Puzzle Pirates - First Impressions
Puzzle Pirates This game cracks me up. What an odd (and fun) concept.
Now let me explain. Have you heard of MMORPGs? MMORPG = Massively Multiplayer Online RolePlaying Game. Massively multiplayer means that thousands of people can play simultaneously. Online is self explanatory (in this situation you can play through a dial up modem, other games pretty much require a high speed connection). Roleplaying in this case means that everyone is pretending to be a pirate. Game in this case… well this is where Pirate Puzzles breaks the mold.
In Puzzle Pirates you play a little pirate (isometric, 3rd person view). You can job for the Navy, join a Crew, keep a shop, challenge others to a duel or a drinking game, join tournaments, lose an eye, buy a hat, and do many other piratey things. The twist is that whether you are helping sail a ship, or fighting a tavern brawl, how well you do is determined by how well you (as in the person at the keyboard) do at a number of “puzzle games”. Some are like Tetris, others are maze like (in the sense that the old game Plumbing Works or Pipe Works was), and others are traditional games like cards, or a simplified variation of Go!. Each of the games of course has sound and graphics to make it more pirate-like.
What makes the game fun is of course the social element and the team play. You can become reknowned for being the best cannon loader in your archipelago for instance. What makes the game hilarious (in my mind at least) is that in a ship to ship battle my captain is relying on how well I (and 3 others) do at this tetris inspired puzzle to determine if we sail faster than the other ship. So I’m playing tetris, but I’m actually nervous!
The beauty in all of this is that, as can be expected, Tetris type games don’t last hours. You can jump in and play a little while, or stay in and participate in a blockade (I’ve yet to do that though). What I have done though is found a crew to join, fun bunch of folks, participated in a few ship to ship battles and bought myself some boots.
I’ll do a follow up on this post. I’ve got the greenlight to do an interview with the CEO of Puzzle Pirates for The Safehouse so I’ll be gathering more info.
