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Pirates of the Burning Sea - Flying Lab Software - PC


I love pirates. In my misspent youth, I whiled away hundreds of hours rampaging around the virtual Caribbean in Sid Meier’s Pirates. Needless to say, I was quite excited when Flying Lab Studios announced their plans to produce Pirates of the Burning Sea, a MMOG based in the Caribbean during the golden age of piracy. A couple of screenshots and some dev logs got me even more excited. How did the final product come out? Keep reading.

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Good review!  Maybe it's changed a bit since beta but I just couldn't get into it.  The avatar combat just put me right to sleep!  Even though I like pirates, I don't think I like pirate games.  I almost wish Righ would have got into this one.  I think it might be more fun for me to watch than to play.  I hope WAP is a pirate.  One of those dainty ones with ruffles and lace.

Agree. After a few sessions, I totally lost interest in this game. And I've enjoyed playing Eve!  :ye_gods:

Dunno if it's the setting or gameplay, but it just didn't strike me at all.

I am actually playing Spanish at the moment. However, my free trader is VERY fancy. I will try to remember to post a screenshot.

Excellent review.

I pre-ordered this and then neglected to pick up my copy, which is still (hopefully) sitting at GameStop. I suppose this might be the impetus for me to go get it and have another go at it.

This review / preview turned me off on the game:

http://potbsvault.ign.com/View.php?view=blog.Detail&id=16 (http://potbsvault.ign.com/View.php?view=blog.Detail&id=16)

I really don't like excessive zoning.

I don't particularly care if you like our review or disagree.

But for fuck's sake, don't link to goddamn IGN as something that could sway your opinion. Even when they're stating fact, they're still intolerable.

Don't knock IGN too much - they've found a great way to cut costs. Just merge the "Fact Checking" and "Editorial" departments into Accounts Receivable.

Profits are up!  :drill:

It was a good review, but I would have liked to have seen more objectuve criticisms.  Granted, I'd only want them if they were genuine. 

Thanks for the read and taking the effort to write something up. 

While I agree that this game will have/deserve an audience, there's no reason not to mention the painfully slow pace of ship to ship combat as an example of why this game may not be for some people.  If you aren't enthralled by the uhh... more tactical approach to pvp, for instance in eve, this game is even slower.  It's much slower, in fact.  How slow?  Slow.  Realistically slow.  Like sail boats and stuff... they don't go that fast.

There's a lot to this game, and I appreciate the amount of work that must have gone into it.  It was nearly completely polished in beta when I played, and I think that there must be a solid development team working on this game.  I read about the decision to make the game as realistic as possible without making it too boring.  But going slow in a boat is boring.  They knew it was boring too, and changed out-of-combat travel to move along much more quickly. 

I really wanted to like it, but at the end of the day I just think that the design sounded better on paper than it works in practice.  I'm a HUGE fan of the PvP rule set they implemented.  Just not enough of a fan to go that god damn slow on purpose.  I can see crafters and sailing aficionados loving it.  I am neither.

e: sp

I actually like that this game isn't all about reflexes, ping and button mashing.  I don't enjoy having to level via combat to qualify for the advanced manufacturing recipes but it hasn't been the horrible grind I feared it would be.

I will vouch for the bright and totally dandy like colors of his Freetraders outfits (and ship sails). I was almost going to make him leave the society unless he openly proclaimed how he preferred cabin boys to wenches.

LOL j/k WAP

The slowness is okay for me, except when sailing into the wind. On a random chance at any given moment, you're almost brought to a stand-still, and there's nothing you can do about it. You're prevented from pursuing gameplay 25% of the time. I maintain that this is the worst game mechanic ever.

I got used to the zoning. Although it's a bit immersion-breaking for me, it also seems to fit the gameplay. I dunno how or why, it just makes sense.

Great writeup.  Bought the digital version, and after a week or so of trying to get into the game I cancelled and uninstalled.

The ship to ship combat is great, very slow an methodical and watching your teensy  crew scramble over decks is pretty damn cool.  Sadly the "boarding" part  of the game is the complete opposite;  opposing crews seemingly  hyped up on meta-amphetemines zerg each other without rhyme or reason until your waves of crew are exhausted and you win or lose.  This could have been a ton better, with more strategic pacing. The avatar combat is completely unispired and lifeless and really adds nothing to the game.

Tried the economy tutorial, but as I ran incessently between the auction house  and to a side room  within the same building  to talk to the same NPC as well as to another nearby outside NPC  complete with loading screens as you changed each area just to  advance the tutorial, my eyes glazed over.  Pretty much the most annoying thing I have ever had to do in a MMOG.

The ship combat is definately well developed, and it's obvious this is where all the dev time/effort went.  Sadly most of the other core gameplay elements seemed tacked on as an afterthought.  Unfortunately cool ship combat with little scramblin' dudes is not worth $15 a month.

I enjoyed playing for a week, but after that there was nothing compelling me to keep playing.  It seemed to me very shallow.  Ship combat was fun.

To Ixxit and Draegan:

Not that I don't think you gave the game a serious chance, but in your time playing did you ever, even once, group? PvP? or were you soloing, doing the missions, and never sailing around facing any real danger?

Group ship combat is why I play this game, and if all you did was some missions and what you'd consider "slow" combat, then you never really got close to the true fun of this game. Grouping up, a full gang of 6 players level 15 can easily compete with level 30-40 NPCs, and it's extremely fun and challenging, unlike missions which become an extreme bore, repetitive or simplistically easy after a short time.

I present to you the fanciest Free Trader on the Spanish Main:

Iago Cordoba (http://i156.photobucket.com/albums/t11/wayabvpar/019.png) (too big for inline viewing).

What the gay is that? :pedobear:

Girl, please.  Sadly they "updated" the avatars toward the end of beta and I was not able to duplicate this outfit.  My gay freetrader, let me show you him:
(http://i202.photobucket.com/albums/aa181/Yegolev/potbs_beta_serge.png)

The two tone wig makes it art.

When they get more of the player content in for sails and flags, things will really look cool on the OS.

Both of these characters look like they might be inclined to approach via the stern, and try to ram some balls into the poop of some unfortunate sailors.

Nice write up for the game though.

Our society sail was approved WAP, so hit me up in game and we'll all have the same design..  :awesome_for_real:

SQUEEEEEE

Yeg = Pirates of the Burning Pee

How do the mechanics work for getting access to it in game? Is it like the beta flag stuff? Or does it get released to certain characters by the creator, who then have the option in the customize ship panel?

Only the creator can actually buy user content sails and flags, and then once the creator has bought them they can be given to anyone, simply by trading the sail decal or sail to other people like a normal item. I bought 30 of the sail decal when I first visited, and have been giving one to nearly everyone in our society, and you only need to have a single version of them in your inventory to display them on all your ships.

The character panel (C) has a customization button that you can use to add player content sails and flags, as well as change the ship colors or sail colors...

On My Lancer:
(http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f27/taolurker/Lancer.jpg)

On My Raa:
(http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f27/taolurker/Raa.jpg)