Anyone else playing Sid Meier's Pirates?

We got hooked on Pirates! when it was a Nintendo game. Now we have the computer version and it’s so much fun! Ivylad plays and I sit beside him and keep track of his quests and where he needs to go and help him track down the buried treasure.

The only thing I don’t like is that you can’t attack cities and forts from your ship any more; you have to land and storm the gates. It was easier to shell from the safety of the sea.

It’s so easy to get sidetracked on missions and quests, and the Caribbean is a huge place! But we’re learning our geography!

We always buy treasure maps, because the yield is more than what you pay for, and we’ve had to buy ruby rings for the governor’s daugthers. We don’t buy the other stuff.

We had a problem figuring out how to save the game, but now we know how.

We have recently uncovered a treasure south of Puerto Cabello, and we’re on the way to track down Raymundo, even though our men may be itching to divide the plunder.

We also chose Skill in Medicine, but although that worked well with the Nintendo game I’ve found that our fighter gets dizzy? (I’m assuming that’s what those halos are around his head) during duels.

We’re playing War for Profit right now.

Any tips or secrets anyone want to share?

I’ve played it quite a bit. I was thrilled it worked so well on my laptop.

My only problem with it is that gunnery has become unimportant. There’s situations where a well placed shot is important (slowing down a faster ship, mostly) but in 99% of sea battles I just drive my ship straight at 'em and take them with a swordfight, and as you point out, it’s no longer a part of fighting cities. It was a big part of the game that no longer really matters.

We’ve found gunnery useful. If the crew is bigger than ours we use grape shot to trim them down to size, and if the ship is getting away from us we use chain shot to take out their sails. Of course, if we can take the ship without damage we can sell it for a good price.

We favor the smaller ships for maneuverability and speed. We’ve found that it’s hard to plunder anything but food and guns from ships. Do you buy cheap in one port and sell high in another, rather than plundering?

The ‘dizzy’ is when your opponent has correctly read your move and done the correct countermove. It makes you react slowly so he has a chance for a free hit. The same will happen to him if you do the same.

I LOVED the original but this one with it’s mini games irritates me. I don’t want to dance or wander around some dark town clubbing guards. That’s why I have Thief II and III for…well not the dancing part.

And I find the overall effort at being ‘cutesy’ less then appealing. Ahh well I did bring back fond memories for a short time.

Oddly enough I just started playing Pirates again on the NES. I may have to look at the PC version now as well :slight_smile:

FWIW, you might want to check out this thread from around the release date.

I really like the game but I haven’t played in several months. As Darkhold stated the dancing and sneaking really get on my nerves. Far too important if you ask me.

However, it’s a really really good game.

Pirates! on the Amiga was one of the first games I really got into. Love the remake in totality but I do have a couple of gripes.

The difficulty seems a bit off. It’s a breeze up until Swashbuckler then it goes insanely hard.

Also is there a reason to pick any sword except the rapier? In the original the heavier swords would do more damage so could be tactically useful if you needed to kill the enemy captain real fast. Now each hit does the same amount of damage and the heavier swords are too slow.

I liked the way you could get lost or blown off course in the original. The Caribbean seemed huge and dangerous. Knowing your position constantly takes some of the thrill away for me.

No silver fleet >: (despite what those teasing barmaids have to say).

Just spent a load of time bitching there. But I do love the game. Especially like the improved world model where you can see every ship in the 'main going about it’s business.

Gunnery becomes much more useful when you’ve got some decent cannon in your flagship. If you’ve got something like a fast frigate or galleon combined with copper plating you can destroy those tough military crews without even crossing swords.

If you’re getting dizzy it means your guy in losing the battle initiative. It’ll make him slower to react and your crew will die faster. Every time your opponent blocks, dodges, hits or taunts you’ll lose some and vice versa. So try to keep that to a minimum.

Also, if you haven’t downloaded it already, get the patch. They fixed the incredibly aggravating dancing mini-game. It’s still not exactly fun, but it’s tolerable, and opens up a bunch of new quests.

How exactly does it “fix” the dancing? Besides the fact that it’s easier to dance with the plain daughters and the beautiful ones tend to flip their hands around more so you can’t tell what move she wants you to do, what does it fix? And where does one get the patch?

We’ve bought a lot of ruby rings, but no one has offered a diamond necklace. And tracking down Raymundo is hard!

I was so mad at Ivylad today. We attacked Havana, made it French, then attacked Harry Morgan, but he sank us. But did he save the game recently? NO! So when we reloaded, we had unhappy men and although we sacked Havana again, we didn’t get nearly the same amount of plunder and it wouldn’t let us install a new governor. Grrrrrr.

And how come you can’t attack some ports and settlements? They’re the enemy, but when you land and walk toward them all you do is get the normal In Town options.

Doesn’t the game auto-save before any battle? So you should be able to restore the game to just before you attacked Harry Morgan (although I think that was Henry Morgan), and sail away rather than attack him.

But I agree with those who don’t like some of the mini-games. I’d rather not do the dancing.

We had problems saving it. According to the book, you hit Shift S. But when we went to load, it went to a game that we had decided to abandon. So we started over, and we figured out how to save it by clicking on the CD logo and hitting save game. But then, after a bad battle, we hit Shift L to load and got an abandoned version of game #2, where Ivylad had been completely destroyed by Raymundo.

I didn’t think of hitting Shift L, and now it’s too late. :smack:

You have a reputation with each port in addition to the major powers. If a port likes you or is neutral you can’t attack it. Just pirate some ships near the port and they’ll quickly get pissed off enough to be attackable.

No, we were trying to attack a Spanish settlement (they currently have a bounty of $21,000 on our head) and after walking to town it let us stroll right in and conduct business.

Can you only attack towns with governors? We tried to attack a Dutch town with a governor, and I don’t know if it’s because the town takes up the whole island or what but we couldn’t walk to it to attack. (St. Eustatius, in case it matters.)

This sounds a bit like New Horizons, the SNES game I loved playing when I was about 12 or so. Is it?

If so, I might have to order a copy… I’m starting to get tired of Civ III.

I have to 37th the opinions on the dancing. It was tough at first, mundane at the end. I lurved just sailing around and being a pirate! Having to dance with the daughters of folks in what seemed like thousands of was annoying. The fights are the same to me, you can meet Captain Kidd on the high seas and knock him out with a few blows, all you have to do is get the pattern down.
Dancing though…there are only a few basic steps, man it got old.

Well, we’re an English Duke now. Is there any reason to keep being friendly to the English? We won’t lose our rank and the upgrades will still be free, right? I’m not saying we’ll go out and attack them, but maybe we should concentrate more on the French right now, and only pull into English ports as the needs arise.

The Indian war canoe suggestion from the thread CapnPitt linked to is intriguing. I think we’ll try it next time we play!

And the governor’s daughters keep offering us stuff we already have, like the Spanish rutters or the Perfectly Balanced Swords. How do we use those, anyway?

Well, even after you’ve become a Duke, the governor will keep rewarding you with land if you keep doing things he likes, so Duke’s not quite the dead end that it was in the older versions. As for the rutters and balanced swords, I think those are just automatic: the rutter makes more information show up on your map, while the balanced swords give you a speed edge when fighting.

I love that you can chase down ships now, rather than just randomly encountering them like before. Much more enjoyable. I’ve been making nice with the Spanish until I can get married (the governor’s daughter in Caracas is a hottie), after that I’m going to go berserk and trash the whole Spanish empire.

I love the game (I even didn’t mind dancing once I got the hang of it). My only gripes are that its very much a remake, rather than a sequel, and how repetitive it can get at points (tracking down the same guy again and again… they could’ve changed his name at least). I think they could have added a bit more depth to the game without ruining its charms.

How do we get married? We’ve fought some fiances and beaten them, and the daughters have given us gifts. Is there a wedding ceremony? If so, does that mean the other governors’ daughters are off limits?

There is a wedding ceremony. When you get high enough relationship-wise, you’ll visit the governor’s mansion to find out that she’s been kidnapped. You have to complete that mission before getting married. After you get married you can still dance, etc., with other governors’ daughters. In one game I had a daughter get kidnapped while I was already married, but I didn’t rescue her, so I don’t know what happens.