Pirates: duel on the high seas

Pirates: Duel on the High Seas (or PDHS if you want to make it sound like an illness) sails a broad course between dull to look at and dull to play with: it's the arranged marriage of your nightmares.

You play a tiny pirate vessel out to steal booty, find keys, collect beards (seriously) and wipe out every last ship on the seven seas, playing from a top down perspective, navigating your boat from bland river to bland river. Indeed, contrary to the game's title, none of it actually takes place on the 'high seas'.

The controls are simple: one button to go forward, another to eh… reverse your sail ship (with the d-pad to turn), and another for your cannon balls. Pick-up weapons take up a fourth button. That's it, the whole game: navigating through dull canals, turning the ship to shoot at waves of other uninteresting ships. Occasionally a downed enemy will leave a crewmember floating around, who you can pick up and use to boost guns, speed, healing and your map's draw distance.

The enemies themselves are slightly varied, but rarely do anything fancy. Half of them sail around so fast you'll spend ages chasing the bastards down in a manner so devoid of fun you'd have a more enjoyable time playing football with a brick.

This really isn't much of a game; it could easily have been on the original gameboy and have played pretty much the same. It's clear that at some point one or two developers loved something about this game—it has a cute kooky feel in the cut-scenes that borders on likeable—but it doesn't stop the game from being blander than a ryvita sandwich. Take your booty elsewhere!