Shiver me timbers 'Lassy,' it be time for a pirates story! It always feels good to strike a chord with pirate talk, even if it is two months away from National Talk Like A Pirate Day! Still scratching your head in amazement as to just why I am speaking in pirate? The much anticipated pirate strategy game Age of Booty (formerly known as Plunder) has finally been released on XBox Live and we here at Warp 9 couldn't be happier. After four straight hours of game play and twenty- three online matches I can honestly say that Age of Booty is one hell of a good time.
Visually, AOB looks great for a down-loadable game. The waters are crisp, pirate ships look like, well...pirate ships and best of all it sets the mood extremely well. You actually feel like you're manning a ship constructed for pillaging, sinking enemy ships and plundering around the open seas like a skirby dawg! Basically, the object of the game is to overtake cities before your counterparts do; pretty simple. However, developer (Certain Affinity) tossed in some resource management tactics and now you got yourself a full blown "open sea" at your disposal.
Game play is fast...real fast! In fact, each match usually last about ten minutes or so unless you're your playing an eight on eight match; which will run perhaps twenty minutes or so depending on how good you are. The map is outlined in grids and you are able to sail from grid to grid taking out bases and pillaging resources.
Each map consist of a set number of bases you have to over take in order to win the match and each map is littered with opposing factions, abandoned crates, and islands. It's up to you to decide what you want to pilfer first. By stocking up on resources however you can upgrade your ship with either armor, cannons or speed (I always choose speed first). This is where the tactical side of the game shines.
Multiplayer is definitely where the fun is
at. Matches are surprisingly easy to find, join and play in, seeing as though AOB has garnered some pretty high download numbers (roughly in the 40-thousand or so mark). Even though the single player challenges offer up some pretty good matches it will only take a matter of a day or so to complete them all. But as mentioned before hand, the single player challenges isn't where you'll find yourself most of the time.One other aspect of the game worthy of mentioning is the sound effects. Pirates talk trash in their rough and scraggly voices while boats, cannons and bombs all sound very realistic; even for an "arcade-esque" type of game. It's always fun to hear one of the pirates yell out something like, "Tis 'Ol Peg Leg here to skirmish ye booty!" I hope he's talking about gold.
The only down side to this title is that game play does tend to get old after a few matches. It would have been nice if the developers had included side missions or objective based multiplayer matches to bolster the experience. Instead, it's your typical run of the mill, "over take three bases for victory" matches, leaving you wanting more.
Besides the one downfall of repetitiveness Age of Booty offers up a breath of fresh air on XBox Live's service. The achievement points are easy to get, battles are frantic, fast and fun (F3), visuals are spot on and the SFX are crisp and satisfying. Overall, Age of Booty satisfies that old RTS itch we all have deep down inside.
Age of Booty gets a well deserved......
8.5 out of 10
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