Slashdot Mirror
Puzzle Pirates Done, Walking Plank To Release
Spuggy writes "Ahoy mates! Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates (originally mentioned a few months back on Slashdot Games) now has an official launch date of December 8th, 2003 - it's available in Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X flavors, and has been playable in Beta form for a while now. For those of you who have still not tried the game out, Puzzle Pirates is an interesting marriage of several puzzle games and aspects of a MMORPG; but instead of your typical hack & slash of EverQuest, you perform various single/multiplayer 2D puzzles to power your boat, craft various goods in the game, and even fight your fellow players and a series of NPC Brigand boats who threaten your voyages across the ocean!"
Imagine your character owning a discount body piercing shop in this game.
You could make a killing, charging a buccaneer.
Get off my launchpad!
Aaargh Jim Lad! A really interesting innovative approach. Hopefully will do sufficiently well to encourage the developers to persue similarly clever ideas in future.
been beta testing this game since july. Its Loads of fun.
It's a first post, that be!
We should make a clan called the peg legs.
I can already imagine t' splinter factions, those scurvy dogs!
Get off my launchpad!
Harr mateys, I've been playing this great game since the original mention on /.
It really is a lot of fun if your a puzzle game kinda person, and the community is great, aguably the best part of the whole game. There's also a good supply of user run in-game events. There is a lot of swordfight and drinking turneys. Also we've seen Races, Sea shanty writing contests, and even a murder mystery (in which I got to play the Murderer).
The game will run on most any platform (as long as you have Java runtime 1.4.2) and it even runs pretty well on a low-spec machine (300Mhz 128Mb Ram). I'll also mention the developers of the game are a good bunch, friendly, funny, and very responsive to the needs of the community.
Are these real or music pirates? I don't think I want to play a game with pirates who aren't stealing music... just not evil enough for me.
I had it mind that it was a chatroom
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
Don't worry, everyone there speaks like the players in any other MMORPG, which is to say, not like a pirate.
Do swordfights consist of trying to out-insult your opponent?
This game really is great; if you sign up now before the December 8th Release date, you can get 2 years of the game for $50. It's definitely filled the void in Linux gaming for myself and all for the price of a PS2 game that I get sick of in 2 weeks; not to mention being able to see some of my ideas and features be implemented into the game
The devels really are great, they're constantly active on the forums and in game; not to mention that they actually listen to the players (for example, there were quite a few complaints that there weren't enough Brigands (NPP boats) out there for you to pillage, so the devels made a few changes to the game so you now see consistently more Brigands on the waters).
I highly recommend that you go check it out; for anyone new to the game, feel free to look me up in game for any help or info "/tell spuggy". I also recommend that you get involved in the social aspect of the game, which as a previous poster said, ranks right up there as one of the best features of the game.
Cheers, hope to you see you all there.
I've also been playing since the previous slashdot post. To this day the game is still amazingly entertaining, and I'm always learning some new aspect of the game. Anyways gets two thumbs up from me.
this really is a fun game. I like that the developers are cool people (go e + co.!) and that they throw in bizzare stuff like when everything went all 'spooky' on halloween with the characters turning into zombies and skeletons and such.
the economics of the game is pretty interesting as well. buying an island is just plain epic.
of course, having it work on macX is huge for me.
but instead of your typical hack & slash of EverQuest
Yes, but I think the people who enjoy games like EQ are not necessarily all climbing aboard Puzzle Pirates for a change of pace. This game looks to be an evolution of Yahoo! Games, and not quite in the same category of MMORPGs. Rather, if there's a game to rock the MMORPG world, it's going to be World of Warcraft.
Hecubas
It may be redundant, mateys, but hoist this one aboard ye decks:
The Pirate Keyboard
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
What is the bane of many a good pirate hairstylist?
The corsairs.
Don't blame Durga. I voted for Centauri.
Arr, matey, I beg to differ. While the speech isn't totally pirate nor totally devoid of real world, there are frequent "Arr", "Matey", "Avast" and other pirately talk thrown in. Lots of flavor, really enjoy playing.
Mirka, Pirate of the Velvet Claws
It took all of 15 seconds of load-up before this:
An error occurred while launching/running the application.
Title: Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates
Vendor: Three Rings Design, Inc.
Category: Invalid Argument error
The application has requested a version of the Java 2 platform (JRE) that is currently not locally installed. Java Web Start was unable to automatically download and install the requested version. The JRE version must be installed manually.
Heute die Welt, morgen das Sonnensystem!
$50 for 2 years? That's not bad. I want more information about pricing because I couldn't find anything about on their web site. Is it a per hour, or flat montly rate? What is the cost after Dec 8th?
SCO.com uses Linux
Downloaded it last night and got of board with a fun crew. $50 for 2 years of play is well worth it, and I certainly don't mind paying for a fun new original (to me, at least) game. Arrrrr!!! Look for Hokar.
Although there's a definite focus towards casual players (despite being an MMORPG) YPP amazingly manages to hold up well - much of the complaints levelled towards other RPGs, offline and on, still apply to an extent (i.e. repetitive) but the skill-based progression works far better than it should. Even going out and killing things is constantly fresh.
/.ers know, a large amount of YPP's source is slated for open release once polished, and using Java allows them to deliver to a wide variety of platforms. I understand they develop on Linux (not sure what flavour), and naturally there was an emacs argument at some point on the forums. The team has a suprising amount of experience and know-how behind it, and partakes in a stunning amount of social interaction - often they can be found in the game building community (read: slacking off by playing their own game, always a good sign). Users have affected the design a lot by pointing out needs, suggesting new features and whining about changes (notably the chat system - clan chat was specially coloured after appeals from the player body, then changed after complaints about the poor choice of colour, and a recent update added flag (alliance) and officer (high-level, pretty much, although the game doesn't use levels) chat after a suggestion on the game's forum).
Also of note is the devs, Three Rings. As
So, let's see. We have a Java-based deliberately multi-platform MMORPG where the high-ranking players are really dedicated to forging an enjoyable and l33t-free environment, casual players can play for a few hours every few days without being left behind, the devs listen and actively participate (and are very good at what they do), and a code base and design that has been so stable throughout the beta that a game-wide reset has only been performed when switching to the release server.
Sounds okay to me.