Puzzle Pirates and How to build your playerbase

[Soukyan]

Saw this mentioned on Slashdot just now (Mysterious Future ;) and followed the link to Gamespot. I missed this yesterday, but:

Now, it appears the plucky little game is headed for the big time. Today, Ubisoft announced it had struck a deal with Three Rings to properly publish the title, which has been renamed Puzzle Pirates. The game will be released for Windows, Linux, and Macintosh this April.

According to Ubisoft, Puzzle Pirates "is expected to earn a “T” for Teen rating," will retail for $19.99, and will cost $9.95 per month to play.

Fantastic news for Cleaver and Co. I still play this game at least once a week and I'm truly glad to see them hitting it big. I hope the store sales pay off for them. There are always a lot of players around when I'm in-game, but certainly more subscription dollars never hurt. Shame they dropped the Yohoho! part of the name. At least the piratification of curse words is still in the game. Arrr!

[Train Wreck]

Just went to Their website and created a trial account.  I can play from my Mac at work.  Hell yes!

[SirBruce]

Congrats the Daniel and everyone else at Three Rings!

When we spoke on the "Massively Multiplayer Games on a Budget" panel at AGC, and discussed various ways for smaller MMOGs to gain users (free download trials, magazine promotions, etc.) I made the point that while all of these should be tried, there's really no substitute for getting a publisher to put the thing in a box on a store shelf.  It took them a while, but it looks like they finally managed to put together a deal, so I predict their subscribership should really start taking off after that.

Bruce

[Signe]

Bruce got them a deal with UbiSoft!  What a guy!



Yay!  Fishsticks!

[Dren]

Bruce got them a deal with UbiSoft!  What a guy!

Damn it....coffee....nose....pain....

Righ is such a lucky guy.

[Nebu]

Signe: You have a gift. Thanks for a good laugh.

Edit: Deleted by request.

[HaemishM]

Please to not turn this thread into you know what about you know who. You have been fucking warned.

[Signe]

Oops!  Sorry!

Not that I would ever dream of doing anything like that again, but how many warnings do you get before something awful happens?  And does it count if it's accidental... like the sex in that other thread?  Not that I ever had accidental sex very often or anything.  At least not that I can remember.  I'm sure I must have had the other sort of sex more often.

I'm just asking for an accident prone friend....

[HaemishM]

Yours was funny and entertaining. Thankfully, it wasn't the point of origin for the derail, so I will only /fishslap you.

[Signe]

Ok... so a good fish slapping isn't even a warning.  I'm not sure I like the bent and twist of this trend.  But ok.

[Piperfan]

They are adding unique content to the box. At 9.95 it is reasonable in price I suppose, if you like puzzles. Is this ll you do in the game? Puzzles at every turn or is there more?

I know there have been other threads on the game but this is a /rerail attempt.

[Aenovae]

This is getting off-topic of the very important fish stick issue.

[SirBruce]

Wow, sorry that I confused some of the kids on the short bus.

The point was simply to illustrate that this was indeed something to strive for, and why it is important, not that Daniel didn't know what he was doing until he listened to me.

Bruce

[Furiously]

Grats t' everyone at 3 Ring's. I always mean t' log in and play. I be thinkin' me lifetime subscription might make me less likely t' play. Regarrrrrrrdless.  I can't wait t' pick up a box just t' show me further support.

[Paelos]

I like the idea of the game. I'm not personally a puzzle person, but I know that's a big deal with a lot of people on Yahoo and the like. I think it has more potential as well to bridge the gender gap of gamers that like to play MMOs. Which is nice.

[Jain Zar]

Ive always though it sounded interesting, but the concept of task resolution via puzzles really rubs me the wrong way.  Even if it does have adorably cute pirates..

[Signe]

I kind of like this game.  Everyone really is more adorable than in most of the cutesy looking games.  They are like small children... with beards...  that you can kill.



What's not to like?

[Soukyan]

Well, I have a hell of a good time playing it. If you like teamwork, swordfighting between boats can require a good bit of coordination with each other if you want to win and take the spoils. Other ship puzzles are solitary in nature, but everyone must do their part in order to keep the ship in good shape and make safe and quick passages. I guess if you don't enjoy puzzle games, you'll never truly like it, but that's your bag, not mine. ;) I, too, have a lifetime subscription, but I will be buying a box to further support them. I'll probably buy a couple and give them to friends as gifts. I know several people who love these kinds of games.

[stray]

Ive always though it sounded interesting, but the concept of task resolution via puzzles really rubs me the wrong way.

I thought all games were puzzle games. At least the good ones are.

[eldaec]

Ive always though it sounded interesting, but the concept of task resolution via puzzles really rubs me the wrong way.  Even if it does have adorably cute pirates..

Worth noting that all the so called puzzles are in fact variations on the theme of Tetris.

Tetris Pirates (Yohoho or otherwise) doesn't really trip off the tongue though.

[Aenovae]

I thought all games were puzzle games. At least the good ones are.

All games are patterns, which we enjoy learning.  Didn't you read the book!?

[Otis]

Worth noting that all the so called puzzles are in fact variations on the theme of Tetris.

There is really only one puzzle in the game that is fashioned in the same pentomino style of Tetris, unless you want to expand the "theme of Tetris" to include any puzzle game that drops pieces on a board.

[Train Wreck]

Worth noting that all the so called puzzles are in fact variations on the theme of Tetris.

There are several puzzles that have nothing to do with falling pieces, such as the drinking game, alchemistry, and rum distillation, to name a few.  And none of the other puzzles are much like Tetris, anyway.

[eldaec]

Ok, all 'games that involve fitting pieces into a specific shapes with time pressure'. No, they don't all include falling.

But tetris-like is snappier than 'games that involve fitting pieces into a specific shapes with time pressure'.

[schild]

Seriously. Only sailing is like tetris. I guess through abstract reasoning, you could consider carpentry a form of tetris, though it's much MUCH more like Alchemy. Please, you need to brush up on your Popcap knowledge.

Also, tetris > queued hotkeyed fighting.

[eldaec]

Bah.

My actual point is that most people would read the name 'puzzle pirates' and probably think of something other than what puzzle pirates is actually like.

[Hanzii]

Bah.

My actual point is that most people would read the name 'puzzle pirates' and probably think of something other than what puzzle pirates is actually like.

Playing various puzzle games while pretending to be a pirate - yeah, I see how that's hard to get from the title...

[eldaec]

I'm going to stop talking now.

[Paelos]

What's the drinking puzzle like? I couldn't glean much about it from the site info and one screenshot.

[Signe]

Seriously. Only sailing is like tetris. I guess through abstract reasoning, you could consider carpentry a form of tetris, though it's much MUCH more like Alchemy. Please, you need to brush up on your Popcap knowledge.

Also, tetris > queued hotkeyed fighting.

Nutter!  hehe.  God, I wish I had said this!

[Llava]

Bah.

My actual point is that most people would read the name 'puzzle pirates' and probably think of something other than what puzzle pirates is actually like.

Playing various puzzle games while pretending to be a pirate - yeah, I see how that's hard to get from the title...

I think eldaec's problem is that he didn't take his audience into consideration.  With most (all?) of us being experirenced gamers, we don't treat the word "puzzle" lightly.  We know it can mean a bunch of different stuff, from tetris to jigsaw to riddles.

Another, less experienced person, however, might see the word puzzle and think of jigsaw puzzles, maybe trivia.  So it's not that his comment had no value, just that it's sort of obvious to us.  The average halfwit, though, would probably have several follow-up questions for him.

[Alkiera]

Aren't puzzle pirates those people that download popcap games over BitTorrent?

Alkiera

[Samwise]

What's the drinking puzzle like? I couldn't glean much about it from the site info and one screenshot.

It's exactly like Alchemy.  Exactly.  If you can't place a drink on the table according to the rules, you drink it.  First one to pass out loses.