Ubisoft raises the stakes in the second year of Skull and Bones. Game is developing at its best, although the numbers on Steam aren't optimistic
Skull and Bones will finally introduce some new features and content, the lack of which has bothered players since its release. Will this be enough to make Ubisoft's pirate game sail wide?
Skull and Bones kicks off with the first season of the second year, in which Ubisoft's pirate game may finally set sail on the high seas. In any case, it will get many new features, including those that fans of pirate atmospheres have been missing from the start.
The devs discussed plans for the second year of S&B in a freshly released video. They also published a detailed list of changes in the first season.
Elevation of Skull & Bones
In the first season, the devs will introduce a system for upgrading (or "elevating") items, allowing players to customize their gear by adding various modifiers. The player will need to reach at least level 9 of infamy to gain access to this function.
Every "elevated" weapon will have from 2 to 4 slots for "modifications," which will need to be unlocked with the help of materials and modules (obtained for challenges, but also, in a limited weekly supply, from two merchants). These, in turn, will have three levels: basic, advanced, and special.
Ubisoft also prepared a forging system that allows you to replace the current modification with a random upgrade. This is not a completely random system: each type of weapon will have a pool of effects assigned, and the order of modification changes will have an impact on future effects. To make it not too easy, each item will receive a limited number of forging attempts (60 points).
Communicative developers
Besides that, the first season of the second year in S&B includes, among other things, the second level of the world with bigger challenges, but also better loot (Cutthroat Ties, available from the main menu), a ship (schooner), a pet, seasonal currency, equipment, many gameplay modifications (including fixes related to the bizarre and unintuitive "progression" of ships), and a scoreboard (the player's rank will now depend on the infamy in a given season).
You can find the full list of changes for the new season of Skull & Bones on the official game website and in the announcement posted on Steam.
Most of these new features were introduced in response to player . The fact that the official list includes some explanations from the developers, who clarified various decisions related to the weapon modification system, speaks volumes. For instance, the team introduced a random element of "reforging" equipment, so that powerful "elevated" items would be a valuable loot, but not so much as to frustrate the player and force the developers to overdo it with the drops.
Second season for the save?
Besides, in the video, Ubisoft confirmed the content of the next three seasons, including land combat, a huge frigate, an attack on a gigantic fortress, and a kraken (and the changes in hunting).
This clearly pleased the players who haven't given up on Skull & Bones yet, or are open to giving the game another shot. So far, Ubisoft's pirate game has been, to put it mildly, not the best, both in of ratings (although 65% positive reviews on Steam aren't that bad), nor in of popularity (at least on the Valve company's platform; via SteamDB).
More than one player has already given up on the game and expects the end of S&B , similar to what happened with the incomparably more popular XDefiant case), the extensive changes and detailed explanations from the developer give us confidence that the French publisher won't abandon this project.
Of course, the question remains how these changes will turn out in practice - and whether they will be the beginning of the game's redemption, as was the case with No Man's Sky. The second year of Skull and Bones will start today, after a technical break lasting from 11:00 pm PT. Ubisoft anticipated that the servers would be turned back on about 3 hours later, so they should be available soon. Let's add that until April 20th, S&B can be purchased on Steam for $19.99.
