Skull and Bones arrives today on consoles and PC. It's been seven years since Ubisoft first announced this pirate game during its E3 2017 press conference. Since then, Skull and Bones has suffered six delays and many players were no longer confident about seeing it. That said, the final result is curious: everything indicated that it would be a disaster and it is not, but it is not particularly interesting either.
In a world where Sea of Thieves exists, it's hard to recommend any other pirate game. Rare's game, published in 2018, invites you to put yourself in the shoes of an outlaw sailor during the golden age of piracy. And don't let its cartoon appearance fool you, it is the best pirate simulator ever made. Skull and Bones is the complete opposite.
The new thing from Ubisoft is mainly an RPG with hints of massive multiplayer online. Sea of Thieves is a relaxed, handcrafted game in which everything has to be done by hand, there are no shortcuts and this is part of the experience. It is impossible to pilot a ship alone and thus emphasizes the feeling of team play and camaraderie among the crew. In Skull and Bones, each player has their ship. In fact, all the action happens from the controls of the ship.
It's more like a ship game than a pirate simulator. Change the sea for the sky or space and the result would be similar. The playable loop is as follows: you arrive at an island and disembark (you teleport, there are no animations for getting off or on the ship and the player character does not know how to swim), an NPC gives you a quest, you collect loot, you fight if If necessary, you hand over the profits and receive a reward. Years ago we laughed at World of Warcraft missions that made you kill dozens of wild boars to obtain resources and upgrades, because Skull and Bones does exactly that.
This is not all bad. Skull and Bones is fine if you know what to expect. It is a proud game as a service – unlike the recent Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League – and with all the bad and good that entails. The best thing about the game is the naval combat mechanics. You can modify your ship to suit each situation: there are defensive builds, attack builds, to heal your companions... Your ship is your character.
The world is incredible, Ubisoft is a specialist in creating large open maps and the Skull and Bones ocean is no exception. But it is little used. Continuing with the playable loop, it all boils down to doing messenger missions, returning to base, upgrading the ship and going out to sea again. There is no hand-to-hand combat and the boarding is an uninteresting cinematic.
If you connect with its proposal, if you don't come to Skull and Bones expecting a hacking simulator, you can have a good time for several dozen hours. Especially if you play with friends. I haven't had the chance to try it, but another great incentive could be the large naval battles with other players, in the style of raids in massively multiplayer online games or a bit in the style of Destiny.
Many people – myself included – did not expect to see the release of Skull and Bones. A game announced seven years ago and with six delays smells of cancellation from miles away. But Ubisoft has decided to move it forward and, in addition, plans to give it a long life since, for now, it has announced an entire year of content and seasons.
Skull and Bones was born from the piracy and naval battle mechanics of Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag. What seemed simple became extremely complicated and many of us thought the game was dead. Finally, the Ubisoft Singapore studio was in charge of the bulk of the development and the country's government gave large subsidies to the French company in exchange for moving the project there. In fact, this could be the reason why the game was published despite everything against it.
According to the specialized media Kotaku, in exchange for the subsidies, the Singapore government required Ubisoft to expand its offices in the country with more workers and, in addition, obliged them to publish a new game – of a new intellectual property – in a margin of a few years. Everything indicates that this new game is Skull and Bones, so, according to this information, Ubisoft was obliged to publish the game if it did not want to have to return subsidies to the Singapore government.
Skull and Bones has a Free-to-Play soul. Everything is designed with the idea of gaming as a service in mind, nothing is left to chance. After launch, seasons, special events, and content updates will begin. The game will invite users to stop by the store to buy skins and upgrades for the ships, it will invite them to spend for months to continue sailing through this constantly evolving ocean.
But Skull and Bones costs 80 euros on console and 60 euros on PC. This could be Ubisoft's big mistake. The game is not bad, it is different from what many of us expected, but with friends it can be an enjoyable experience. Although many will not even try it when they see the price. The same thing happens with the Suicide Squad game.
Three or four years ago, games as a service were the goose that laid the golden eggs. All multiplayer titles had to be like Fortnite and have battle passes and seasons, like Call of Duty: Warzone or Apex Legends. But in 2024 the market has changed. Fortnite is now an entertainment platform and is pivoting its business model towards creating Roblox-style content. Asking 80 euros for a game as a service that will surely close its servers in a few years is a mistake.
Ubisoft has missed this opportunity. It has achieved the most difficult thing: making a naval combat game with solid and interesting mechanics. But it has buried it by turning it into another game as a service. They could have done what they specialize in: giving Skull and Bones an elaborate single-player story and missions.
Skull and Bones arrives today on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC.
