Last Pirates: Die Together Early Access Review

Last Pirates: Die Together is the newest entry in a genre I can only refer to as “friendslop,” a title used both lovingly and critically to describe those horror-adjacent, cartoony games inspired by Lethal Company. In these games, as is the case for Last Pirates: Die Together, you and a group of friends travel through a series of levels full of monsters and other hazards, doing your best to collect valuables and extract with them without your entire crew dying. Horror and comedy are delivered in tandem as the game’s unique, cartoony design mixes with goofy mechanics and, at times, frightening monsters and local voice chat to create a fun-with-friends experience.

At the time of writing, Last Pirates: Die Together has not been released yet, but I had the chance to try the game before it entered Early Access. Since this playthrough took place during the pre-release period, some of the criticisms or issues mentioned here may already be resolved by the time you start playing. The final weeks before a launch are always a hectic rush of last-minute adjustments and pressure for a development team, so keep this in mind as you read.

Overall, I would say that I enjoyed my time with Last Pirates: Die Together. It was a fun entry into the genre, which is itself a tried-and-true formula with more successes than failures. There were some unique elements in Last Pirates: Die Together that really stood out to me, but on the whole, I would say that the game is rather generic, not doing much to meaningfully separate itself from other similar titles; this made it about as memorable as any other game in the genre I have played or reviewed.

As I mentioned before, the gameplay loop in Last Pirates: Die Together is the same as others in the genre. You and your friends, using local, distance-based voice chat, enter a series of abandoned pirate hideouts to gather and extract treasure, aiming to meet a quota before you can leave and avoiding dangerous, pirate-themed terrors along the way.

The main gameplay difference in Last Pirates: Die Together is the use of noodly, cartoon arm physics. Your arms can stretch out really far, like some demented Muppet, and you must physically grab and carry all of the items in the game, with just one hand to do so. Manipulating treasure in this way can be a challenge, as if you smack items against the walls or drop them, they lose value, instead splitting into coins that must then be collected.

It is an interesting concept, but I don’t feel like the game does a whole lot with it. For starters, you can only stretch your noodle arm out when it is already holding something, essentially just making for a way to deposit objects into containers from across the room. It would be much more interesting if you could reach out to grab items from afar and, say, manipulate them through barred doors or from behind furniture. This would also make the mechanic where objects lose value when they smack into things much more interesting; as it is implemented now, that mechanic does nothing but inconvenience you by creating a larger mess to pick up.

I particularly enjoyed the monster design in the game, with Last Pirates: Die Together going for a haunted-pirate-adventure aesthetic. Floating heads of deceased captains, zombie buccaneers, and other creepy pirate-themed horrors litter the game, giving everything a unique vibe. Some other monsters, however, feel rather generic and either do not fit the setting or seem like they were designed lazily because the creators could not think of more pirate-themed ideas to include in the game. I liked these creatures a lot less and would like to see them redesigned to fit better.

Other than that, I do not really have anything else to complain about with Last Pirates: Die Together. It is fun to play, but about as fun to play as anything else in the genre. I could not recall any major bugs, and the more inconvenient mechanics, such as a lack of information, since you are supposed to figure things out with a group of friends as you play, are genre staples.

I struggle to imagine how much the game could improve during its Early Access run to further stand out in the genre. Doing more with its main mechanic, as I mentioned earlier, would be a big first step. Perhaps adding more enemy variety and fully committing to the pirate horror aesthetic would also do wonders for the game. That said, I don’t think there’s much in the current version of the game to set it apart from others in the genre. I think the game will be popular and have its moment in the spotlight, but it will more than likely fade into obscurity alongside other titles that share a very similar formula.

That being said, I had fun with it. It wasn’t the greatest game I ever played or anything, but with the right friends, I think you will have fun with it too, even if it doesn’t become a constant in your rotation.

Pros:

• The pirate horror aesthetic gives the game a fun identity.
• The stretchy-arm mechanic is a neat idea, albeit one that could be improved.
• Relatively solid state in Early Access, I didn’t personally encounter any bugs.

Cons:

• Doesn’t do enough to separate itself from other games in the genre meaningfully.
• The main, noodly arm mechanic feels underutilized and more like a gimmick than a meaningful mechanic.
• Overall, it doesn’t leave much of a lasting impression in an oversaturated game market.

Try Hard Guides was provided a Steam code for this PC Early Access Review of Last Pirates: Die Together. Find more detailed looks at popular and upcoming titles on our Game Reviews page!