After 11 years of development, Ubisoft has now released their newest game Skull and Bones promising that it will give the truest pirate experience.
Despite the game’s rocky development filled with delays and constant money problems, gamers have been waiting and anticipating Ubisoft’s newest release, thinking that the game will be able to live up to Ubisoft’s previous pirate game assassins creed black flag.
Skull and Bones’ 11 years of development started with a spinoff to Ubisoft’s hit game series Assassin’s Creed but later transformed into its own open-world multiplayer experience that plans to have high stakes player vs player action that contributes to its overall atmosphere of pirate life.
Contrary to its origins in Skull and Bones, instead of playing as a pirate captain controlling your ship through your character, you take direct control of your ship by playing as your ship. In your gameplay of Skull and Bones, you’ll be sailing the seas fighting and completing missions as a boat except for specific sections of the game where you’re required to play as a person.
One of The biggest highlights of the game would have to be its truly amazing presentation that could convince you that you’re watching a movie instead of playing a game. Graphics and sound design that rival high-budget movies combine to make a game that immerses you into the life of a 17th-century pirate.
Despite the game’s flair, players will quickly realize that Skull and Bones has several problems hidden underneath its impressive surface, with the most glaring problem being its monotonous mission that leaves the player feeling less like they just had a fun gaming experience and more like they’ve just done a mandatory chore.
Another problem was the egregious monetization of the game having the typical battle passes, premium currencies, and skins that are usually found in a free game despite Skull and Bones price tag of 60 dollars, or 90 if you buy the premium edition.
But the worst of the problems is the way the game seems to refuse to give the player a pirate experience: there are no sword battles, your pirate crew can’t hold a mutiny, and (worst of all) you don’t play as a pirate; you play as a boat.
Compared to Ubisoft’s other pirate game Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, the situation is almost flipped. Black Flag has an engaging mission design, a reactive crew, and of course, you play as a pirate, not a boat. The only thing holding the game back is the arguably dated graphics that were impressive on release.
Of course, most of the game’s problems can be led back to its 11 years of development. Having a long development time is by no means a new thing in the video game industry, but it is for a company like Ubisoft that’s more used to pushing out Assassin’s Creed games every one to three years. The game’s mismanaged development was plagued with issues at every turn. Project leaders would come on board to try and take the reign of the project just to find out they could barely steer the game into a shippable state and would ultimately have to pass it on to the next person.
Skull and Bones set out to give players the ultimate pirating experience that no game has before with the quadruple-A level quality that Ubisoft promised but instead, Skull and Bones is a mediocre chore-like game where the only pirating it does is when it steals 60 dollars from you.
