➤ Pirates Outlaws, the review of the roguelite deckbuilding that takes us to the Seven Seas 🕹

Here you have our review of Pirates Outlaws, the roguelite deck building game in which we can explore the Seven Seas with our characters.

It was 2019 when Pirates Outlaws arrived on Steam and, after years, the interesting deck-building roguelike is finally ready to also arrive on consoles, specifically Nintendo Switch, Xbox One and PlayStation 4 (as well as the current generation through backward compatibility). . It is also now available on iOS and Android.

Starting March 29, 2023, you can embark on an adventure in the sea of pirates, where many enemies, regions to explore and decks to discover await you in a video game that will easily remind you of the recent classics of the genre, above. everyone kills the needle. However, let's not waste any more time and get straight to the point on this one. Outlaw Pirates Review.

on boarding

Pirates Outlaws, the review of the roguelite deckbuilding that takes us to the Seven Seas — In each game of Pirates Outlaws we can explore the seas, choosing the path

Pirates Outlaws, as you can guess from the name, offers a pirate setting. With our map we will have to explore archipelagos, made up of islands full of pirates, inns where we can rest and ships to attack to obtain treasures. The narrative substrate is somewhat limited, but as is typical for me roguelike deck building you don't need much more.

Controller in hand, structure It is very similar to the aforementioned Slay the Spire, the simplest example to compare. For each game we will have a map, a starting point and a series of interconnected paths: we can decide which direction to go and therefore which area to explore next, whether it be a battle or a safe place to rest. Unlike Slay the Spire, each move costs "navigation points": if you run out of them, you take damage. They can be recovered in taverns by spending money, so it will always be important to stock up at the right time and calculate how much we have in our pockets.

In general, it is always necessary to choose the path in advance, seeing where we can go with the next moves, to ensure that we always have access to taverns to heal ourselves and markets to improve cards. In fact there is as much strategy in card battles as in travel- This is an excellent design choice as it is well balanced and, without ever putting us in too much difficulty, rewards us for being attentive and focused.

The map also indicates which boss we will face at the end of each path and, once we have discovered and understood all these enemies, we will have to think about the best way to form our deck of cards to be as advantageous as possible against our opponent. . opponent in service. The bosses are many and often unique, with interesting but sometimes unbalanced mechanics. Luck is really essential. In many situations and a couple of unlucky hands can make winning impossible. That's a true statement throughout the game and in every fight, but it's clear that against a powerful boss it's even more noticeable.

Like Slay the Spire, it is possible to play many hours without completing a region, even the simplest of them all. At least, overall progress is rapid even without achieving a real final victory. Every few hours you get a new character (and there are several, all different) and very quickly you unlock two additional modes and difficulty levels higher than the basic mode already described.

Le extra mode they allow you to play the game a little differently. The arena allows you to take on enemies in waves, with a pause between one battle and the next where you can perform various actions, such as healing yourself, obtaining cards, and more. This mode mixes all the content from the base game for greater variety. Instead, the tavern allows you to create a deck by choosing predefined packs before each battle, to test your knowledge. These are great ideas for playing the same video game differently.

Outlaw pirates sword and gun.

However, we haven't talked about the focus of the game yet: card battles. Our character will have to face one or more opponents in each battle. Enemies will indicate above their heads the type of action they want to take, such as attacking, creating a shield that absorbs damage, or applying bonuses/maluses. For our part, we will have five cards in our hand and we will have to perform the same type of actions as our opponents, with one difference: various attack and defense movements cost ammunition, which must be recharged with dedicated cards.

Unlike games that give you a fixed amount of points to spend each turn, Pirates Outlaws asks you to have a balanced platform with free cards, others that spend bullets and recharges. The good thing about this system is that sometimes it is possible to play several turns at the same time, thanks to cards that make us draw and reload in sequence. The bad thing is that if you run out of shots and don't reload for a couple of turns you won't be able to do anything and this often means dying.

Pirates Outlaws targets this high-stakes system, making the experience potentially a lot of fun or a little frustrating. Luck really is a key factor, so if you prefer games where you always feel like you're in complete control, you'd be better off moving on to something else (check out Inscryption's review, for example).

However, as already mentioned, progress is constant and new characters are unlocked periodically. They are varied and above all they are all based on unique mechanics, often very fun to exploit. One of our favorites is the Cursed Pirate, who becomes more powerful every time he adds a curse card to his deck (which should normally be avoided entirely). Then there are characters who flip a coin with each attack to decide whether to do double damage to the enemy or suffer a counterattack, as well as a character who has a bear on his side that fights alongside us. There's even a pirate chicken, seriously.

Considering also that there is one significant amount of skins to unlock For each character and various challenges to complete, we assure you that if you enter the Pirates Outlaws "loop" you will have to play for dozens of hours without any difficulty. The console control system is well done and we don't miss the mouse and keyboard.

Finally, a quick one. stylistic note. Even at a graphic level there is no lack of variety. The style is simple, but the enemies, arenas, cards and characters are all very different and pleasing to the eye. We weren't particularly impressed with the soundtrack, but it fits the setting and is never repetitive.

Conclusions

Tested version PlayStation 4 digital delivery PlayStation Store Holygamerz.com 8.0 Readers (1) 8.5 your vote

Pirates Outlaws is a very derivative, but well-crafted roguelike card game. Its greatest strength is the amount of content and variety, which will keep players glued for many hours wanting to try new characters and new regions. The battle system is familiar to fans of Slay the Spire and similar games and luck plays a big role, but for the most part it's fun to tackle.