Over twenty years in the making. With legal battles, several project restarts, and full game leaks involved, the commercial release of Captain Blood appears to be a full-on miracle. Treating it as such—a product of its many times, one that rolled through four console generations and one whole generation of humans—makes it a treat for all video game trivia and history lovers.
I like to think of myself as one, so I was brimming with excitement to get my hands on a game plucked straight from a retro era: a playable time capsule unfettered by modern design principles and simultaneously a brand new hack-and-slash title tied to a long forgotten Age of Pirates series. I tire of the green stamina bar and invincibility frames, give me a dodge roll on my right thumbstick and let me get smacked all over if I push it in the wrong direction!
Here is where I reveal the unfortunate truth. As ecstatic as I am that Captain Blood is seeing the light of day, its quality is a far cry from most of the similar hack-and-slash games released throughout the twenty years it was hidden away. It feels unfinished, plays like a slog, and often frustrates. It is difficult to appreciate its storied history whenever you are actively playing it.
There is a honeymoon phase throughout the first hour of what ended up being an eight-hour adventure on its highest difficulty. Taking in the rich atmosphere of a game straight from the 2000s in all its glory I reveled in its lighting, models, and bloody combat. I got my butt kicked by the first few enemies as they swarmed and stunlocked me in the corner of a small bar before moving to the streets of Port Royal at night, repelling the assault of the Spanish on the docks with steel and a flintlock, and destroying their ships with a machine gun.
While a refreshing change of pace to modern design, the big issues with combat quickly began to rear their head. For one, enemy attacks land way earlier than they should. The animations do not consistently match the hitboxes, making it difficult to learn and react to enemy attacks. At some point, you will get used to it, but it does leave the visual aspect of a fight deeply unsatisfying. Enemies with guns do not even have to aim, as long as you are on your feet the moment they shoot, you get hit!
Second, though enemy animations are easy to exploit, it goes both ways. Stunlocking goes both ways, as it is a real possibility that any one of the dozen enemy types will take off your entire HP bar if you are unlucky enough. The explosive enemies are particularly prone to this, throwing grenades under your feet at perfect intervals so that even if you spam the dodge button you will be unable to escape. You can create some space using your gun or an explosive of your own to avoid these situations, but once you are in, there is no way out.
On the other hand, you can also clear entire levels without taking damage if your timing is on point. The final hit of a combo will send enemies on the ground and into a recovery animation, and as long as you hit them with an area-of-effect attack the moment they get back up, they have little to say. It is easier said than done, however, as each type has different recovery times, invincibility frames, and cannot have most attacks interrupted. You can get a few seconds of uninterrupted mashing when you use your rage meter, which makes you invincible and more powerful.
The highlight of the combat is found in death animations: dismemberment, ragdolls, and the executions available once you knock out enough health off an enemy. Except for bosses and one enemy type, everyone else can be finished in four distinct ways using the face buttons. Each provides unique bonuses such as rage meter, gold, or access to their weapon which otherwise has a small chance to drop after a kill (a fun bit of variety that adds a lot to the combat experience). You first have to unlock these three in the shop using the gold you accrue during the levels, where you can also buy new combos, more health, grenade capacity, or extra shots on the flintlock.
In near-death situations, executions are key, providing a second of invulnerability as the other enemies stand and stare, as well as seemingly regenerating small amounts of health. It is hard to pinpoint when exactly that happens, but with health potions being a rare resource dropped from enemies at random or found in some chests hidden throughout the levels you do end up gravitating towards anything that might bring you back from an unfortunate mistake that took away half your health. It is good then that they are so brutal and satisfying, you will see them a lot.
It can mess with the pacing of combat though, which in general is a big issue of the game. It all slows to a crawl so often. Execution animations are a period of inactivity, and so are the walks between combat spots in its painfully straightforward levels. Worst of the worst are its turret sections in the form of ship combat. You play through them three times between main levels and they are excruciatingly sluggish. You cannot have a real pirate game without them, but in this case, I would much rather it be a one-time gimmick, akin to playing as your first mate Walt for a boss fight, than a recurring segment.
What is a recurring segment are QTEs, because this game is just that adorably retro. I have no gripe with QTEs, but their implementation here leaves a bit to be desired. The timings are harsh and can send you back a checkpoint if you miss just one input. Still, they serve as my favorite bits of variety just because something exciting typically happens during the cutscenes. Much better than slowly pointing and shooting.
Be sure to check out the options before you jump into the game and get to said cutscenes, as the default audio mixing is horrendous. Dialogue is barely audible through the various effects and loud music. No matter how much I fiddled around with the options, I could not get it all to sound like I wanted to. I eventually lowered the music enough so that I could hear some voice lines; the generic pirate-themed tracks that never work together with the action and keep playing through deaths and restarts did not do much for me anyway.
I also experienced many visual bugs, some black boxes popping up on the sea, floating grass, and clipping models, but that was sort of what I was expecting going into a miraculously recovered piece of history. I think that context is exactly why any enthusiast will be able to reach Captain Blood’s credits. The core gameplay is underwhelming, meaning anyone going in blind will have a hard time appreciating what good there is, as it lacks any excitement pushing you onward.
The enemy variety is really solid, and the level structure largely works even if it is not executed particularly well, but the story and charisma are severely lacking. The barebones story beats painfully push you from one location to another, and characters act like real badasses but with no wit to make them likable or memorable. Everything is straightforward, with no rough edges that would make the player feel anything other than detachment. Maybe if I could actually hear these people I would see them differently, who knows?
For how fresh it looks compared to modern releases, Captain Blood is unexpectedly standard and straightforward, with the only flair being the bloody animations and the few bosses that are still dragged down by inconsistent hit detection and low stakes. The main path towards appreciation of Captain Blood is through understanding its circumstances—the context that makes its many flaws as endearing as they are annoying. Undoubtedly a difficult game to recommend, but if like me you are always on the lookout for the deepest of cuts, you should check this one out.
Mateusz played Captain Blood on PC with a review code.
