Skull & Bones is a “pirate” game created by Ubisoft, a developer with a number of great game recently. This game was introduced back in 2017 at E3 (RIP), and has been in development for about 11 years. Let’s see what 11 years of devlopement got us.

Gameplay and Story

Skull & Bones is a pirate-adventure game that mainly focuses on the naval exploration and combat part of the game. For the most part you don’t spend any time at all on land especially because there is no land combat. For a majority of the game, or even the whole game you’re a pirate who’s trying to make a name for yourself and become a pirate legend.

Everybody has to start somewhere, for you this means you’re going to be an errand boy, but hey apparently errand boys get their name cemented in history too. It makes you think, was Black Beard just running errands? Nah probably not, that was a different ocean. Every mission in the game unfortunately feels like you’re doing chores, everybody wants you to sail really far away and grab something for them and bring it back, thank goodness there’s fast travel or I would have lost my mind.

The naval combat is decent, which is bitter sweet I guess. That’s the majority of the game so I’m glad that’s the part they focused on, but it’s still repetive and slow. You end up just circling a ship waiting for you cannons to reload and eventually they sink or you board them. Whoopie!! It’s unfortunately a lot of rinse wash and repeat.

The extent of the on land gameplay is shops, job boards, cooking, turning in quests, and the most interesting part is the rumors. Probably the more exciting part of the game is the rumors, because it gives you a break from traveling your usually paths. There might be a rumor of a large sunken ship, or maybe even a mysterious beast lurking in the depths sinking ships. But, for the most part you’re UPS with cannons.

Amidst your travels you’ll gather materials to be able to upgrade your tools so you gather materials faster, or even build a new and bigger ship. There are actually quite a few different options you can go with in the ballistics department, you have your common cannons, or you can go with Torpedos, or short range high damage cannons. That is something that I can appreciate, but they don’t change the gameplay enough to call it diverse.

Graphics and Audio

Probably the biggest hit or miss part of the game is the graphics. Sometimes you’ll be sailing and catch a glimpse of the horizon and it looks absolutely stunning. Then you dock to have a conversation and you swear this game is 10 years old (oh wait, it is!). But, I don’t want to discount the landscape shots, it does actually look really nice in 4K when you’re sailing.

The audio… Oh the audio, from hearing somebody scream “HELP US!” every 30 seconds to some very, um, “colorful” voice acting, there’s not a whole lot going for it in this department. The voice acting is an odd thing, it sways a line where I can’t tell if it’s one person doing an array of bad accents or if it’s AI-generated voices. The first woman that you meet in the game, her accent is so stereotypically bad, I have to skip through her dialog. They just over-exaggerate so much it makes my bones shiver a little bit.

Feedback

Where do I start, this game is supposed to be a pirate game, but the best way I can describe it is as a “Mean Spirited Merchant” game. I came into the game with an open mind, hoping for the best because I love pirates, I think they bring such a cool theme and they can give a game a lot of spirit. Unfortunately, that’s where this game lacks, in spirit.

A few tweaks could have steered this game in the right direction. Add some land combat, a good old-fashioned pirate sword fight could add some high stakes when at port. When at battle at sea, there is an option to have your crew board the enemy but it just plays a cutscene and then they sink. Being able to actually play this out would add A LOT to the game. Maybe once you hook up, you have a two minute timer where you fight the other crew and grab as much treasure as you can then they sink. Or you grab a hold with them and you have to actually make it onto their ship and take out the whole crew before the timer runs out.

Combat is not the only spot where this game needs improvement, it’s the majority but not the only area. Skull & Bones could really use diversity in the missions. The missions get old really fast. Then lastly the customizations, there are a decent amount I can’t lie, but I wish they were able to be a little more custom. I wish that you could really design the ship to be exactly how you want it.

Verdict

Skull & Bones has a ton of potential to be a decent game, it just feels like it was forgotten, and then came the due date so it was just green lit. The “fun-factor” runs out very quickly and then the annoyance sets in. Like I said above, just a few additions to the game could have immensely improved it but instead the game was left at sea to be a pile of jetsam.

Skull & Bones is available now for PC via Ubisoft and the Epic Games Store. The title is also available for console release on Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5.