Pirates! Gold
Description official descriptions
As with the original, this is a blend of strategy, action and adventure. Pirates! Gold lets you play the role of a beginning buccaneer in the 17th century Spanish Main, in search of fame and fortune. Each town in this untamed raw region has different surprises and dangers.
How you acquire stature is up to you; you can make your living through honest trade and the search for hidden treasure, or you can be a little more daring and attack and plunder ships. As you can choose a specific skill to stand out in, the game can vary each time. Sword fighting is played out in side-view action sequences.
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32 People (31 developers, 1 thanks) · View all
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[ full credits ] |
Reviews
Critics
Average score: 81% (based on 26 ratings)
Players
Average score: 3.8 out of 5 (based on 89 ratings with 7 reviews)
Topical pirate simulator, in a tropical setting
The Good
I like the fact that it did not add historically inaccurate things, like large monsters, to the otherwise smooth interpretation of the daily activities of your average pirate, such as plundering, treasure hunting, swordplay, sea battles, etc.
It is mind-numbingly easy to get the gist of the game, but total mastery is not easy to come by. Excellent replay value.
The Bad
The sameness of all the locations, the music can get to you after a few hours.
Overall, not much to dislike. Could use some more pirate-style debauchery, though.
The Bottom Line
An excellent way to live some high-seas fantasies, if you can find it cheap enough.
Mine cost me $29, but that was an online auction service.
Genesis · by Eric Olson (1) · 2004
The Good
This game has a very interesting premise in my opinion. Playing as a pirate is very satisfying. The graphics, while hardly amazing, are pretty good and are a joy to behold. They just exude the atmosphere of piracy on the high seas, along with the sounds which just stop short of making you burst out into a sea shanty as your family watches in horror. There is plenty for you to do in this game also. You can raid ships, plunder cities (even overthrow the governor and install a new one to your liking), search for buried treasure, find an ancient Indian treasure, hold other pirates for ransom, raid the treasure fleet, and impress regional governors to attain ranks (which attract the ladies) and gain land (which increase your score).
The Bad
The combat system is where the game goes from great to just good. First, in ground battles, you command your own character who attacks the enemy's leader. How well you do in this battle effects the morale of your's and his troops, which determines how many casualties each side takes. this is in effect, pretty lame. Those hoping for a strategic battle between pirates and the town's militia will be disappointed, as the majority of ground combat is senseless button mashing. Just keep your character stabbing constantly and you will most likely win. The sea combat is ok. It involves steering around your ship (if you have more than one, you can still only have one fighting per battle) and pressing the attack button which fires a salvo of cannons. You can also, ram a ship to board it. Again, not all that terrible, but certainly it could be better. A variety of annoying bugs may plague you occasionally such as the cannons on your ship not appearing in a battle, your ship not being armed with cannons despite the fact you have cannons in your inventory, and the gold that you have accumulated on your ship disappearing after a battle. Some of the cargo feels a bit rushed also. A total of three items for any time period (Always food, occasionally there is tobacco instead of furs, yipee! ) The lack of interesting cargo inventory makes the game seem a bit less realistic.
The Bottom Line
Hardly a great game, but certainly worth a look. They are coming out with a newer version sometime this year, so we might be seeing more pirates soon;)
Windows 3.x · by James Kirk (150) · 2004
good, but needs to be patched.
The Good
This game is great. The setting, 17th centuary pirates, is sadly one (along with mideavil europe and fuedal japan) of the under used game worlds.
I have never played the original Pirates but it looks great.
This game is an updated version of Pirates and is worth the money since Pirates is hard to find (read Hard).
The only problem with it is the fact that it needs to be patched to work right (just go to MSN and search for Pirates! Gold and you'll eventually find a web with the Pirates! Gold Patch.)
Besides that the game is wonderfull, everything is wonderfull, buy it, buy it now!
The Bad
The fact that if you play it under Win 95 or 98 it will crash if you don't patch it.
The Bottom Line
Buy it now.
DOS · by Wolfang (155) · 2000
Trivia
Rarity
The Windows edition seems to be very rare.
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Related Sites +
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Cutlass Isle
Information and forum on Pirates!, Pirates! Gold and the upcoming Pirates! 2 -
Pirates and Pirates Gold
Provides tips, tricks, files, and other stuff related to this game. -
The Lost Tavern
Dedicated to Pirates!
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Contributors to this Entry
Game added by Eurythmic.
Genesis added by PCGamer77. Windows 3.x added by poomang. Amiga CD32 added by Kabushi. Macintosh added by Tomas Pettersson.
Additional contributors: Trixter, JubalHarshaw, Brian Dobson, Sergio Brinkhuis, Alaka.
Game added July 17, 1999. Last modified February 27, 2024.