You shouldn't expect the same sort of free form adventure - where you can go anywhere to do anything you want, anytime - that you got with Sid Meier's Pirates! in Tortuga: Two Treasures. But then again, you also won't find yourself aimlessly sailing at a snails pace against the wind as your pantalooned pirate grows into a decrepit old man.
Instead, Tortuga carves its own path through the Caribbean, taking a more structured approach to gameplay which focuses on its story, as you alternate between missions that have you swashbuckling with landlubbers and terrorizing the open seas.
We started our adventure on Thomas "Hawk" Blythe's ship the Hawkeye - the Millennium Falcon of the 17th century - with an urgent mission from our infamous pirate boss, Blackbeard. The plan: land in the port of Kingston where we'll allow ourselves to get captured, and leave a treasure map to trick the governor into retrieving it before we pluck it from his hands.
But boldly sailing up to the English controlled port in our pirate warship would be suicidal - even for the Johnny Depp-like Blythe. So we set off to capture a more inconspicuous merchant vessel.
Ship battles are simple yet sweet. You'll use your A and D keys to steer and adjust speed by raising and lowering your sails with the W and S keys. Once we approached our prey, we unleashed a barrage of broadside blows - tearing their sails and splintering their hulls. With our enemy incapacitated, we approached the merchant vessel and boarder her.
Although you'll eventually learn new moves and combos, sword battles are mostly a keep-left-clicking-to-slash affair. Still the sound of metal clashing was satisfying as we slashed our way towards the ships captain. With the captain dead, the ship was ours and we safely made our way to Kingston under the guise of merchants.
With some help from Blythe's buxom lover, Sangua, we snuck into the governor's mansion where we engaged in some feisty flirting with his daughter, Catherine.
Everything went as planned. We let ourselves get captured by the guards and let them discover Blackbeard's map. The governor immediately left in search of the treasure while Sangua set off to regroup with Blackbeard. It was only a matter of time before Blackbeard returned to bust us free... Only, he never came. Blackbeard had betrayed us and Sangua was in danger. Luckily, we were saved by Catherine who helped us bust out of our cell, and we set sail for revenge against the backstabbing Blackbeard.
