Why is Sid Meier's Pirates still the best Pirate-RPG?

[Dave Johnson]

Every other Pirate "RPG" that's come after has been vastly inferior in some way.

Sea of Thieves in an MMO-Lite

Skull and Bones is... AAAA.

Windward is a failed attempt at an MMO.

Carribean Legend is a re-release of a re-release of a re-release, which was already outdated when it debuted in 2000.

Blood & Gold: Carribean was immediately abandoned by the Mount & Blade devs after release.

Atlas was immediately abandoned by the Ark devs after release.

Don't get me started on the LEGION of "Low-Poly Unity Asset" pirate games that've come out over the past couple years, all of them are absolutely stanky.

Ironically, the closest we've ever come to a good "successor" to Sid Meier's Pirates is "Assassin's Creed: Black Flag".
It has great ship combat, great melee combat when you board enemy ships, and even some light RPG elements... but it's still not close enough to fulfill the role of a replacement.

Why is this such an IMPOSSIBLE genre for developers to succeed in?

[ReamedBySteem]

bc Sid Meier.

[Dave Johnson]

Originally posted by ReamedBySteem:

bc Sid Meier.

Apparently Sid holds the secret formula to a near-perfect pirate RPG, too bad he's hyper-fixated on re-releasing the same Civilization game every five years.

[ReBoot]

Risen 2 does pirates & ist huge fun.

[Dave Johnson]

Originally posted by ReBoot:

Risen 2 does pirates & ist huge fun.

Over a decade old, no ship combat,
it's also a Piranha Bytes game which means it's a 1999 game wearing the skin of a 2009 game.

[ReamedBySteem]

Originally posted by Dave Johnson:

Originally posted by ReamedBySteem:

bc Sid Meier.

Apparently Sid holds the secret formula to a near-perfect pirate RPG, too bad he's hyper-fixated on re-releasing the same Civilization game every five years.

I think it's a business decision, like when Ritchie Blackmore decided 'metal' was what the punters wanted so metal it would be. 'Pirates' (the ppl not the game are kind of.....and don't get me wrong when I was a little kid I LOVED being a pirate) but pirates are a bit camp (Adam West batman camp not 'camp' camp) and meh, whereas 4x turn-based strategy is still tickety boo and deadset popular with the fans.

[stuff]

Sid Meier just gets it. Would be nice to have a more modern version tho'