Merchants of the Caribbean

Super, thank you, alawar team very much for a pretty game such this one;

Typically, I love time management games and work tirelessly to get 3 stars or gold on every level. I enjoy challenging and new game plays, as well. This one, however, became a boring chore rather than a fun challenge. Twice I installed, twice I got about a third of the way through, and twice I felt stuck and defeated and had not desire to continue. The production chain was unique and exciting, but it also seemed to get in the way of completing the tasks at hand. I never really felt like I was completing a level, just earning enough production to sell everything and move on. And the pirate ship games were odd - never really knowing what improvements you were earning, what the success rate mattered, and why we were even playing the game at all. I think they tried something new, achieved some of it, but never tied it all together. In the end, I am just putting this aside as a non-complete. Too much time already spent trying for gold.

[h1]Summary[/h1] I genuinely really like this. My first introduction to this company was through their Robin Hood games, mostly because I really like Robin Hood in general. Played the first one of those while I was pregnant with my first born, and it was exactly what my pregnant brain needed. This is different, yet the same in what feels to me to be the best way. [h2]Gameplay[/h2] At the time of this review, I've only played 84 minutes, but I plan to keep playing. I like playing these games in short bursts to help kind of chill for a little bit at the end of the day- I've got two kids, now. I absolutely love the theme of this, and I love how they've taken their kind of singular gameplay- get into an area, break down obstacles to gain access to more resources, use resources to gain access to more resources, reach goals- and added a very good twist to it. The naval battles feel just tense enough to make it feel like I need to pay very close attention to what's going on. It feels like there are stakes to what I'm doing in a very fun, sensical way, because this is a game in which you are aboard a ship, looking for treasure, and dealing with pirates- yet the core gameplay still remains solidly what you would expect from this game. In each level, you build plantations and then sort of like factories in which you take the resources you have from your plantations to turn into new, better-selling resources. Selling these resources causes the prices to drop in the market, which causes you to have to take pause a little to reconsider what the best action is- do you want to build another corn plantations, or is there an option that will go better because you've sold too much corn AND flour, but flax sells for quite a bit right now? [h2]Tl;dr[/h2] It's good. I like it. It makes my tired mom brain feel like it can still achieve things after a long day of dealing with two toddlers.

I really like this game, it's relaxing and fun except for the ship fighting mini games. They become so difficult as the levels go up, that you get to a point that you can't win and you have to bypass the mini games

TLDR: The game wasn't fun for me. No technical problems, but gameplay was too much tedious effort for little reward. - The levels are very expansive with extra resources and superfluous roads, while containing tons of options and methods be which to complete it. There are so many options and extra materials and build sites to choose among, that I got overwhelmed with the sheer number of unguided decisions to be made. I got side-tracked building a little economy that wasn't required to complete the level in time. I prefer a more contained flow to a level. Map Issues - The levels require scrolling to see all the paths, without a zoom option. - Some areas on the map are visually blocked without clear ways to tell they exist. You need to clear an obstacle first to unlock the area. Since there are extra roads, I didn't always clear out that path, only to clear everything else on the level and discover I needed something in the blocked area. - There is no clear way to tell which type of build site each one is. There are some visually distinct categories of sites, but you can only tell what your options are for that build site by clicking on it, and only once it's accessible. Market Feature - The market element is unique, but clunky. - Only money is required for any work, but income buildings only produce resources. You have to use the market feature to sell each resource for money before you can use it to do anything. - Each level has different prices for the same resource; so you have to learn which resources are the most valuable for each level. Too much effort without adding fun challenge to the game. If there were groups of levels that had the same trade rates, it might be an interesting added complexity to the game, but still too tedious for me. Pirate Battles - Pirate battle levels are a pain in the rear. They are simple in mechanics, but take so long to complete. It becomes tedious to perform the same few number of actions for such a prolonged period. - You can't always repair all the damage done to your ship in order to beat the pirates. I don't want to constantly make simplistic triage decisions.

Das Spiel ist an sich nicht schlecht nur leider nervt es wenn die Achievements verbuggt sind und es bei einigen Aufgaben auf Glück ankommt. Echt schade das sich anscheinend niemand mehr um dieses Spiel kümmert!