What happens when you can develop a great water engine but are capable of not much else? CoAS happens. Or, sh*t.
Akella, a Russian outfit, developed the Sotrm water engine which at the time it was released was borderline revolutionary. The problem was, as would be uncovered over the next decade or so, Akella couldn't make a computer game.
So we begin with Sea Dogs, which is a decent game, and then proceed to a long series of Mods on Steroids that would eventually become Pirates of the Caribbean (to this day one of only 3 games that I've refused to finish) which at the time was supposed to be Sea Dogs II but Disney--having a nfity movie out at the time--decided to f*ck it up and rush the product out for all the 12 year olds going to see Jack Sparrow (hey, they're 12, they'll buy anything! And is there a company that understands this better than Disney?).
PotC was a catastrophe; a crappy and unifinished, bug-infested rot of a game BUT it has the Storm engine.
And then the Lord said, Let there be modders! And the mod community--especially in Russia--began creating the game they wanted to play.
CoAS is that game in it's latest incarnation. It is, strictly speaking, an amateur release. It was made by amateurs, sold to Akella, and released pretty much as was. It is also unfinished, bug-infested, and one of the most unstable PC games I've run across, which is saying something.
The problems are too vast to even list.
The first and foremost is at the level of principle: this was a game made by modders FOR modders. That is, it plays like the ultimate inside joke, where only the cool kids in "the know" can have the slightest hope of figuring out what to do next. This was not, I emphasize, meant for the gaming public at large.
There is no tutorial, and the game is extremely hard to play throughout but, ironically, it is at its hardest ath the very beginning!
The second issue is that since the game wasn't developed by professionals, the translation and localization efforts are hideous. The english version is frequenly incoherent, with vital clues coming in some form of butchered pigeon English that not even Pat Morita could understand. The attempts to make wise and have your character call everyone "buddy" or "pal" (yep, including the women) can drive you to a real tavern for medication.
These already butchered clues are too few as well. Many quests just leave you guessing as to what to do next, and when you go on some board to get the answers (and if you commit to playing this, you will spend much time on two boards even to get out of the tutorial), your first reaction will invariably be "wtf?!".
There is almost no story per se; it's a series of badly designed vignettes that you stumble upon. The title is taken from the centerpiece quest which will probably go down as oneo of the most infuriating and sadistic exercises ever developed by someone with a computer.
Then there's the problem of legions of crashes, disappearing saved games and mass corruption of saves, and the constant problem of having to sail into the wind which conveniently always goes against you whenever you're on a timer. Starting the Peter Blood quest, one of my first encounters on the sea with my little unarmed canoe was with, well, virtually every ship in the Atlantic. This game loves to gang tackle you when you're down. I'm truly surprised they didn't insert an American nuclear sub just to make sure they killed you!
Pass this one by, and hope that someday, a grownup with a budget buys the Stoem engine and finally makes a professional product. As for Akella, that company should be sued out of business.