The most piratey guide to pirate games that has ever pirated in the history of piracy!

Disclaimer: This is about the genre of pirate games! It contains NO instructions regarding illegally obtaining games!

Link to the original guide:

https://www.piratesahoy.net/threads/the-most-piratey-guide-to-pirate-games-that-has-ever-pirated-in-the-history-of-piracy.34594/

Cover image created by our members and developers Hammie and Nomad. Used with their permission.

Ahoy there!

We, the ladies and gentlemen of PiratesAhoy!, a community focused on pirate games, have banded together to create a comprehensive guide to games set in the Age of Sail. It was made to raise awareness that the genre is more alive than ever, and to provide a counterpoint to the "Nobody makes good pirate games anymore"-narrative.

It was planned to post the entire guide right here, but it was too big for reddit, so the reddit-thread will be a very short version. It will still include the entire list, but without any detailed descriptions. If you want to read the whole thing, feel free to pay a visit to our site via the link - it will directly lead you to the guide in question. It's also recommended to save that to your bookmarks, since the reddit-thread won't be updated once it gets archived.

The original starts with quite a lot of rambling regarding the genre itself, so if you want to jump right to the list, just scroll down until you hit the big, bold text, which is also the title of this guide.

For your convenience, and to not make this list explode, it's limited to pirate games where you control a ship (in)directly that is integral to the gameplay instead of being mere fluff. It will also only list games set in the Age of Sail, otherwise, you would have to take tons of sci-fi games too.
Not included are games that aren't playable in any form as of the time of writing, are abandoned in EA, frankly bad, nobody of us has played (yet), and have PlayWay as a publisher. They are notorious for clogging the stores with concepts, which are then developed depending on wishlists. Suffice it to say, their pirate games will never come to fruition.

If the games have optional multiplayer, are in Early Access, have demos available as of the time of writing, and/or are free to play, I will mark those with (MP), (EA), (D), and (F2P) respectively.

They are divided into categories, depending on whether you look for titles similar to Black Flag, Sea of Thieves, and such, and are all in alphabetical order.

Now, let's go!

Pirate Simulators (Black Flag and Sid Meier's Pirates!; feature both land and sea content)

-Blood & Gold: Caribbean!
For Germans, purchase over GOG.

-Buccaneers! (D)
Feel free to give my review a read.

-Captain Bones (EA)

-Caribbean Legend (D)

-Corsairs Legacy (D) (EA)

-Forgotten Seas (MP)

-Man O' War: Corsair - Warhammer Naval Battles

-Neverseas (EA) (D) (MP)

-New Horizons (F2P = Beyond New Horizons)
Also has a TVTropes-page, that gets updated now and then and should give you a great overview regarding the features.

-Sailist (EA) (D)
Have this review of mine right here!

-Tempest (MP) / Under the Jolly Roger (PlayStation Store)
I can only recommend reading my review of it.

Naval Simulators (Skull & Bones; No or barely any land, only sea)

-Fluffy Sailors (D)

-King of Seas

-Mystical Maritime Adventure

-Pirates of the Polygon Sea
Not available in Germany.

-Terror of the Seven Seas
My personal GotY of 2024.
Just have my review here - that is so long, I had to continue it in the comments.

-The Pirate: Caribbean Hunt (F2P) & The Pirate: Plague of the Dead (F2P)

-Windward (MP)

Pirate Adventures (Sea of Thieves; may or may not feature both land and sea content with low amounts of combat, if at all, and a high focus on exploration)

-Sailwind (EA)

-Sail the Seas (EA)

-Salt (MP) & Salt 2: Shores of Gold (EA)

MMOs (Online-MP only; and no damn Sea of Conquest)

-Battle Sails (F2P)

-Blazing Sails

-Legend of Pirates Online (F2P)

-Puzzle Pirates (F2P)

-Naval Action (F2P)

-Pirates of the Burning Sea (F2P)

-Uncharted Waters Online (F2P)

-World of Sea Battle (F2P)