https://p.dw.com/p/5Gjq1
A bright, almost cloudless sky. Waves lash against the Jackdaw. Her sails snap in the wind
To the horizon, single-masted ships drift across the ocean. To starboard, empty sandy beaches lined with palm trees stretch off into the distance
Standing at the wheel of my very own pirate ship, I listen to my crew as they launch into their next shanty. The salty scent of freedom washes my face — and all this despite the fact that I’m really at home, sitting on my couch. I’m playing “Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced.”
The video game is a fully revamped version of the popular 2013 pirate adventure. With updated graphics and additional missions, it’s expected to become a hit with gamers. Pirates, after all, never go out of style, a long-standing staple of popular culture
Writers such as Emilio Salgari (1862–1911) and Rafael Sabatini (1875–1950) produced countless pirate tales that would later inspire Hollywood films, including “Captain Blood” (1935) and “The Black Swan” (1942)
Robert Louis Stevenson’s adventure novel “Treasure Island” (1883) has also seen multiple film adaptations. The “Pirates of the Caribbean” theme park attraction at Disneyland inspired game developer Ron Gilbert in creating the “Monkey Island” video game series, first released in 1990. Both the Disney ride and the game went on to influence the “Pirates of the Caribbean” film franchise
There are several pirate-themed games set for release in 2026 alone, including the city-building title “Corsair Cove” and the action games “Windrose” and “Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced.”
A romanticized image of piracy’s ‘golden age’
While pirates have existed since antiquity, today’s popular image largely draws on the so-called Golden Age of Piracy, which began in the late 17th century and lasted only a few decades
During that period, European powers expanded their colonies in the Caribbean and along the West African coast. Merchant ships transported goods from Europe to those regions, bringing colonial products back with them. Pirates would attack those vessels, raid their loot and return to the sea. Most didn’t live long; many were captured or killed
As historian Jann M. Witt sees it, pirates were simply criminals. “The pirates people imagine today have nothing to do with reality. It’s a romanticized image,” he told DW
At the same time, some scholars have portrayed pirates as early proponents of a more democratic, community-oriented social order. However, Witt said such claims are difficult to support due to limited historical4) is often cited. Witt considers it more “sensational journalism” than scholarly research
“I know that a lot of the pop culture ideas of piracy are sort of romanticized and that’s great,” Sean Dagher, a composer and folk musician who has himself spent time on the high seas, told DW. “It’s not piracy that people are in love with — it’s the pop culture romanticized idea.”
Dagher, who contributed shanties for “Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced,” said sea shanties served a practical purpose. They weren’t simply for entertainment but also tools that helped crews synchronize work, such as hauling in ropes
“Shanties are used to coordinate the work,” Dagher said. “If everyone’s pulling on the rope at the same time, it’s better than if people are sort of pulling whenever they want.”
Shanty singers would often improvise verses to motivate crews during long, exhausting tasks, sometimes using humor or crude lyrics to boost morale near the end of the job
Freedom, escape and adventure
“I think what fascinates people about seafaring in general is the idea of just going off somewhere,” Dagher said. “Although life on a ship was hard, the idea of going somewhere new and sort of getting away from the troubles of your current life are exciting.”
Paul Fu, creative director of “Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced,” also points to that sense of freedom
“Pirates fascinate people because I think it gives people a sense of freedom and adventure,” Fu said
He also notes that pirate ships were not, in reality, places of freedom: They were governed by strict hierarchies. Life at sea was harsh, with limited food and poor medical care
The game reflects that brutality through combat tactics involving hidden blades, swords, pistols and smoke bombs. Still, the game world is deliberately not dark. Developers adjusted lighting and time cycles so that days feel longer and brighter than the nights, Fu said
How the freedom myth took hold
According to historian Eugen Pfister, pirate stories have always had a cultural function to serve
“Pirates stood in for cultural and political purposes even during their lifetimes,” Pfister said. “These stories showed a brief escape from social hierarchies and structures.”
The stories were intended to reinforce social norms for their audiences, whether they encountered them in books, on the stage or on the big screen. They depicted a brief break from society’s hierarchies and social order. Up until the 1950s, pirate narratives often centered on an honorable man forced into piracy by circumstance, who ultimately returned to society
The shifting winds of the pirate myth
That narrative shifted in the 1990s. The honorable pirate gave way to what Pfister calls the “liberal adventure capitalist” — a self-interested, profit-driven figure bound only by his own rules, such as Jack Sparrow in “Pirates of the Caribbean” or Edward Kenway in “Assassin’s Creed.” Where earlier pop culture pirates often returned to society, modern pirates stand outside it
Despite these shifts, Pfister said one constant remains: Pirate tales show little regard for historical accuracy. Instead, they rely on far-flung, dreamlike settings and selectively borrow from pirate folklore to match the spirit of the times
This article was originally written in German
