Best Of
10 Best Pirate Games to Play
Find ten pirate games for sailing, stories, stealth and strategy, including Sea of Thieves, Black Flag Resynced and Return to Monkey Island.
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Pirate games can mean steering a ship, planning a raid, solving a ridiculous puzzle, or building the port everyone else sails out of. This ranking makes room for all of those, while explaining when a game is mostly naval combat, tactical infiltration, or a story adventure. The plot summaries stay with the opening premise, leaving discoveries and betrayals for you to find. The list also separates online games from self-contained single-player campaigns. A fleet management game and a first-person sailing sandbox can both be excellent choices, but they answer very different versions of the question: what would you actually like to do as a pirate?
For adventures beyond the sea, compare our open-world games selection.
10. Republic of Pirates
Republic of Pirates begins with the ambition to turn a small foothold in the Caribbean into a thriving pirate settlement. Production chains, trade routes, and fleet decisions make the port as important as the ships leaving it. The campaign gives that expansion a revenge-driven frame, but the day-to-day decisions are about keeping an economy functioning. Choose it if you want piracy expressed through construction and management rather than sword fighting. It is a city builder with naval strategy elements, so do not expect to personally climb every mast or explore the town through a character’s eyes.
Official trailer — PlayStation. Footage may show another platform; use the official game listing below for the featured version. Republic of Pirates – Launch Trailer | PS5 Games.
9. Tortuga: A Pirate’s Tale
Tortuga: A Pirate’s Tale puts you in command of a pirate fleet in the seventeenth-century Caribbean. Recruiting captains, dividing rewards, and keeping the crew satisfied become part of building a reputation at sea. Naval battles use a turn-based structure, which makes positioning and preparation more important than quick reactions at the wheel. Pick it if you enjoy planning a broad campaign of raids and trade disruption. The focus is fleet command rather than a heavily scripted personal story. Its management systems also mean that a rich prize can create new problems if the people who helped capture it feel neglected.
Official trailer — Kalypso Media. Tortuga – A Pirate’s Tale | Release Trailer (US).
8. Caribbean Legend
Caribbean Legend follows a young Frenchman into a seventeenth-century Caribbean adventure filled with work, danger, and opportunities at sea. It combines a character-driven RPG structure with sailing, trading, and combat, giving you more freedom to decide what kind of career to pursue. Choose it if you want a substantial maritime role-playing game and do not mind learning unfamiliar systems. Its older design roots show in how information, controls, and quests are presented, so patience matters more than expecting a frictionless modern tutorial. The full campaign and separately offered versions should be compared carefully before buying.
Official trailer — BlackMark Studio. Caribbean Legend | Gameplay Trailer.
7. SteamWorld Heist II
SteamWorld Heist II follows Captain Leeway and a crew of mechanical sailors through a sea made dangerous by a mysterious water problem. Exploration leads into turn-based missions where aiming ricocheting shots and coordinating different roles can turn a difficult room into a satisfying solution. It is a good fit if the appeal of a pirate crew is giving everyone a useful job. The setting is playful science fantasy, not a historical Caribbean simulation. Job changes let characters develop beyond their starting role, while the surrounding voyage gives the individual tactical encounters a shared purpose.
Official trailer — Nintendo of America. Footage may show another platform; use the official game listing below for the featured version. SteamWorld Heist II – Launch Trailer – Nintendo Switch.
6. Skull and Bones
Skull and Bones starts with a shipwrecked survivor working toward becoming a powerful pirate captain in the Indian Ocean. Its emphasis is on outfitting ships, choosing weapons, and fighting at sea rather than recreating Black Flag’s on-foot assassination campaign. Pick it if naval builds and ongoing online activities sound more appealing than following one fixed story to its conclusion. Cooperation and competition can both shape the experience, depending on the mode and activity. It requires online access, and its seasons, progression, and purchases change over time. Read the current edition details before treating an older trailer as a complete picture of today’s package.
Official trailer — Ubisoft. Skull and Bones: Launch Trailer.
5. Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii
Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii finds Goro Majima washed ashore with missing memories and an unlikely opportunity to become a pirate captain. The premise quickly mixes modern-day Hawaiian locations with theatrical seafaring adventure, giving the game a very different tone from a historical naval simulation. Choose it for action combat, eccentric characters, and a story willing to enjoy its own absurdity. It is part of the Like a Dragon universe, although its immediate setup is easy to follow without knowing every previous game. Do not confuse its pirate theme with a realistic account of ship operation or Caribbean history.
Official trailer — PlayStation. Footage may show another platform; use the official game listing below for the featured version. Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii – Launch Trailer | PS5 & PS4 Games.
4. Return to Monkey Island
Return to Monkey Island brings Guybrush Threepwood back to a longstanding mystery with familiar rivals and new obstacles in his way. Dialogue, observation, and inventive item use carry the adventure, so the attraction is discovering how its world thinks rather than mastering combat. It is the best pick here for a pirate story you can enjoy at a slower pace. Earlier Monkey Island games add context to returning relationships, but the game provides ways to orient yourself. A hint system can help when a puzzle stops being interesting and starts becoming a roadblock, without turning every solution into an automatic instruction.
Official trailer — PlayStation. Footage may show another platform; use the official game listing below for the featured version. Return to Monkey Island – Launch Trailer | PS5 Games.
3. Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew
Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew follows Afia and a crew of undead pirates aboard a supernatural ship. Each recruit brings a different ability, making infiltration missions about finding combinations that get everyone through an island’s defenses. Its pause-and-plan tools encourage you to treat several characters as parts of one coordinated idea. Choose it if you want piracy mixed with tactical stealth rather than ship-to-ship aiming. The Caribbean setting is deliberately fantastical, with magic and cursed characters driving the premise. It is a single-player adventure; controlling a crew should not be mistaken for multiplayer co-op.
Official trailer — PlayStation. Footage may show another platform; use the official game listing below for the featured version. Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew – Launch Trailer | PS5 Games.
2. Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced
Black Flag Resynced revisits Edward Kenway’s pirate adventure, taking him into a Caribbean conflict larger than the fortune he initially hopes to make. Sailing, island exploration, and the tension between a personal ambition and competing factions give the journey its shape. Pick it if you want a directed adventure that connects a pirate’s life at sea with time spent on land. This is a remake of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, not a new numbered sequel. It is also a separate purchase from the older release, so compare editions and current platform requirements rather than assuming ownership carries across.
Official trailer — PlayStation. Footage may show another platform; use the official game listing below for the featured version. Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced – Horizon Launch Trailer | PS5 Games.
1. Sea of Thieves
Sea of Thieves puts you and your crewmates aboard a ship in a shared pirate world. A voyage might begin with a treasure map and become a much less orderly story once another crew, a storm, or an unexpected encounter appears. The attraction is working the ship together and learning from plans that do not survive contact with the sea. Choose it if the best story is one your group creates. It also offers structured narrative voyages, but it remains an online game. Different sea modes have different restrictions and rewards, so check which experience suits a new crew before setting expectations.
Official trailer — PlayStation. Footage may show another platform; use the official game listing below for the featured version. Sea of Thieves – Launch Trailer | PS5 Games.
Which Should You Play First?
Sea of Thieves is the natural choice for shared sailing stories, while Black Flag Resynced provides a more directed single-player adventure. Shadow Gambit is the tactical option, and Return to Monkey Island is the pick for dialogue and puzzles. If you would rather run the port than stand on deck, Republic of Pirates changes the scale of the fantasy.
If playing together is the main attraction, our PvE co-op games on PC guide offers another starting point.
