For those on a pirate bent, there are a few choice options to sate your inner swashbuckler -- not many, but pretty good options, at least. While Sid Meier's Pirates is on the old-school tack and Pirates of the Caribbean Online is the family-friendly option, Sony's new Pirates of the Burning Sea is for the comparatively hardcore gamer with a serious Player-vs.-Player (PvP) bent (and a mind for a thorough, intricate in-game economy). It's a massively-multiplayer online (MMO) excursion into the "golden age" of Caribbean Piracy, with a look that's not ashamed to hijack World of Warcraft's presentation and is almost, but not quite, as gleefully cutthroat as Eve Online (a futuristic, hypercapitalistic MMO).

If you're at all for "The Life," you know the drill: Players can join one of the naval Powers in the sail-age Caribbean, i.e. the English, the Spanish or the French (a little surprisingly, however, no Dutch). Each choice of allegiance offers its own ships, skills and benefits.

Of course, you can always forego the traditional naval servitudes and become a straight-up pirate. There's always a trade-off: The pirates get to sack ports -- but they can't actually take formal control of them. It's a hook-to-mouth existence, but an exciting one. Another disadvantage to the pirate's life is that they don't typically get the largest, most impressive ships-of-the-line that the English, Spanish and French captains are entitled to. Of course, you can always try to steal one.

The various navies are pitted against each other in a terrific overarching strategic game wherein players of the different "nationalities" can wage vast, server-wide conflicts to literally conquer the virtual Caribbean, port by port. It's kind of cute how quickly and seriously many players seem to take to these in-game patriotisms (or kind of scary, depending on how you view these things). As the Powers struggle over ports, those areas can become destabilized (via PvP combat, PvE missions and harassing computer-controlled shipping) and degenerate into lawless zones where first you need to worry about pirates and, eventually, everybody has to worry about everybody.

When the situation at a given port reaches critical mass, a huge 24-on-24 battle rages to determine the winner -- the conqueror -- of that port. Once a particular navy controls a significant majority of the whole in-game Caribbean, the strategic balance is reset, and the whole bloody mess starts over again -- with suitable rewards for the victor, of course.

As is the case with Pirates of the Caribbean Online, the ship combat of Pirates of the Burning Sea is arguably the best part of the game. Sheer ship size and number of guns is important, but it's a deeper challenge than that, and truly a strategic workout demanding your attention to wind, the turn radius and top speed of each of the game's 50+ ship classes, raking fire, effectiveness of chain-shot to your enemy's sails, and numerous other factors. A skilled, determined player with a small, nimble craft can easily have the best of more lubberly player with a larger vessel, and can make his efforts count in a larger battle -- just the way it should be.

The land-based sword combat leaves a bit more to be desired -- it's not bad or broken, but its aspirations of different fighting styles don't oblige players to switch up their tactics all that much.

Another robust aspect is the in-game economy. Materials are collected, combined and turned into weapons, gunpowder, ships, luxuries and the like, said final products of which are sold via numerous auction-houses. Players who are really able to keep such things straight in their minds can keep an eye on the real-time effects of supply, demand and sales; what this means for the game in broad strokes is that there are real, breathing reasons for players to decide to crew up and hit unsuspecting ports for their respective raw materials. The war affects the economy and vice-versa, and makes the Burning Sea world a convincing, compelling place to get your swashbuckle on.

It's leagues and fathoms away from the more casual, cartoonish simplicity of Pirates of the Caribbean Online, and the consequences of some potentially vicious PvP means that it's not for everyone -- but the skilled-verging-on-hardcore virtual pirates out there know who they are, and Pirates of the Burning Sea is just the engaging, rewarding MMO many of them have been waiting for.