Misha
Site Founder
Hey there, everybody! It's Misha, and today I'll be discussing my first hours of game time, and my feedback to the developers. First of all, a bit about myself. I've been playing POTCO for the minimum length of 3 hours per week, and likewise since October 18th, 2009. This, along with other popular Disney MMO's that are now nonexistent have turned me into the Gamer I am today. POTCO in particular, struck me hard both when it was living under Disney, and when it closed. At first, I saw the game and it's "Unlimited Access", and because I'm such a fan of the movies, I threw my wallet to Disney to be able to spend my times Plundering, Swashbuckling, etc in the Caribbean.
Onto my impressions though, we'll start with the good. So, the good! Firstly, let me state that I applaud the developers for managing to keep the same formula the game has always been on. As obvious as that statement might sound, remakes of games aren't always the same, and the developers are doing a phenomenal job of holding the game together as best they can without any funding from the community. Second set of applause though, goes to you wonderful ladies and gentlemen who make up the community that this game is so well known for! Aside from the minority 1%, the community to Pirates Online has always been clean, fun, and very warm to come back to. Somebody you don't know, of which you met in a cave in the middle of a volcanic island, could become your best friend in the entire game. You can do everything together! The game just allows for this really cooperative, warming feeling to have a family within a virtual world, which many titles nowadays don't have anything near the scale of POTCO and TLOPO. Another tidbit is that Pirates Online is stupidly re-playable! Whilst not everything in the game is the most fun of activities, no-one can deny that even without being able to replay quests, the game still has an element of replay-ability unmatched. It's that feeling of "I know what's here, but I don't care. I could do this a thousand times and still enjoy myself." that puts this game apart, and unlike many games, not everything happens the exact same.
So to my secondary section, the bad. Now, I want to be clear as I'm writing this, I have no intent to rush or pester the developers, as they are doing their best with what they have, but more-so as a sort of image to paint and pave a way into the future of this magnificent game. Most portions of this section will be things I feel could bring some color into an already amazing universe of the game we love. Starting off though, I do have to acknowledge the bugs and crashes. Kudos to the developers though, working on it slowly but surely! I won't bring anything else about bugs to the table, as I know they aren't hidden from sight, and both the devs and community are working to shed light and improve the game. Next comes to the storyline, though. In Disney's POTCO, the storyline at this time was alright, nothing especially exciting until you've completed the story quests. My only issue with these quests is that they are stressing the point of being tedious and repetitive. If anything, my one request to the devs would be to add more variety into the quests to make them worth playing through more than once, even if it means introducing some extra rewards to especially difficult missions, heck; I'd be fine going to any of the multiple islands around the Caribbean past our main Pirate Strongholds to run errands and kill things, I'd just love to see diversity that could bring some color back into playing the game more than just a standard MMO. Finally, my biggest overall baddie has to be shown with it's ugly face. Enemy diversity. "What is he blabbering about now?" Many players who have delved into other MMO's know what I'm talking about. Enemies in the game simply aren't much different from each other. Now, I'll be producing another forum post much later talking about designs for new enemies in different areas of the world, but I just want to point it out. Enemy diversity could be something the game's needed for a while, but until experimentation happens, we won't know. Let me put an example here. For all of you POTCO players, do you remember invasions? Keg Runners? Jolly Roger himself? Now, I'll be the first to say that Keg Runners were slightly broken, but do you remember that feeling of your heart sinking as you watch this mammoth undead with the equivalent to your War Frigate's worth of Gunpowder strolling up to the barricade? Or the amount of downed players the moment that he got within to arm's reach? THIS is the feeling I love, and that type of feeling more than just in timely events, would add so much to the game! Could you imagine standard Undead Keg Runners roaming the islands here and there? It would be a surprise, but I do feel it could add a touch of spice to the game, or, err, gunpowder.
Finally though, I talk about my mixed feelings on ideas from both what is presently in the game, as well as what could be implemented that players are talking about. Here's a biggie.. (Now I know the Devs denied any type of this idea for the time being, but hear this out) Graphics overhaul. Updating the graphics, even slightly. Now, don't get me wrong, I'd be first in line to test out an HD variant of the game, as buggy as it would be, but I'm taking the side of the Devs on this one. Why though? Well, while I don't mind a few graphical improvements to flush out the game and make it more Down-to-Earth, changing the whole game would make it lose it's classic feel which, at least in my mind, would drive many away as it just wouldn't be the same game. Feel free to let me know what you think about this.
This is basically it to my first impressions, remember though that this is all my personal opinion and that before you bash me for it or agree with me, think about it for yourself before you go to war over it.
Onto my impressions though, we'll start with the good. So, the good! Firstly, let me state that I applaud the developers for managing to keep the same formula the game has always been on. As obvious as that statement might sound, remakes of games aren't always the same, and the developers are doing a phenomenal job of holding the game together as best they can without any funding from the community. Second set of applause though, goes to you wonderful ladies and gentlemen who make up the community that this game is so well known for! Aside from the minority 1%, the community to Pirates Online has always been clean, fun, and very warm to come back to. Somebody you don't know, of which you met in a cave in the middle of a volcanic island, could become your best friend in the entire game. You can do everything together! The game just allows for this really cooperative, warming feeling to have a family within a virtual world, which many titles nowadays don't have anything near the scale of POTCO and TLOPO. Another tidbit is that Pirates Online is stupidly re-playable! Whilst not everything in the game is the most fun of activities, no-one can deny that even without being able to replay quests, the game still has an element of replay-ability unmatched. It's that feeling of "I know what's here, but I don't care. I could do this a thousand times and still enjoy myself." that puts this game apart, and unlike many games, not everything happens the exact same.
So to my secondary section, the bad. Now, I want to be clear as I'm writing this, I have no intent to rush or pester the developers, as they are doing their best with what they have, but more-so as a sort of image to paint and pave a way into the future of this magnificent game. Most portions of this section will be things I feel could bring some color into an already amazing universe of the game we love. Starting off though, I do have to acknowledge the bugs and crashes. Kudos to the developers though, working on it slowly but surely! I won't bring anything else about bugs to the table, as I know they aren't hidden from sight, and both the devs and community are working to shed light and improve the game. Next comes to the storyline, though. In Disney's POTCO, the storyline at this time was alright, nothing especially exciting until you've completed the story quests. My only issue with these quests is that they are stressing the point of being tedious and repetitive. If anything, my one request to the devs would be to add more variety into the quests to make them worth playing through more than once, even if it means introducing some extra rewards to especially difficult missions, heck; I'd be fine going to any of the multiple islands around the Caribbean past our main Pirate Strongholds to run errands and kill things, I'd just love to see diversity that could bring some color back into playing the game more than just a standard MMO. Finally, my biggest overall baddie has to be shown with it's ugly face. Enemy diversity. "What is he blabbering about now?" Many players who have delved into other MMO's know what I'm talking about. Enemies in the game simply aren't much different from each other. Now, I'll be producing another forum post much later talking about designs for new enemies in different areas of the world, but I just want to point it out. Enemy diversity could be something the game's needed for a while, but until experimentation happens, we won't know. Let me put an example here. For all of you POTCO players, do you remember invasions? Keg Runners? Jolly Roger himself? Now, I'll be the first to say that Keg Runners were slightly broken, but do you remember that feeling of your heart sinking as you watch this mammoth undead with the equivalent to your War Frigate's worth of Gunpowder strolling up to the barricade? Or the amount of downed players the moment that he got within to arm's reach? THIS is the feeling I love, and that type of feeling more than just in timely events, would add so much to the game! Could you imagine standard Undead Keg Runners roaming the islands here and there? It would be a surprise, but I do feel it could add a touch of spice to the game, or, err, gunpowder.
Finally though, I talk about my mixed feelings on ideas from both what is presently in the game, as well as what could be implemented that players are talking about. Here's a biggie.. (Now I know the Devs denied any type of this idea for the time being, but hear this out) Graphics overhaul. Updating the graphics, even slightly. Now, don't get me wrong, I'd be first in line to test out an HD variant of the game, as buggy as it would be, but I'm taking the side of the Devs on this one. Why though? Well, while I don't mind a few graphical improvements to flush out the game and make it more Down-to-Earth, changing the whole game would make it lose it's classic feel which, at least in my mind, would drive many away as it just wouldn't be the same game. Feel free to let me know what you think about this.
This is basically it to my first impressions, remember though that this is all my personal opinion and that before you bash me for it or agree with me, think about it for yourself before you go to war over it.
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