Bounty Bay Online puts gamers in the heyday of sailing ships. With their own boat, they can explore the known world and visit 60 harbour cities in America, Australia, Africa and Asia, but they can also set course towards European cities like London. There, players can drop anchor and walk into the British capitol with its typical look in 3rd person perspective.

Gamers can choose their path to fame and fortune. They can act as a blood thirsty pirate, or as a peaceful fisherman. And even if they don´t like the water, they could become a farmer, a blacksmith or a lumberjack.

Also, a career as a trader is a possibility – thanks to the trading system that calculates all the prices based on supply and demand. The political situation also has an influence on how business runs – if the situation between Britain and Portugal is somewhat strained, then it will be difficult to sell one’s products in Lisbon. Additionally, some trading skills also influence if all the effort was worth the price.

If one prefers sabre over silver, then the way of the skull might be the preferred choice. Pirates can attack and conquer cities, fight sea battles and capture other ships. They can collect goods from sunken ships, and sell them in the next best harbour, if there’s no price on their head yet or if they bribed the city guards – otherwise, they might have to sail to special pirate nests instead.

Every member of the Bounty Bay Online world has its own ships. Right after start, they have a simple boat, but while playing they gain access to lots of better ships, for example, a beautiful frigates with a hand-picked crew. With those vessels, one can even explore the more dangerous waters. And there is a lot to explore – from the pyramids of Gizeh to the Chinese Wall. Findings, as such, are put – automatically – into the logbook, so that every gamer writes his own book of fame and adventure.

From Friday at 20:00 CET the cities of Alexandria, Venice, Lisbon, Bordeaux and Amsterdam can be attacked and taken over by guilds in the merchant’s alliances. The existing city battles for War- and Commercial cities now have new times at the weekends. The encounters between the guilds fighting for dominance now offer additional tactical possibilities and exciting battles at sea and on land thanks to the readjustment and merging of city battle times as well as the implementation of merchant battles. These merchant cites which are now ready to be besieged, as well as the reorganization of the existing city battles, offer ‘city-less’ guilds in particular the opportunity to capture cities which up to now were defended by very large and influential guilds and alliances.

The eight cities which are available for city battles are divided into two categories ‘War Cities’ and ‘Materials Cities’. Both types can be conquered by guilds at certain times.  Up until now the battles for the eight cities have been split evenly over four days with only two cities per day being allowed to be conquered. The compressing of the wars down to two days immediately demands additional tactical finesse from players, since guilds will on the one hand have a greater choice of cities to fight over and on the other, will also have to make sure that their own cities are adequately defended. War cities such as Oslo and Cape Town can with immediate effect be taken from 19:00 on Saturdays. As soon as a guild has captured one of the cities after a successful land and sea battle, and manages to keep it occupied, the guild will be awarded access to useful battle items. Material cities such as London  and Nagasaki, among others, can be defended from 19:00 on Saturdays against potential occupiers and will enrich their regents with valuable resources

However, before the cities can be stormed the challengers must battle through the coastal waters guarded by the defense fleet and city artillery units. Once they have reached the beach and the city fortification they must penetrate the city defenses in a land battle and attempt to destroy the fortress’s flag within a certain amount of time. If they succeed, the siege is successful and the attacking guild will control the city from then on.