Sid Meier's Pirates! Remake Hoists Mainbrace

Thanks to GameSpy for its first impressions of the PC remake, Sid Meier's Pirates!, an updating of the seminal Civilization designer's late '80s game of the same name. Meier notes: "We've learned quite a bit about gameplay... we learned how to build on a classic game without destroying it", and the preview reveals: "The game world is a 'fully fleshed-out sandbox' where you'll have your own ship (or fleet of ships) and free reign to do as you please." However, Meier also mentions: "There's a little more of a stronger story pull", since apparently, this Q4 2004-due title has, like other piratical titles, "an über-villain, a pirate captain responsible for killing your parents, forcing you to leave the old world, and scattering your family all over the Caribbean."