It’s basically an unwritten rule that three types of character will never not be cool: zombies, ninjas and pirates. Hollywood has certainly paid attention, with dozens of films starring these types of characters, and the videogame industry has taken note as well. But pirates have become the topic du jour in gaming circles, a trend that CDV Software will continue in May when it releases Tortuga: Two Treasures for the PC.
Building on popular games like Sid Meier’s Pirates, Tortuga: Two Treasures features a strong sea-based component with ship-to-ship battles. But, also like Pirates, ship-to-ship combat is just one piece of the gameplay pie, with stealth aspects and swordfights spicing things up as you exact revenge on Blackbeard, your double-crossing mentor.
The alpha build we played opened with a nighttime sequence designed to show off the game’s stealth elements. Off in the distance, an opposing Spanish ship was anchored offshore, with our objective being to destroy the ship before moving to the inland city. Had we been the proud owner of a cannon-laden Corvette, blasting the Spaniards out of the water would’ve been the easiest solution. But we weren’t. Instead, we had to row over in our dinghy and see what our piratey wiles could accomplish.
As luck would have it, the Spaniards were smart, or at least observant. Upon noticing our dinghy, the Spaniards presented a pattern-based riddle. Answer it correctly, and we would be presumed friendly and be allowed to move closer to their ship. Answer it incorrectly, and they’d make toothpicks from our dinghy’s remains. As the game progresses, the answers to these pattern-based riddles will be revealed by winning battle, making stealth a much more approachable (and safe) option in the later stages. But at this early point, solving the riddle amounted to little more than guessing the correct answer. Fortunately, luck was on our side, and we sidled up to their ship.
Once alongside their stern, we had two options: sabotage their rudder, which would render them sitting ducks for a later attack, or plant an explosive charge, which would blast them immediately. What would Blackbeard do? Yeah, the same thing we would: blow them up. After planting the charge, we rowed a safe distance away and watched as their ship splintered into kindling. With mission accomplished, we headed for land.
The land-based gameplay is like most other action-adventure games, with non-playable characters to engage or avoid and various offensive and defensive moves from which to choose. Rather than assign moves to different keys on the keyboard, though, the developers have mapped both offensive and moves to the same keys, so players need to hold the left mouse button to activate offensive moves and the right mouse button for defensive. This makes combat easily approachable, but it can be frustrating in the heat of battle if you’re trying to adjust the camera and parry. We found this out the hard way, so after the first few enemies, we decided to be a bit stealthier and evade the NPCs’ cone of vision, which is indicated on the HUD. The developers at Ascaron will undoubtedly adjust the camera problems, but in this alpha build the problems did at least show the choices you’ll have when wandering through the game’s six towns.
The ship combat is also classic fare, with different classes of ships having different numbers of cannons, rates of travel and turning radii, the latter of which is also affected by whether you have your sails raised or lowered. You can also choose from different ammunition, from exploding cannonballs and traditional cannonballs to chain-linked ones and buckshot. The use of each type depends upon your strategy. If you want to reduce your enemy’s maneuverability, you’ll want to damage its masts and sails with the chain-linked cannonballs. If you want to damage its hull or take out its cannons, you’ll opt for the normal or exploding cannonballs. Or, if you want to reduce the ship’s reloading rate and overall battle efficiency, you can select the buckshot to take out its topside crew. As if that weren’t enough to keep in mind, you’ll also have to monitor your inertia as well as your enemy’s, because the game’s physics engine requires you to think of both when firing. But in spite of the complexity, ship-to-ship combat is probably the deepest, most engaging and enjoyable aspect of Tortuga: Two Treasures.
There are bound to be gamers who think the pirate genre has been overdone, that it’s time to focus instead on, say, making a can’t-miss Old West game. To them I say “look at first-person shooters.” Even though a genre may seem old and crusty, along comes a story or a game that washes away the skepticism and forces you to simply enjoy the developers’ work. Tortuga: Two Treasures certainly isn’t the first pirate game; it’s not even the first in the past 12 months. But when it ships for PC this May, Tortuga: Two Treasures could very well be the pirate game that makes you forget, even momentarily, your reasons for wanting to overlook it. And overlooking Tortuga is something you most definitely should not do.
— Jonas Allen