It’s time to put on your black caps and eyepatches, Windows Phone gamers. Sid Meier’s Pirates! from 2K Games is now available on the Marketplace.

In Pirates! gamers play as the son of a man whose family was unjustly imprisoned by a nobleman in the 1600s. The path to rescue them is fraught with peril, as he’s forced into the life of a pirate. From there, players must form alliances with some nations while warring on others, collecting treasure, upgrading their ship, and hiring new crewmen all the while. Pirates! is ostensibly a strategy title, but it packs a wide variety of gameplay, including ship battles, sword fighting, city bombardment, and even dancing. How else are you going to romance those ladies?

We noticed last week’s Xbox Live title, Civilization Revolution, which is also a Sid Meier property from 2K Games, suffered a noticeable visual downgrade during the transition from iPhone to Windows Phone. Still an awesome game, but that’s beside the point. Pirates! comes to Windows Phone straight from iPad, having never materialized on iPhone for some reason. Thankfully this version’s visuals are quite clean and attractive, with no aliasing problems to speak of. It looks and plays like a faithful port of the 2004 Xbox version. Pirates! is also a whopping 225 MB download, thanks in part to several FMV sequences taken from its big brother.

Sid Meier’s Pirates! costs $2.99 and there is a free trial. Set your sails toward the Marketplace and grab it here. Thanks to Jimbob73 for the tip!