Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest Review – The Pirate Classic Gets a Serious Glow-Up

Having been after Paolo Mori’s pirate classic for over a decade, I was ecstatic to learn about Stonemaier’s reproduction, Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest. However, that happiness lasted for one round.

But let’s rewind.

In Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest, you’re a sky pirate. Adventuring through the clouds to different floating islands and taking all the loot you can stuff your pockets with. Only, you’re not alone soaring from island to island, so you’ll need to out-maneuver all of the other players if you’re to make it rich.

Each turn you send one of your band of pirates to fight for loot on an island by picking a card from your hand. Other players start with the same band of scallywags and are also picking one of them to fight you for the loot.

When picking a pirate to send, there are two considerations. First is their rank, determining the order they’re activated. The other is their ability, what happens when the pirate is activated.

Once everyone has a face-down pirate card, they’re all flipped up and ordered from lowest-ranked pirate to highest. Starting with the lowest-ranked swashbuckler, you perform the abilities of all of the pirates in ascending order. After all abilities are used, you then go back through the pirate line-up in descending order with each pirate picking up one piece of loot from the island.

If there are any left.

So while not always the case, in general, lower-ranked pirates get to use their abilities first. While higher-rank pirates get the treasure.

Beyond this, six cards (chosen at setup) tell you the worth of each loot token. Often giving providing money or a condition to get money. There are also cursed relics that will cost you money if you can’t get rid of them.

After a certain number of rounds, whoever gets the most money wins the game.

Welcome to the mess

The above description doesn’t do Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest justice. Because the moment pirates start activating, all bets are off. Cards get discarded, treasure gets earned, and abilities start going off left and right. Often leaving you stunned wondering what you have just witnessed.

Especially the first time you play Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest when all of the cards are unfamiliar. During this learning phase, it feels random and impossible to put a cohesive plan together. Made worse that everyone’s in the same boat, throwing pirates at the wall and seeing what sticks.

As a result, it’s kind of a mess. Pirate powers are activating all over the place, no one’s plan is working. It’s just a bunch of pirate-themed clowns leaving a clown car. Except the first clown fell, and now there’s this twenty-clown-high pile, all giggling, laughing, and honking their red noses.

At this point, I was anything but impressed with this Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest. Thinking, I’ve been waiting 10 years for a game that felt as calculated as rolling dice and seeing who got the highest number.

Then we played the last round.

My good friend, who was bemoaning his luck and last-place status, managed to win the game with a 45-point final round. Everyone was stunned. Nobody moved to pack up, and we began to conduct an Air Crash Investigation’s style review of what he did during this last round. Sure enough, there was no cheating, no rule-breaking of any kind, the son of a gun pulled off a miracle. In doing so, he opened up all of our eyes to the possibilities of Libertalia: Wings of Galecrest.

In each of the following games, everyone had an Air Crash moment, and our enjoyment of the game went through the roof. We went from feeling hopeless caught in a sea of randomness to figuring out how we could crash our plane.

A treasure trove of goodness

Simultaneous card selection is always a welcome mechanic, as there’s no downtime. You don’t have to wait for other players to take their turns, only for them to select their card. It shines brightly in Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest, as it allows your playtime to match the one suggested on the side of the box, for once. An exceedingly rare feat for a game that goes up to 6 players.

When it comes to turn-by-turn gameplay, the simple choice of picking a single card has never been so difficult. Do you pick a high-ranking pirate for the first choice of treasure? Or do you go for the ability?

Well, that depends on the loot on the island. If there is a lot of good loot to take, a low-ranking scoundrel might still net you a score. If there’s not much on offer, then you best pick a high-ranking card to make sure you at least get something. Of course, this only applies to one or two of your cards. Most of them are medium-ranking pirates that you must play at one point or another.

Obscuring this decision further is the loot tokens on offer. Each has its own ability or condition and the value of these changes frequently. Then you have everyone else at the table also making the same decision, trying to get on top of the dog pile.

As a result, despite your best efforts, your plans rarely come to fruition. But they get close. It’s like you don’t rob the bank vault, but the cashiers have plenty of money on them regardless. Making it a successful heist still.

The beauty of Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest is the interactivity between players. It never stops. Creating a volatile game, where only the most creative and cunning players can pull a victory from the madness happening around them.

An improvement on the original libertalia

Given that this is a reprint, we need to talk about what’s new in this edition. Firstly, Geoffrey Rush from Pirates of the Caribbean is no longer on the front cover, or anywhere else within the game. All of the artwork has been redone in the style of cartoon animals.

It’s a fun aesthetic and Lamaro Smith has given all forty characters strong, unique personalities. Given the previous art gave off a “we’re going to feed you to the sharks” vibe. The new artwork is more in line with the bumbling comedic nature of Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest.

While the art is the most prominent change, it’s not the end of the new features. Solo and two-player variants have been added to the game. As well as 10 new character cards, and a second, more complex, set of treasure abilities.

Further to all of this are the improved components. The thick plastic loot tokens deserve a special mention as you handle them often, and they feel great. But so too do the coin counters and player order tokens.

Like a pig in mud

Libertalia was a great game in 2012 and a decade later, Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest is still a blast. Once you figure it out, that is. While there are still times when I think the game is too messy for my liking, the more I play, the more I revel in the mess.

As with my outlook, my recommendation has changed as well. Taking Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest from a game I wouldn’t recommend, to one that I wouldn’t recommend missing out on. It’s up there as one of the year’s best games. Especially at the higher player counts where it’s rare to find a game this good that doesn’t go full party game.