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This game took 11 years to make?! Skull and Bones makes being a pirate feel boring

5K View2024-02-19

Skull and Bones

8.0

ActionStrategyAdventure

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SHOULD I PLAY SKULL AND BONES?

Skip it, unless you really love sailing simulators. I had to play a lot of Skull and Bones to understand how I really felt about the game, because I wanted to give it the best shot it had at hooking me in, but I was left disappointed by almost everything about it. From bland combat to painful grinding and endless, mindless sailing, Skull and Bones’ problems weigh down what could have been a fun, pirate-themed experience. Instead, it feels like a sinking ship full of pretenders wearing fake eye patches.

TIME PLAYED

I played Skull and Bones for twelve hours. I’ve reached infamy level 7, also known as Marauder rank, and acquired a sloop ship and ranked it to level 4. I’ve explored around forty percent of the entire map, killed hundreds of enemy ships, and completed dozens of quests. I’m currently trying to get a bigger ship, which would allow me to explore the virtual seas more comfortably.

WHAT’S AWESOME ABOUT SKULL AND BONES?

• Visual quality and design. The visuals are the only part of Skull and Bones where I can actually see how the game could have taken eleven years to develop. This world is full of realistic and diverse areas that carry their own cultural influences and unique environments. Sailing into new waters always felt like another adventure, and exploring the beauty and mystery of each shoreline, river, and archipelago made the pirate life a little more charming.

• Becoming a great pirate. In Skull and Bones, I took on the role of a shipwrecked pirate whose only dream was to become an infamous legend of the seas. I had to do favors for other pirate captains and complete missions to climb the social ranking and gain more infamy. Even though there wasn’t a lot of storytelling, I enjoyed how the world grew with me. Every time I completed a mission or destroyed multiple ships, more stories of my conquest and destruction spread throughout every harbor I visited. The characters inhabiting this world made sure I knew I was doing glorious pirate work. I also admired the level of depth the developers put into designing the characters and making each one unique, especially across different places.

• Rogue waves. Rogue waves are a real-world phenomenon that appear in the open ocean during storms. These gigantic waves can capsize and destroy a ship if the vessel is caught unguarded. When rogue waves showed up in Skull and Bones, I had to quickly sail out of harm’s way to stay alive. This challenge added a nice touch to the otherwise mindless sailing I had to do.

WHAT SUCKS ABOUT SKULL AND BONES?

• Overly simple combat. Fighting ships on the open ocean in Skull and Bones is a surprisingly carefree experience. All I had to do was right click and drag my mouse to aim my cannons, and most enemy ships died in a matter of three to seven barrages. Since a lot of my performance in combat was based on the quality of my gear, I ended up easily wiping out opponents who were less decked out than me. I was hoping there would be more complexity added to the combat over time, but that didn’t really happen; eventually I got so bored of ship-to-ship battles that I ended up avoiding combat whenever I could.

• Too much grinding. It took seven to eight hours for me to finally grind all the gear necessary for exploring the outer reaches of Skull and Bones, which is where all the fun endgame content takes place. I had to build new ships to beat stronger opponents, complete quests to rank up and get better blueprints, and repeat this entire process over and over again. Since many of the requirements for unlocking certain blueprints are inconveniently spread all over the game’s gigantic world, I spent most of my time endlessly sailing from place to place just to get natural materials or special ingredients from faraway merchants. This endless string of fetch quests pulled me right out of the pirate fantasy and made feel more like I was doing chores.

• No dedicated player-versus-player systems. The only real way to fight other players in Skull and Bones is by accepting an event in the open ocean and brawling out there. Just one problem: There’s no ranking system to create a fair environment for PvP. Most of the people that join these events are in the endgame stages and have extremely strong ships, which meant I didn’t stand a chance when I tried to check it out.

• Limited out-of-ship exploration. There are so many beautiful locations spread across Skull and Bones’ world, and it’s such a shame that I couldn’t explore all of them. I was only able to leave my ship and walk around designated outposts, where I could trade with merchants or talk with NPCs about quests. Not being able to check out other large landmasses felt like a huge wasted opportunity.

• There are better pirate games. Most people will compare Skull and Bones to Sea of Thieves or the naval battles of Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, but it doesn’t nearly live up to those games. Where those two titles capture the sense of swashbuckling adventure of being a pirate, Skull and Bones feels like it’s just mimicking the true pirate experience through its tone and storyline. The actual gameplay is mostly bland combat and grindy progression—a much tamer and more civilized experience than I’d expect from the pirate life. I just never once felt like a pirate when playing Skull and Bones, and I can’t imagine a bigger problem for this specific game.