Steam celebrates International Talk Like a Pirate Day with a weekend sale

(Image credit: Valve)

I did not realize this, but there are a lot of pirate-themed games on Steam. I discovered this little piece of trivia because tomorrow, September 19, is International Talk Like a Pirate Day, and that means—you guessed it—it's time for a Steam sale.

Some of the games in the sale are straight-ahead pirate games, which others are more of a stretch: Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire, for instance, is a party-based fantasy RPG from Obsidian, but you're exploring islands aboard a big saililng ship, and so it's in. (It's also half price.) The Tropico games are also in there, as are Solar Sails—pirates in space!—and something called Girls' Civilization 2 VR, although it's not actually out yet.

My favorite of the bunch, though, has to be V ARRR, an HTC Vive game about defending your ship from pirates. User reviews on Steam are mixed, but the title alone is worth the purchase price. (It's on sale for $1.)

Here are some slightly more serious suggestions:

There's quite a bit more—there really are a lot of pirate games on Steam—so it's worth a browse if you're looking for something new to play. The Steam Pirate Sale is live now and runs until 10 am PT/1 pm ET on September 21.

Andy Chalk

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.