Pirates of the Caribbean: Legend of the Black Buccaneer is an adventure horror game set in the Caribbean in the sixteenth century.
when The Da Vinci Code hit theaters, there was suddenly an abundance of books like Cracking Da Vinci's Code? Or how just as the 2005 Steven Spielberg/Tom
Cruise summer blockbuster War of the Worlds was hitting theaters, we
were also treated to the David Michael Latt/C. Thomas Howell
direct-to-video shelf-filler H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds? Well, just
in time to capitalize on the
piratical fervor over Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, budget
publisher Valcon Games arrives with Pirates: Legend of the Black
Buccaneer, rewarding those looking for another fun-filled summer romp
with an action adventure game that teems with awkward platforming mechanics, one-note combat, confusing level designs, and simplistic puzzles.
Legend of the Black Buccaneer is the Bolex watch of pirate games.
Through
some needlessly longwinded opening narration, you're told the tale of a
slave-turned-demon-goddess who lures greedy sailors to her island lair
with the promise of cursed treasure, which is
how the game's protagonist, Francis Blade, finds himself shipwrecked at
the start of the game, on an island populated by antagonistic monkeys,
pirates, and other dastardly enemies. Almost immediately upon his
arrival, Blade discovers a fancy amulet that magically turns this skinny
European into some kind of hulking undead hoodoo spirit version of the
old WWE wrestler Papa Shango. This creature is known as the Black Buccaneer, and with the ability to
transform into this powerful, top hat wearing behemoth at will, Blade
works his way across the island, fighting monkeys, plundering treasure,
and collecting ship parts in order to get off this rotten island. Once
the premise is set, the game doesn't spend much time elaborating any
further.
The action in Pirates: Legend of the Black Buccaneer is a mish-mash of other recent, memorable action adventure games like Tomb Raider and Prince of Persia, just not anywhere near as good as in any of them. There's lots of leaping around jungles, caverns, and ancient tombs. You'll encounter your fair share of puzzles that put the focus on box-pushing and switch-flipping. The levels are liberally peppered with enemies that you can take on with either your Francis Blade or Black Buccaneer personas, both of whom wield a pair of swords that can be put into deadly use by tapping at random on the square and triangle buttons. Playing as the Black Buccaneer gives you added strength and the ability to restore your own health by slaying enemies, but you can only play as him for a short while before reverting back to Francis Blade. If your enemies threaten to overwhelm you, you can summon a zombie at special zombie fountains to help turn the tide. In the hands of a competent developer, all this could've made for a decent knock-off, but WideScreen Games botches the job pretty thoroughly.
The action in Pirates: Legend of the Black Buccaneer is a mish-mash of other recent, memorable action adventure games like Tomb Raider and Prince of Persia, just not anywhere near as good as in any of them. There's lots of leaping around jungles, caverns, and ancient tombs. You'll encounter your fair share of puzzles that put the focus on box-pushing and switch-flipping. The levels are liberally peppered with enemies that you can take on with either your Francis Blade or Black Buccaneer personas, both of whom wield a pair of swords that can be put into deadly use by tapping at random on the square and triangle buttons. Playing as the Black Buccaneer gives you added strength and the ability to restore your own health by slaying enemies, but you can only play as him for a short while before reverting back to Francis Blade. If your enemies threaten to overwhelm you, you can summon a zombie at special zombie fountains to help turn the tide. In the hands of a competent developer, all this could've made for a decent knock-off, but WideScreen Games botches the job pretty thoroughly.
The
platforming elements are the most immediately frustrating, because they
make up such a large portion of the action. Simply jumping looks and
feels incredibly awkward, as if your character is weighed down with lead
boots. However, when you're able to wrangle the camera in order to line
up with another platform, your character suddenly springs to life, leaping
much farther than he seems capable of. Damage taken from falling off
platforms seems arbitrary. Fall down one floor and you'll keep on
truckin' like nothing happened; fall down two floors and you'll be
scraping your mangled corpse off the floor. When simply moving your character around feels like a chore, it doesn't bode well for the rest of the game.
The puzzles, which tie in to the platforming elements, are less frustrating by virtue that they're all brick-simple exercises.
Still, you'll regularly come upon a box you can't yet move or a switch
you can't yet flip, requiring you to backtrack later on. It's quite
rare, even in a really good game, for backtracking to be fun, and here
it's a source of much frustration. The level designs are relatively
small but extremely dense, usually consisting of multiple floors and
exits to other areas, and it's quite easy to get turned around and lose
sight of your next objective. The simplistic map is of little help
either, since it gives you no sense of vertical space when most of the
levels are often vertically oriented.
The
game's presentation does little to compensate for the tired, clunky
gameplay in Pirates: Legend of the Black Buccaneer. The animations are
consistently stiff and unnatural looking, and the character models are
mostly just simple and bland, save for the Black Buccaneer, who just
looks ridiculous. The environments, which are consistently small, are
also coated with dreary, washed-out textures that trade mostly in
muddled earth tones. There are the occasional soft-glow effects and a
black halo wraps the screen when you play as the Black Buccaneer, but
even when the game isn't trying to show off with fancy effects, the
frame rate is inexplicably erratic. The sound design actually seems unfinished, with a lot of repetitive or apparently absent sound effects.
From
stem to stern, Pirates: Legend of the Black Buccaneer is derivative and
uninspired. It cribs shamelessly from some of the best action adventure
games of the past few years, and in the process fumbles the execution
of the elements that made games like Tomb Raider and Prince of Persia so
memorable. This game is banking almost entirely on its flimsy word
association with Pirates of the Caribbean, and has nothing of worth to
offer beyond that. Even the most steadfast enthusiasts of piracy should
avoid getting Shanghaied by this one.
Processor= 1.0GHz
RAM= 256MB
Video Memory= 64MB
Size= 85MB
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