One of the best pirate experiences ever created, but not the best adventure game out there. It's an interesting proposal that fails on offering an deeper story.

My relationship with the faction was positive, I had visited their cities and towns, but - for some reason - this one port just smashed my ship into smithereens before I could do anything and I respawned at my previous stop sans some of my cargo and money (the punishment for dying), cursing the fact that there’s no way to save your game.

Tempest is an amazing pirate simulator that can count on a very specific ship managing system and a pretty good action combat system for the naval fight. On the other side of the coin there are cyclic missions that offer to the player always the same repetitive mechanics. If you love pirates and always wished to be a sea wolf, this game could be made for you.

Tempest is available for just $15 and it scratches an itch few other games do. It’s a capable, if somewhat buggy, pirate adventure that offers up challenging combat and an open world to explore. Customization and late-game challenges courtesy of legendary ships and mythical monsters help round out the title, making it worthwhile if a little frayed around the edges.

While most of the game was rather bland, Tempest’s potential showed in some of the stranger quests that popped up (ghosts!), the large scale naval battles, and surprise sea monster attacks. Unfortunately, these events are short distractions from the lackluster nature of the rest of the game.

An extremely unengaging gameplay and bad graphics mine what could be an interesting addition to the pirate genre.

Even the cooperative mode can't smooth out the many bumps of Tempest.