Galleons

Galleons is a small shareware game for DOS from 1993 that does exactly one thing: a duel between two sailing ships. One galleon flies the Jolly Roger, the other a flag of crossed sabres, and the goal is simple — send the other vessel to the bottom before it does the same to you.

There are two roads to glory. Either you shatter your opponent with cannon fire, or you simply ram them and hope the collision hurts them more than it hurts you. The battle is viewed from above, and before each engagement you fit out both ships to taste: guns, armour, sails, rudder and the quality of the crew are all configurable, and the loadout you choose is reflected in the points awarded at the end of the battle. Even a duel this simple carries its own little economy of risk.

The game is at its best with two players. Each ship can be captained by a human or by the computer, and two people can share a single split keyboard or plug in a pair of joysticks. This kind of couch duel was a speciality of the early-nineties shareware scene: no campaign, no story, just an arena and an opponent within elbow’s reach.

Honestly, Galleons will not hold a solo player for long. The computer captain is no strategist, the graphics are purely functional, and after a few battles you have seen it all — this is a game for quarter-hours, not evenings. But that modesty is part of the charm: the rules can be explained in one sentence, and within a minute you are trading broadsides. As a miniature keepsake from the era when games fitted into a fraction of a floppy disk, it has earned its little place.

You can set sail in Galleons on oldgame.cz directly in your browser, nothing to install.