. Mop up that pirate shit simulator. Game really makes you think about how to poop on a ship.

There are no biomes in this game like terraria but you fight other shipfarers who have a theme. Vikings, orientals, 'imperials' tribals, etc. you pillage their ships and steal their themed blocks.

One nice thing about this is that You can configure stats on your team, the role playing isn't quite there though as all stats grant some buffs and you can't really 'tweak' your band of pirates into roles. You can however, assign the best bits of loot to them and sell the rest. It's a nice raid and salvage type balance

It's strangely addicting. Raid a ship, plunder it. Get gold, upgrade your ship with the parts you stole from it. Make a big ship. Take that ship everywhere. It's your home. Contrast that to terraria: Build a house, build a town, go deep underground, spend time away...

In this, you take your ship everywhere. and you work long and hard to keep it free of poop. It's great. Trust me.

Combat is satisfying. Very simple. Much of it is automated. You only heal yourself and your band of pirates fallout 3/Pipboy style. and issue move orders. I like the simple approach TBH.

I dont' quite understand the pets. Pirates dont like milk. and Maybe you need multiple chickens to lay eggs. A mobile food source is a swell idea though. However, things that make more poop just can't live on my ship. DIE. Also, why do pirates not like fish so much? Scurvy dogs lust for my fruit!

Feels unfinished, or rather maybe not altogether, but gee it's a fun game. It's not like terraria but inspired by it, and does it's own thing. Compared to most games I have played that 'had anything to do with' terraria (or minecraft) it does what it does very well.

Whats not so fun is the long load times:

There is also this weird land clipping bug that results in your pirates misfiring their grapple and going straight down to davy jones locker! Having 40 or so salty dogs also really slows down your computer. They will automatically go into towns when you dock, and often that results in them drowning. Training swim is your first priority,as ye convert these landlubbers to true neerdewells, to make it less annoying. Working pirates, shooting pirates, and 'fighting' pirate job/class system is a bit oversimplied maybe. Would really be nice to assign tasks if you wanted, but this works fine for the game as it is except in rare sistuations. This are minor issues, they cost you time rather than be game breaking... A four star game is lurking beneath these poopy bugs in my opinion.