Modern pirates call for classic games

Josh
Saturday
10:55 pm

Pirates have been around ever since man sailed the oceans (and, presumably before then, but they were just called thieves).

With the resurgence in high-profile piracy cases, news organizations have gone into high gear to provide enterprising coverage. (One piece you might find cool is this little ditty from NPR that showcases the modern, non-lethal weapons that might someday keep would-be swashbucklers at bay, or, at the least, comedically slipping around.)

But I’m not here to discuss the news — I’m here to cheapen it and tie it to some nerdy aspect of pop culture … preferably something that involves the 80s and my love of old technology.

Which brings me to: Sid Meier’s Pirates!

Pirates! was a classic game that was made for about every system under the sun. If you had a Commodore 64, Atari ST, PC, or Nintendo, you had a crack at owning this sweet baby. The game sold more than a million copies (a big deal at the time), and it got the full, blousy remake treatment back in 2004.

You can download and play the classic game using an emulator, or, if you’re a chump, you can purchase the 2004 update of the game, with better graphics but the same gameplay.

If you have some time to kill, I promise you that the game will captivate you even today. It had that same feel that made Oregon Trail so memorable — it was one of those rare games that take you beyond the simple graphics and beeps into a different place.

The game borrows liberally from history and geography, and was billed as a “historical simulation game.” You pick your nationality (English, French, Dutch or Spanish) and a time period. This comes into play because the game is set in the Caribbean, and different nationalities were in control during different times.

I remember blowing the dust off of the top of a globe my parents got me years earlier in order to stare at the tiny Caribbean islands to plot my course. Havana, Panama, Santiago, Santo Domingo — they’re all there, and they’re yours to either trade with or plunder.

Throughout the game, you attempt to first just stay alive, and eventually to build a pirate army that would make Jack Sparrow proud (or at least flop about awkwardly). You can visit towns, buy provisions and chat up the local governor — if he likes you, he may even introduce you to his daughter. Pirates lets you court or even marry — which, true to life, creates a lot of complications down the road (Am I right, fellas? Haw, haw).

As the game progresses, you can attack ships in real-time battles, firing cannons and using wind to your advantage before engaging your captain in a swashbuckling fencing duel. If you’re strong enough, you can even assault whole towns and retake them for your home country.

There’s no real victory point (I remember trying to play the game through to the advent of aircraft, but got tired of that somewhere in the 18th century), but like any good life simulator, the goal of Pirates! is apparent: Make a ton of money, marry a kickin’ wife, spend a lot of time drinking with the fellas and retire rich.