Sid Meier hits it on the nose once again. It really makes you wish there was more.
The game play is smooth, enabling the player to use a mouse, arrow keys or number pad on all aspects of the game. Also there is almost no lag at all, and I haven't had a crash yet. There is much to do, from finding your lost relatives and hunting down wanted criminals, to searching for treasure and famous pirates like Black Beard. It may seem small but the area of play is roughly from as north as St. Augustine to as far south as what is present day Venezuela; the west edge is Mexico to east edge being St. Lucia. The level setting is fairly well balanced from the easiest setting being almost too easy, to the hardest setting being almost too challenging for veteran game players.
The graphics are what is to be expected for a game by Sid. They're not pixilated, and are well detailed in showing the cannon doors opening/closing on the ship during a sea battle. The only down fall is that there isn't many variables in the ships, and other characters; only offering what seems to be about 5 to 7 different looks of each, even though there is many more than that.
Sound quality is top notch; the ambient noise doesn't get annoying and is actually there. After you plunder other ships your crew sings "Yo Ho" and while sword fighting after a good blow is made, the character makes a grunt while a crowd laughs or ohs. There is not much music variety but hey, its the 1600s so there wasn't much to begin with, and that’s what your cd player is for.
I bought it just recently so I purchased it for around twenty bucks, and its worth every penny, if you see it for more you may want to shell out the extra. As the time I spent is nearing 50plus hours you can see that I has great replay.