What Are You Sinking About?

There were so many games that released last year, and even more that I never heard of because I was too busy trying to keep up. Don’t Sink, as a result, is a game that flew deep under the radar for me. The be honest, the only reason I heard of it was because the developer, Studio Eris, posted on Reddit that their game had newly released on the Nintendo Switch. Upon looking at it, it looked like a quirky game that mixed some town building, naval combat, and Oregon Trail survival into one pixel art, Pirate package. Needless to say, I was interested and very curious to see what this little optimistic title was all about.

Don’t Sink starts you off by creating the look and name of your notorious sea captain pirate, with whom you will spend the rest of the game adventuring and pillaging. After a little bit of time, my purple-hatted, peg-legged, hook-handed, eye-patched Captain Obvious was thrust into the start of his adventure, free to do whatever his heart so desired. After spending a little time in the Tavern, General Store, and Shipyard, he had a small crew and ship with supplies put together ready to move on to a new Island and start a town that he could rule as his own. So how does the infamous and deadly Captain Obvious start his adventure? Naturally, by running some delivery errands on the dangerous and open sea to make some money.



…Town building, naval combat, and Oregon Trail survival into one pixel art, Pirate package.

This is pretty much all the set up you will get in Don’t Sink, the rest is up to you on what you do and when you do it. Each island in the game has its own population, created buildings, small economies, and quests. Honestly, this is one of the main issues I had playing through the game: it only really tells you the bare minimum on how to do anything. For some games, hand holding is very intrusive, but I found myself without an objective very quickly and was confused about what I was supposed to do. Playing on the Nintendo Switch, there are no achievements, but I discovered that on the Xbox One, the achievements actually provide a really nice questbook for a player to follow as it reveals a lot of the gameplay mechanics that I wouldn’t have known about.



For example, I saw that on the map you could invade an island. Why would I ever want to do that, though, as there is no reason given for me to do such a thing? Well, it turns out that if you build up your crew and invade an island with the necessary number of crew mates, you then become the governor of that Island. After owning it, you are given the ability to build the missing buildings and stores that the Island didn’t already have. Then, and only then, are you able to discover a quest for the islander in need.

I found myself without an objective very quickly and was confused about what I was supposed to do.

There was one quest that was very frustrating to me in particular: a man needed a bottle of ale, so I thought the natural solution was to go to the tavern and buy a bottle of ale! Nope, what you actually had to do was invade and take over the island, build up a shipyard, then talk to the new shipyard shop owner, as they had the “bottle of ale” that the man was after. Had there been an explanation anywhere about the purpose of invading and building on islands to create quest opportunities, I probably would have figured that out on my own; but as it stands, I really don’t think I would have discovered that without the internet as a helper. (I also had an issue where I couldn’t actually start a quest unless I had it selected in my menu while on the required starting island).



Once you figure out the frustrating quirks and how to actually start them, these quests themselves are actually quite well written and often hilarious! I applaud the writing of some of the characters, as the dialogue can range from off-the-wall hilarity to actually quite sad and hitting very close to home. One in particular, a character named after one of the developers, SeaBass, has a very poignant and introspective monologue about the work required to create something and the purpose of it all. The creative writing carries over to many aspects of the game as well, specifically the hilarious titles of enemy Pirate ships that you come across in the ocean.

The quests themselves are actually quite well written and often hilarious!

When you go out to sea, you are treated to an Oregon Trail esque mechanic where you have to watch over your crew’s hunger, thirst, and morale by giving them food, water, and ale, respectively. I never had my crew run out of any of these things, but I imagine, much like Oregon Trail and similar titles, the crew would die of starvation. I did have a couple instances of crew members dying of miscellaneous diseases and rotten food, as one would expect. None of these mechanics felt unfair or annoying, and they added an extra level of fun for traveling as you had to ensure you’re crew was happy and healthy in case of a random pirate attack that requires them to fight back!



Let’s be honest, what would be a proper pirate game without some other pirate ships to fight? Don’t Sink has a very engaging naval combat mechanic for fighting with your crew against other captains and crews who want nothing else other than to see you at the bottom of the ocean. Upon starting combat, you have four options: fire cannons, repair your ship, board enemy ship, and run away (if you’re obviously losing a fight). The premise is simple, either attack the enemy from a distance with the cannons and try to sink them, or board their enemy ship and do a 1-on-1 battle with the other captain.



The cannon combat is actually really fun, with there being a mix of different cannonballs to use for different damage types against the enemy ship and its crew. If you get hit, you can use purchased wooden boards to repair the ship, leaving yourself temporarily vulnerable and allowing the enemy to potentially board you or attack harder and sink you. There were lots of close calls where I decided to not repair my ship and hope to get my last shot off and sink them before they could sink me, which made for some really exciting fights!



Don’t Sink has a very engaging naval combat mechanic for fighting with your crew…

The “boarding the enemy ship” mechanic, however, is not as exciting. You and the other captain have HP that is represented by the number of crew members left on the ship, and you enter in a sword fight between the ships and swashbuckle until one or the other’s crew/HP is gone. In theory, this sounds very fun; but in reality it is just a button masher. I discovered that I could beat any ship or captain just by mashing the “A button” – this became the preferred combat method because I would have been destroyed if I faced them with only my cannons. Discovering this was kind of a bummer to me, because I lost all sense of fear of seeing a larger ship and the “risk vs. reward” of distance combat. It’s a shame because the distance combat is actually really fun, but you have the knowledge that if things start going south that you can go close range and just immediately whoop the enemy in close quarters (or just skip to the close quarters for the guaranteed win every time).



Moving away from combat and gameplay, the other thing worth discussing is the sound and visuals. At first, I really loved the soundtrack and its charming, bouncy (almost Grant Kirkhope sounding) songs for the towns. However, there are not many songs in the game, and most of them are just slightly different variations of the same melody. For the first hour or so, this was fine, but after a couple hours I was really getting tired of the same music over and over again. Fortunately, the visuals don’t have this issue as much. The graphics are simple (especially the characters) 2D pixel art, but use a very vibrant color palette. The towns are beautiful to look at, and each town has its own special visual identity that separates it from the rest. You’re not going to see anything that will melt your mind with pixel-art paradise, but the backgrounds and towns are simply smile-inducing!



Overall, Don’t Sink was an enjoyable game for me. It was a short (4-5 hours) game that never overstayed its welcome and never got too repetitive or annoying for its own good. The visuals are simple, yet pretty, the dialogue is well written and surprisingly varied in tone, the Ship combat is mostly fun and exciting, the crew management is easy and fun, and the town building is surprisingly addicting!



Unfortunately there are things holding this back from being a true indie gem. The soundtrack is too limited for its own good, figuring out how to actually play the game and what you are supposed to do is far too vague, and discovering new quests can be limited by some of these unexplained and vague portions of the game. However, for a $10 title, Don’t Sink doesn’t need to be a huge, engrossing, complicated and detailed game. Instead, it is a fun, funny, quirky, pretty, and slightly flawed game that will keep you busy for a couple hours while introducing you to other genres that haven’t been touched in a while.



Is it Cannon?

Yes, if you: Like simple, pixel-art games with little time commitment; Enjoy the Oregon Trail series of games;Enjoy quality writing and self-aware Pirate humor;Need a smaller, colorful game to play in between big releases Like simple, pixel-art games with little time commitment

Enjoy the Oregon Trail series of games

Enjoy quality writing and self-aware Pirate humor

Need a smaller, colorful game to play in between big releases No, if you: Want an in-depth naval combat system; Want a customizable town building tycoon;Want a game longer than 5 hours that you can keep on coming back to;Need a game to explain exactly what to do next at all times Want an in-depth naval combat system

Want a customizable town building tycoon

Want a game longer than 5 hours that you can keep on coming back to

Need a game to explain exactly what to do next at all times

Don’t Sink originally released on PC on April 13, 2018 and is now available on Xbox One and Nintendo Switch (Reviewed).

Note: Hitcents provided Cannonicity a review key for Don’t Sink in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Note: Due to an issue with the Nintendo Switch version not being able to take screen captures, all images come courtesy of the official Don’t Sink website and were not taken by Cannonicity.