|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
 
|
ATTENTION Bilgemunky Pirate News Archives 10/15/04 - If you're planning a trip to Disney World any time soon, be sure and pick up your own Game of Life: Pirates of the Caribbean. While you're at it, pick one up for me as well. Word has it this will only be available at the theme park, and won't be sold online. - Just a reminder that there's two highly anticipated pirate videogames on the horizon. Pirates of the Burning Sea promises live action online ship-to-ship combat against other real-life players. Now when we have a dispute, we can say to each other "meet me on the high seas!" Burning Sea is due out fourth quarter of this year, which means right about NOW (which makes me think it's a wee bit behind schedule, since they've yet to post a date and the beta remains unreleased.) Also coming soon is the long-awaited sequel to Sid Meier's Pirates! This game appears to be shaping into everything we could possibly hope for, bringing all the fun of the original, rebuilt from the ground up to make the most of todays technology, and adding new features and storyline possibilities. It's due out November 16. If you're so inclined you can preorder the Limited Edition - it costs the same as the regular, but it's on DVD and comes loaded with extra features (including a copy of the original game.) The only catch is that you have to order before the release date. You can do so through a link at Pirates Ahoy. There is another game out there, but it seems to be stalled out. Voodoo Islands changed their website a few months back to nothing more than an uninformative splash page. And then, just last month, they replaced that splash screen with a new, equally uniformative splash screen. I have no idea what's going on, but the picture is cool. - A cannon has been recovered from the wreckage of Blackbeard's ship, the Queen Anne's Revenge. I'm not sure if that's really all that big of news, as the wreckage was discovered eight years ago, so they're bound to drag something up now and then. No word yet on whether the cannon is still functional. - And speaking of long lost pirate treasures, it seems that Lego has decided to breathe new life into their pirate line. It appears to be catered to a younger audience, and the Lego characters have a bit more cartoony personality than before, but mighty fun looking nonetheless. I'm really glad to see that Lego has returned to the true path of piracy. _____________________ 9/2/04 - The Jamaica Observer recently published an interesting article titled Henry Morgan's Legacy, an intriguing piece linking Henry Morgan to the current criminal climate in Jamaica today. I'm not well-versed enough in Jamaican culture to comment, but it's definitely an interesting read. - The Big News Network is reporting that comic Johnny Vegas may be playing in the next "Pirates of the Caribbean" film. I don't know who that is, but news is news, I guess. _____________________ 7/8/04 - So yet again, Johnny Depp makes the rest of us look like good-for-nothing slackers by buying his family a tropical island. You can read more of my own thoughts on the subject here. - Now this I admire. Some folks in New Jersey are working to restore a victorian neighborhood, which is pretty cool. But the extra sweetness is that it's an oceanside town that was used by Rum Runners, which is totally awsome!!! They're attempting to preserve this aspect of their history, which makes this about the coolest neighborhood revitalization I've ever heard. - The beta is now available for World of Pirates. So sign up if you'd like to try out a pirate game for free. - I just learned that there was at one time an actual Pirate's World Amusement Park in Florida. Apparently it was only open for about nine years, when the market was broken by the opening of Disneyworld. So the next time you're in Dania, Florida, be sure and pour some rum on the ground for this fallen buccaneer mecca. _____________________ 6/17/04 - Finally, something for us midwestern land-locked pirates to get excited about! And don't go telling me that puddle called Lake Michigan means we ain't landlocked. The moment I see a slimy beast jump forth and devour a man whole I'll show some respect. But until then, it's nothing but a ripply mass of salt-water envy. But back to my point. The Defiant Theatre in Chicago, IL will be hosting a play based on George MacDonald Fraser's The Pyrates, opening June 27th. I fully expect this will be worth checking out! - Jeff's Pirate's Cove is celebrating its 25th Anniversary this month. Congratulations! - Now, I don't normally post news about real piracy (i.e. internet pirates, movie pirates, or those jerks out in asian waters shooting up innocent people) because, well, it's just not fun. But I couldn't pass this one up. Yes folks, we have Designer Underwear Pirates. It seems Fruit of the Loom is having to deal with their share of cutthroats and scalliwags. Really, who'd've thunk it? _____________________ 6/14/04 - Captain Morgan's ship has been found! For you lubbers that didn't know, Captain Morgan is an actual historical figure, and not a mere corporate fabrication like Joe Camel or Walt Disney. Morgan was a vicious brute, deadly and unstoppable. That is, until he decided to hold a barbeque on his ship celebrating the defeat of two French vessels. It seems that a loose spark ignited the powder keg and BOOM! Fortunately Captain Morgan was thrown clear, which surely annoyed the French no end. But then, Morgan had a knack for that. Oh yeah, so his ship's been found, yadda yadda yadda, you can read about it here. - Oh, to be single again! I just learned about Blackbeard's Adult Resort (located in the Dominican Republic.) Now, they never state specifically what one of their "erotic, exotic adult fantasy vacations" entails, but I think it's a safe bet you should leave the kiddies home. And when your grannie asks where you spent your vacation this year... make something up. _____________________ 5/24/04 - Lots of exciting videogame news out there. First and foremost, the official website for Sid Meier's Pirates! has launched. It looks to me like they're doing a fantastic job of capturing everything we loved about the original while making full use of the modern technology at their disposal. Can't wait for this one! P.S. - it's also worth mentioning that Sid Meier's Pirates! the Boardgame is also in the works. - It seems that Akella is launching a genuine Sea Dogs 2. I've been grouchy about the Disney takeover of the original Sea Dogs 2 (even though it IS a wonderfully fun game,) so this is definitely good news. The downside? No word yet on if it will be available outside of Russia yet. I can't say much more, because the website is entirely in Russian. - Akella has also announced plans for yet another pirate game, Captain Blood. This one looks like it WILL be available in America. It also looks like it will primarily be much like its predecessors, Sea Dogs and Pirates of the Caribbean, but with a few improvements. Most notable is that it appears ship boarding will be more realistic and chaotic, complete with cannonballs zooming past and ships continuing to blast away at each other. No website yet, but you can read the press release. - On the non-videogame front, Pirates of the Caribbean won "Best Fight" at the Stunt Awards. Yarrr! - Pirates of the Caribbean sequel rumors continue. Latest is that they will be filming two sequels together (in the proud traditions of Matrix and Back to the Future.) Rumors also claim that Kieth Richards will be playing Jack Sparrow's dad, although sources closer to Disney say this is no longer the case because too many fansites like this ruined the surprise. - And in the true spirit of saving the best for last, it seems a bunch of teenagers, calling themselves the American Pirate Association, dressed up as, well, as pirates and crashed a parade in Michigan. It seems they were eventually pulled from the parade by police and fined, but then held a car wash to pay off their debt to society (as well as raising enough to donate a chunk to charity and buy a brick for the new police station.) There are a number of stories out there - you can read the details here, here, and here. By the way, that brick they bought for the police station will be engraved "American Pirate Association." Bottoms up, me mateys! Ye earned it! _____________________ 5/9/04 - Just stumbled across a cool online game called Pirate Wars. I haven't played enough yet to give it a proper review, but from what I can tell it's mainly a text-based game that allows your to train a crew, stock your ship, and raid/pillage/plunder your heart out. Check it out! _____________________ 4/22/04 - Pirates of the Caribbean cleaned house at the MTV Movie Awards, getting a total of six nominations. The nominations were for best movie, best on-screen team (Depp and Bloom), best male performance (Depp), best comedic performance (Depp), best villain (Rush), and breakthrough female (Knightly). And here I'd been thinking MTV didn't have any taste (I'm particularly pleased to see Geoffrey Rush finally get his props.) Now go to MTV's website and vote for Pirates of the Caribbean - Bilgemunky's orders! _____________________ 4/12/04 - The Anual Blackbeard Festival in Moorehead, North Carolina, has been cancelled this year. Read about it here. - I read an interesting article in an Illinois paper, the Journal Gazette and Times-Courier, titled Instructor Once Sailed the Comics Seas as a Space Pirate. _____________________ 4/10/04 - Buffalo Wild Wings has introduced their new Captain Morgan flavor. This actually happened a while ago, but I forgot to mention it - sorry. To me they taste more like maple syrup than rum, but they're still quite good. And the posters of peglegged chickens in all the restaraunts make it well worth the visit. - It seems we pirates are getting increasingly trendy. Check out this article at Trend Central. Also the Pirate Chic article at The Age. And another at Girl Zone. - This is just too cute to not mention. Chillicothe Gazette had a recent article on Swashbuckling for Literacy. _____________________ 3/23/04 - I'm beside myself. With Sid Meiers's Pirates approaching on the horizon, I've wanted to be excited, but there's been precious little news to get excited about. Well, that's finally changed. 28 images have been posted on Gamespot.com, and they are GORGEOUS!!! What particularly strikes me is how much personality these characters appear to have - it you took the beautiful graphics of Sea Dogs 2 (sorry, Pirates of the Caribbean,) and added a bit of the quirky fun of that recent Sinbad movie - yeah, it's kind of like that. Also don't miss the interviews with Sid Meyer, one of which has a lovely animation clip from the game. Bilgemunky.com Updates: Added reviews of Rhum Barbancourt 8 Year Rum, Captain Ron movie, and Cutthroat Island movie. _____________________ 2/24/04 - Yeah, so Pirates of the Caribbean didn't exactly clean house on Oscar Night - no big. It's really quite the acheivement they were so nominated to begin with. The entire cast and crew should be proud, and we all look forward to seeing what they'll come up with next. Grapevine has it that the early story ideas are quite surprising. But I haven't been invited to any of the planning meetings yet, so I'm as in the dark as you. Guess we'll just have to wait. Meanwhile, we can all waste away our little lives with three pirate online games. FREE games! Pirate's Revenge: A flash slot machine, but pirate themed. Bomb Bandits: A quirky little game where you run around a ship's deck picking up bombs before they blow up (sounds logical.) Cannon Blast: You move your pirate between three cannons to blast other ships as they pass by. Particularly fun to watch the peg-legged fellow waddle back and forth. _____________________ 2/24/04 - A sequel to Sid Meier's Pirates! is due out later this year! Rumors and snippets of this have been out there for some time, but hard facts are still pretty scarce. It IS certain, however, that the game is due out this year and that it will follow the format of the original game in it's mix of action and strategy as you work your pirate from newbie to retiree. It will, of course, be vastly different from the technological standpoint, with 3D graphics and suround sound. If you're not familiar with Pirates!, then it's probably because you're too young to have ever owned an Atari 800. But trust me, this is good news indeed. You can learn more at the Sid Meyer's Pirates! fansite, Cutlass Isle. _____________________ 2/13/04 - From the Pirates of the Burning Sea website: "Flying Lab Software today revealed that Richard King, recently nominated for an Academy Award in Sound Editing for the movie Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, has agreed to be the Sound Designer for Flying Lab Software’s massively multiplayer online computer game, Pirates of the Burning Sea." - If you're lucky enough to be in England any time before March 20th, check out The Pirates of Penzance at the Savoy Theater. Sure, there's lots of ways to see this play, but this is the only place that has Anthony Stewart Head (Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer) playing the Pirate King! You can read a review of the play at Felix Online. _____________________ 2/6/04 - I'll probably lose any and all credibility for saying this, but the Spongebob Squarepants Movie Trailer absolutely rocks my world!!! _____________________ 1/31/04 - Look for St. Augustine, Florida to be raided March 26-28 as the town hosts "The Sack of St. Augustine" - a weekend event that recreates Captain Robert Searle's privateer attack on the Spanish town that resulted in the building of a stone fortress on Matanzas Bay and heralded the beginning for the golden age of piracy! For details see the Official Website.
- Yet another Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article about pirates! In her article "Nature unhinged in the Caribbean", journalist Cheryl Blackberry discusses her island hopping adventures while throwing in more than a few "ya salty dogs" and "me hearties." - Truly it was the year of the pirate! If you hadn't heard, Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl has been nominated for five Academy Awards, including Johnny Depp's role of Jack Sparrow for Best Actor, as well as Sound Mixing, Sound Editing, Makeup, and Visual Effects. I think Best Original Soundtrack would have been another nice addition, but we take what we can get. Additionally, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World really cleaned house with nominations for Best Picture, Directing, Art Direction, Cinematography, Costume Design, Film Editing, Makeup, Sound Editing, Visual Effects, and Sound Mixing. Last, I'd like to mention that Keisha Castle-Hughes was nominated for Best Actress for her performance in Whalerider. This movie has squat to do with pirates, but it's a damned-fine movie and it has whales in it, so we'll mention it anyways. _____________________ 1/7/04 - It seems a new pirate museum is coming to town. Former Philadelphia 76ers president Pat Croce is opening his own little piece of heaven in Key West. You can read all about it in this article. - Gemma Tarlach and Joanne Weintraubmy, of my own local paper, report that pirates are the next big thing (as if we didn't already know that.) The relevant portion of the article reads: Pirates are the next bikers. You can read the whole thing at the Journal Sentinel Website. But unless you want to know their predictions for Hillary Duff or Paris Hilton, then you've already read the important bit. _____________________ 12/15/03 - More scuttlebutt on Pirates of the Caribbean 2. This time Cinescape reports that the sequel will be titled, "Pirates of the Caribbean: Treasures of the Lost Abyss," the Abyss being the first pirate ship to hunt the Caribbean. Furthermore, Pyracy Pub readers have also heard that Geoffrey Rush will NOT be returning due to scheduling conflicts. - Milwaukee is finally getting a Long John Silvers! To most of you this is beyond irrelevent, but some of us have been deprived far too long of fried fish the way God intended: fast, greasy, and with a free cardboard pirate hat. The building is being constructed near the corner of National and Hawley. Ok, so technically that's West Allis, but it's good enough for me. If you actually visited the Long John Siver's site, did you click on "Pirate Fun." I did and learned that my pirate name is "Filthy Foot Chang the Shrimp." _____________________ 12/03/03 - While not much is solid at this time, I think it's a definite that Pirates of the Caribbean 2 is in the works for 2005. According to the Internet Movie Database we have Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, and Keira Knightly all returning. Additionally, there's been some rumors floating around that Geoffrey Rush has agreed to return, and that Barbosa's return is somehow related to voodoo. - Another movie worth mentioning is the upcoming Spongebob Squarepants film in 2004. Scared? Not nearly as much as when I tell you the scuttlebutt at Pyracy Pub is that it's going to be LIVE ACTION. Frightened now? _____________________ 11/22/03 Several upcoming computer games worth mentioning: - Pirates of the Burning Sea is an online pirate ship vs. ship combat game. So far the graphics look fantastic. But be warned, you'll probably have to do some serious upgrades to your computer system before you can even consider playing this one. - Voodoo Islands is being developed right now in Germany. They said it will be released "this autumn," which means it's already a little late or we still have a year to wait. This is more of the role-playing, first/third person kinda game (you know, where you play a character, then spend the whole game looking at your character's back.) The developers boast the game will have the very best water effects to date, so it should be quite the thing. The mix of realistic pirates with a bit of a cartoonish accent reminds me of a more complex version of the X-Box game Pirates: The Legend of Black Kat (but with less cleavage.) - As near as I can tell, Tortuga: Pirates of the New World was supposed to be released last October. More of a Sim game, it looks like you get to play more of a pirate commodore - guiding the development of your pirate city and giving orders to your pirate ship, but not participating in the action directly. It looks intriguing, but complicated. _____________________ 11/21/03 Be patient with me - I just added this section. |
Bilgemunky, the Bilgemunky.com logo, and "because pirateyness is next to godliness"
are trademarks of Bilgemunky Enterprises. All content on Bilgemunky.com,
except when noted otherwise, is copyrighted by Bilgemunky Enterprises.
