If you liked Sid Meyers "Pirates" this is for you. Its similar but better better and more complex. Simple smooth undemanding grapics that work well, simple yet fun naval battles, loot, trade, smuggle .. upgrades and all you'd expect from a pirate game ... free to play. Thumbs up!

Q: Why is being a pirate so addictive?
A: Because when ye lose yer hand, ye get hooked!

'The Pirate: Caribbean Hunt' is the best-value entertainment I've had for years. Perhaps that's partly because I'm a fan of square rigger ships and 1700s maritime history.

Sailing sumulators tend to be expensive, so finding one that is an excellent game, was a happy day for me. I think the devs may have made a strategic mistake in not charging for this game. (People assume a game can't be any good if it's free.) I think it's a gem among seafaring games.

Some aspects of the graphics (notably the ships and terrain) aren't quite as good as in the game called 'Naval Action', however, in many ways I enjoyed this game more. I think it has more atmosphere and a more cheerful feel than 'Naval Action', and does a better job of invoking the spirit of the era and location. This is partly due to the hypnotic music, the beatutiful uplifting Caribbean seascapes and tasteful UI. And the story line provides interesting adventures that 'Naval Action' lacks.

The open world feature gives you an immersive sense of the freedom and adventure of 1700s maritime exploration, while you sail one of the many square-rigger ships at your disposal. I especially like that the game is relatively realistic, compared to the cartoonishness of 'Sid Mier's Pirates', etc. And I like that the ships are soberly shaped and proportioned, compared to the outlandishly stylised ships seen in 'Skull & Bones' and 'Plague of the Dead'.

As a real-life qualified skipper, I appreciate the authenticity of many aspects of this game. Just as in real-life sailing, you have to keep abreast of wind direction, weather conditions, compass headings, sail control, water depth etc. If you have ever fancied trying some real life sailing, this game will give you valuable experience. It is a really well-conceived game of tactics, strategy and skill (skill that you develop as you progress). And there is heart-racing excitement aplenty.

The game is played from a zoomable bird's eye view. The graphics are mostly decent. I love that the sea looks and behaves so authentically, including the wake the ships create, which is the most realistic I've seen, as is the way the flags fly in the wind. The ships rock and roll on the waves and lean in the wind realistically. The sails fill out with the wind and jibe as you turn through the wind. The cannon fire makes the most convincing and dramatic sound I've heard in any seafaring game. There is an amazing selection of ships to try. While they are not as finely detailed as those of 'Naval Action', largely due to the game's age, they are decent enough.

The reviewer who claimed that you are effectively forced to buy premium ships with real money, is completely wrong. I completed the game's two ultimate objectives, including defeating a fleet of 1st rate ships of the line, without spending a penny of real money. (You can accrue in-game 'gold' to acquire bigger and better ships.)

The approach I adopted with this game, (until curiosity got the better of me), was to regard purchasing premium ships (with real money) as tantamount to cheating. I mean, anyone can simply buy a powerful premium ship, but where is the skill in that? Satisfaction for me, came from progressing up the ladder of power through careful asset management and judicious ship selection. After eliminating 'the Pirate Confederacy' and 'the West India Company' using only free ships, I still continued to enjoy this sailing experience. After 250 hours of playing, and over 3 million gold in my coffers, I'm still developing my tactical skills and loving this game.

I recently started venturing into the PVP sea battles, which opened up a new dimension to the game. It was only then, that I forked out a very small amount of real money for a premium ship or two, to give me an edge in combat. While the AI adversaries of the single-player game are good, they are not as challenging as skillful, live players. You can learn a lot from them.

It's shame that HomeNet Games is not developing this game more intensively. I think that's a missed opportunity. Perhaps they underestimate the merits of their own game! They do occasionally produce updates, but they tend to be minor improvements, rather than significant developments.

If you prefer pirate games with mythical/supernatural elements, you may prefer HomeNet's other 'The Pirate' game, 'Plague of the Dead', but that one doesn't offer PVP.

So anchors aweigh and happy privateering! - from someone who grew up within sight of Admiral Hardy's Monument, near Blackbeard's refuge, Moonfleet, where the elders still talk like pirates! (Oooo-AAARGH!)

PIRATE KNOWLEDGE QUIZ:

Q: What has 4 legs, 4 arms and 4 eyes?
A: 8 pirates.

Q: What happened when Bluebeard fell overboard in the Red Sea?
A: He got marooned.

Q: Why don’t pirates shower before they walk the plank?
A: Because they’ll wash up on shore later.

_,.-~-.,_,.-~-.,_,.-~-.,_,.-~-.,_,.-~-.,_,.-~-.,_,.-~-.,_

>>Please give my review a 'thumbs up' if you deem it helpful. Many thanks.<<

Overall, this gets an 8/10 from me.

Without going into overwhelming detail (which is hard, because I really love everything about this game):

• It's gorgeous, and it makes you FEEL like batman a pirate.
  
• The gameplay's great, but simple. There's a really high skill ceiling involving a lot of skeevy pirate tactics.
  
• You can fight anybody, any time. Doesn't matter. Just swing your broadsides out and go to town, even if they're an ally.
  
• You can steal anything, if you can fight for it. You can steal ships, you can steal goods, and you can steal towns.
  
• You can use your loot however you want. You can sell the ships you steal, or tear them down and sell the sailcloth and planks, or you can keep them for your fleet, or you can crew 'em and send them off to do piracy in your name.
  
• The economy is simple, but really fun. Lots of stressors and lots of solutions make for good trading.
  
• There's an open world mode that you don't have to use, but it offers a bunch of content if you're okay with getting where you're going slowly. Also, immersion.
  
• You can only have 4 ships in your fleet when leaving a dock, but once you're out there you can capture and sail as many ships as you can man. When you dock again, you'll only be able to leave port with 4 of them, but it's cool to sail home with like 20 captured ships.
  
• You can win with basically any ship against anything if you play it smart.
  
• You can also lose, very easily, if you're dumb.
  
• You don't have to buy anything to win, or even to advance quickly. At 60 hours in, I bought the $7~ town DLC so I could build more stuff in my bases, but it's completely unnecessary to spend money. By that point, I was capable of taking on anything in-game with ships I stole for free.
  
• The game world is absolutely enormous, and it's introduced to you bit by bit as you buy new maps so you can actually take your time and get used to each area.
  
• There's a good variety of game content, from boss fights with rival pirates to missions for your allied state to slave ships to be liberated and plenty more.
  
• There are good reasons to use any ship over any other ship, even when performing the same role.
  
• There are a ton of ships, and each class of ship is also broken up into different variations. There's like 7 different galleons, not counting the premium ones.
  
• This game is free, and it has multiplayer.

If you like Mount & Blade, this should feel familiar to you. If you're wishing you had a cool pirate game with good ship combat, this is it. If you just wanna relax and listen to some shanty tunes and sail the open seas - this is the game.

So this is my experience - The first 10 or 15 hours of this game are really quite fun. The game is pretty with nice looking ships that take some strategy to sail (sail handling for increasing manueverability is a nice touch). The different types of shot are fun to manage and allow different strategies in combat. But now after 52 hours I am running out of things to do. It was fun trying to take more powerful ships and build your fleet, but after getting a nice little floatilla of a first rate, two second rates and a frigate for chasing down prey...well...what else is there? My ships are all maxed out with up grades, so there is little reason to continue making money trading and pirating.

That said, if you like pirate games, this is worth the $0 you shell out for it! The story is pretty thin and it gets repetitive after a while amd It lacks most of the fun factor of "Sid Meyers Pirates!" No dancing, no sword fighting, no land battles. The treasure puzzle is so easy it is sort of pointless...they might as well just save time and give you the loot. Also, your AI controlled ships are dumb in battle. They constantly get in the way of your player controlled ship. Kind of frustrating. You are not going to be able to "cross the tee" or "split the line" and live out your Lord Admeral Nelson fantasies here. I have no desire to buy any of the premium ships, because as I stated, captureing bigger ship is the real fun of the game.

All the ports feel pretty much the same except for greater availibility of trade goods, ships etc.

I have not been able to do any PVP yet...that could be entertaining.

But look, the game is free! I am glad I playd it. I just wish there was more to keep me engaged. I so want a great pirate game! Give it more depth and give my fleet decent AI and I will gladly pay for it!

Sometimes you'll find a game that looks godawful, and would probably be really funny to play. So you download it, and you begin to play it as a joke. The bad graphics, the default stock arial text, and your urge to play something for the sake of irony keep you laughing.

And then two hours later, you'll begin to play the game unironically. Despite it's appearance, if you dig down into it, you'll find something pretty special. It's like getting a copy of Norm of The North from the bargain bin and opening it up, only to find that the disc isn't Norm of The North, but is actually Star Wars: Revenge of The Sith. Not bad, but passable.

Give this game a shot if you feel like it.

you can do well in this game without the pay to play so thumbs up from me

===[]===
☐ Kids
☑ Everyone
☐ Casual players
☐ Pro players

===[]===
☐ Potato
☐ Terrible
☐ Bad
☐ OK
☐ Good
☐ Beautiful
☑ Masterpiece
☐ Real life

===[]===
☑ Full price
☐ Wait for sale
☐ Average
☐ Refund it if you can
☐ Don't do it

===[]===
☐ 90's PC
☑ Minimum
☐ Medium
☐ Fast
☐ High end
☐ NASA computer

===[]===
☑ You just need 2 arms
☐ Too easy
☐ Easy
☐ Medium
☐ Hard
☐ Dark Souls
☐ Battletoads

===[]===
☐ Really short
☐ Short
☐ Few hours
☐ Long
☑ Endless

===[]===
☑ No
☐ Only blood
☐ Blood and Gore

===[]===
☑ No
☐ Mild
☐ Average
☐ Violent
☐ Manhunt
☐ Mortal Kombat

===[]===
☐ No
☐ Annoying
☑ Better than Despacito
☐ Good
☐ Beautiful
☐ Masterpiece

===[]===
☐ No
☑ Better than Twilight
☐ OK
☐ Good
☐ Fantastic

===[]===
☐ Game itself is one big BUG
☐ Bugs destroying the game
☐ Many bugs
☐ Few Bugs
☑ Nothing that will annoy or bother you
☐ No bugs

===[]===
Singleplayer: 8/10
Multiplayer: 8/10
Gameplay: 8/10
Overall: 8/10

Sid Meier's Pirates grows up and meets a better Pirates of the Burning Sea.
If you enjoyed Sid Meier's Pirates but you wished for a less arcady feel, if you enjoyed POTBS but wished for a more realistic look and feel on the world map, as well as in battle, minus all the idiots, welcome to Pirate: Caribbean Hunt. This game has something for everyone, when your looking for a tall ships game.
1. A good number and varriety of customizable ships, to include captians skills.
2. It has a fast travel option for those wanting to do quests, but are strapped for time.
3. For those that have lots of time, click on the open world tab, raise your sails, set a direction and explore.
4. English, Spanish, French, Dutch, and the Danish are all present in this game.
5. A pirate base. You have the ability to construct unique buildings, then improve upon them, to create a source of income, supplies, and trade goods.
6. PVP/PVE customizable battles, that you can host or join.

Id like to thank the developers at Home Net Games, your team did one heck of a job, well done.
Its the game I've been waiting for, for a very long time, Thanks.

CAAAAAAAPTAAINNNNN


YE?




LOOOOOOOOOOOOOK

This game was great and I had a blast playing completely solo. I Defeated the final pirate and stopped playing when I got to the West India Company. Honestly it got a little repetitive and also I had a hard time fighting when I was limited to 4 ships compared to their 8.

I did make 1 cash purchase in the store. I bought some skill points for $1 and got the HMS Victory (1st-Rate ship) for free on a promotion. (Should have bought some buildings for the islands instead as skill points can easily be earned in game) The HMS Victory made the game a little easy at first, but I quickly got to a point where it wasn't enough and I needed more 1st-Rate ships to progress in the story. I got the additional ships by capturing them in game, no more money spent.

Well worth the $1 I paid for over 22 hours of fun.