Video Game Development at the University of Michigan

I am speaking, of course, about Pirates! (1987) And Sid Meier's Pirates! (2004). They dumbed-down the swordfights (and other aspects of combat) in foolish and unnecessary ways, as well as fundamentally changed the scoring and world map.

"Superficially, PIRATES! appears to be an arcade-style game. The sailing, ship battles, and swordfights all run in real-time where your actions and reactions must be quick, decisive, and correct. But upon closer examination, each aspect of the game is based around the actual principles of that activity."
--- That is from the (entertainingly educational) manual for the 1987 edition of Pirates!

The addition of the (NPC) nationalities of the Jesuits and Natives add flavor to the '04 game, even though the Jesuit and Indian interactions were not implemented correctly. The crew specialists, additional ship types, and ship upgrades were likeable additions; but "Sid Meier's Pirates!" does seem to have been rushed- the new "personal items" generally suffer from balancing and relevance issues; the annual treasure fleet (a major feature) never respawns; your crew won't mutiny even if they have zero food; mail ships can move at supersonic speeds; land battles lack both the player-allied Indians and field artillery promised in the manual; and anytime you rescue someone (sister, girlfriend, long-lost grandfather, whatever), regardless of where they are (ship's cabin, plantation shanty, whatever) it's the exact same cut-scene.

These are all forgivable. The first important mistake in the new game is that your character isn't forced to duel for command of his first vessel - this was key to setting the tone of the original game.

Fencing has been ungodly simplified to 3 attacks, 3 parries (and a "combo" parry/strike if you time the parry right) with the ultimate goal of forcing your opponent off the side of the screen. The '87 version had 6 attacks, 6 defenses (including the ability to advance or retreat), with the ultimate goal of reducing your opponent's morale to nothing. During the course of a duel, morale rises and falls with each hit, and modifies your crew's performance; duels could rove across the screen, as the fighting favored first one fighter then the other. The morale ratings have been replaced in the newer game by an "advantage" bar, which has little or no effect in lower difficulty levels; it allegedly increases the speed of whoever is defending better, and slows whoever is defending worse. What this means is that at higher difficulties it is nigh-impossible to win a duel once you begin losing. It is also worth noting that the length of a sword matters in the '87 game, but has no effect in the new version.

Also, while the original fencing animations were realistic (for the graphical quality of the time), the new ones are decidedly cartoony. This is not necessarily a bad change, but it takes some getting used to... the old game has "parry high" actually parry a high attack, while the new game has the "parry high" command JUMP OVER a low attack. That is nothing compared to the cartoonish cutscenes inserted midway through each duel. You often fight back and forth in a duel. Each and every time you cross the midpoint of a battleground, a cutscene interrupts. Sometimes it's running up stairs, sometimes it's a kick or a flip. But it interrupts the flow of the duel, and the computer can resume fighting instantly; human reflexes are a fraction of a second slower. This is at the same time less intense than the '87 game and more frustrating. The only duel without such a cutscene is when you duel another suitor for the governor's daughter - but don't worry, the game introduces awkward camera angles to make up for it.

The multiple-ship combat seems a huge improvement at first glance, because it allows you to take your flagship against 2 or 3 enemy ships at once. Unfortunately while you're doing that, enemy ships can attack the rest of your fleet and there's not a damn thing you can do about it; enemy ships can fire on you on the world map without actually engaging you in combat, yet you cannot return the favor. Ship-to-ship and crew-to-town interactions have been simplified in other mind-boggling ways. For example, you are NEVER able to attack a friendly port (a very viable option in the first game for over-manned and under-funded captains); and ship-to-shore battle has been replaced by firing from the world map (a poor replacement at best).

The land battles are actually fun; the biggest difference is that they are turn-based instead of real time. However, the game assigns troops to the player based on the number of attackers relative to defenders (and defenders seem to be determined the same way); combined with the (very) small battlefield, this skews the combat badly. Sometimes to the player's advantage, but it's still silly. The end goal of a land battle (or sea battle in the '87 version) is to storm the town's fort; in the old game, this would result in a duel. In the '04 game, you just win.

The Apprentice difficulty level in the new game is absurdly easy and should never be used; it's the equivalent of a "story-mode" in a game without a storyline. You should not be ABLE to complete all the items you're scored on before you retire -? the point is to have many campaigns, and try many different things. The original '87 game and manual describe your goals in somewhat nebulous terms. Retirement was the only way to check your score, and you weren't always certain what counted or what you might have missed. The fun of the game lies not in a high score, but in exploring and experimenting in the Caribbean. The newer '04 game displays the scoring clearly and explicitly in the status menu. This is not a good change. This is not even an acceptable change. Instead of exploring and experimenting, it encourages a "checklist" mentality which kills the game.

Another new feature that hurts the game's design is one I actually like - the 3D world. At the smallest scale, you control a landing party searching among landmarks for buried treasure, lost relatives, villainous hideouts, or lost cities. Now, in the original game, you had to select a "search" option if you thought you had reached "X marks the spot." In the new game, all treasure, all shacks, all hideouts and lost cities are clearly visible on the world even if you weren't looking for them. The sailing map is that exact same map, just zoomed out (which is what I like - it's the same map, and it's also used for naval battles). How this hurts the "explore and experiment" mentality is that there is too much information on the sailing map. In the '87 version, you could see your own ship, land, and weather. The '04 game let's you see any ship on screen, their allegiance, the ship's NAME, where it hails from, etc.

...or at least changes that aren't bad. The dancing rhythm game was a fun addition, and a good use of the 3D graphics. Also added was a stealth game for sneaking into or out of hostile towns; it may be a fun addition, I don't really know. I could never identify which building was the Tavern, so that usually ended badly for me. I could sometimes find the Governor's Mansion; there's a few odd things about the Governors' daughters... in any case, the new system for romancing Governor's daughters is a bit odd (aside from ballroom dance). The daughters never age or marry anyone else, and once you buy them jewelry, there's this one evil Spaniard that kidnaps all of them (in the old game, these major villains were various nationalities). It is disconcerting to see two instances of him attacking each other on the world map. However, it is cool that vessels actually attack each other, invade towns, and take other actions free of player intervention (though it was damned annoying to watch 3 pirate ships spawn just to chase whatever vessel the local governor had asked me to escort). Pirate Havens were also a fun addition, though it did make me wonder why the game wouldn't allow me to found my own haven. But now that there is no true minimum crew required, the game DID allow myself and a crew of 1 to sale two ships and an obscene amount of gold clear across the Spanish Main. And the new game has no forced retirement, so I should get to see how active a career my character can have once he's 200 years old.

Note: views and opinions expressed in this article are the author's and are not necessarily those of Wolverine Soft.