Naval Action Reviews

So I bought this game like a million years ago, when it first came out. I never played it seriously, and have just come back after a very long hiatus. The new player experience in this game is truly awful. You get a crappy little boat with no guns, and have to run boring trade missions over and over to grind out enough experience to get a vaguely better boat. I can't even use the 2 DLC boats that I apparently own, because I need to be way higher rank, and it'll probably take me 30 hours of grinding just to get there. Now, it's worth pointing out that I'm a dude who loves the hauling/trading experience in most games, and even I can't get on board with the early game hauling contracts. Sailing on the world map is boring, simple, and risk free. It's not interesting. Pointing your boat at a compass bearing and going for a piss while you wait isn't gameplay. There are no NPC pirates or storms or anything to spice up your journey, so you just watch a tiny boat blast along at 30 knots for 5-10 minutes, pull a handbrake turn into port, and drop off the mission for a tiny amount of XP. I get that this is probably a tactic to make people spend money to progress faster, but you're putting this in at the wrong part of the game. The first few hours should be fun and engaging to convince a new player that they like the game. Then after a couple of ship upgrades they should start hitting that grind wall to encourage spending. What you've built here is a guaranteed way to turn people away at the door before they spend a single penny.

It was fine until they made basic ammunition something you had to pay for. Now you have to grind way to hard just to get enough money to buy gunpowder with your crappy little starter ship so you can risk all that work in an attempt to capture a better ship with more expensive guns that burn through more gunpowder and ammo. It feels like doing chores just to get to the "Action" part of "Naval Action" Devs need to revert that decision and soon or this game is going to die hard and fast.

I Love this game. No. I *LOVED* this game. This is possibly one of the best Pirate-esque games I've ever played past Black Flag. And then the Devs went and Reset the game and made it damn near impossible to progress for anyone other than returning players. And even then, it's still a struggle. Do NOT spend money on this game. I made the mistake of spending money to try and get my friend to be able to play a great game with me. Only to spend $80 to find out that yet another Dev Team has fucked up their game to a point where it's an unplayable cash grab. They had it. It had the vision. It still has the potential. But as of right now, in this exact moment. Hot Garbage. Do NOT spend money on this game. Do NOT try to get into it. Bomb it into the Ground. Maybe once the game is dead and gone the Devs can pull their heads out of their asses and realize how good of a game they COULD have had. Instead it's a cash grab and a hollow shell of what it used to be.

Complete self sabotage of a game. Why developers would make their game unplayable is beyond me

Naval Action – A Beautiful, Broken Paywall At first glance, Naval Action looks like the ultimate Age of Sail sandbox—massive open seas, historically accurate ships, and immersive naval combat. But once you spend more than a few hours in this game, the illusion falls apart. What you're left with is a glorified sailing simulator held hostage behind mechanics that feel like they're actively trying to waste your time—or get your money. Let’s start with the obvious: the grind. This game doesn’t respect your time. Sailing from port to port takes forever, and for what? You spend hours delivering cargo or doing underwhelming PvE missions, only to make a pittance in currency. That wouldn't be so bad if there was at least a consistent reward structure or progression—but the second you step into PvP or even accidentally bump into another player, you'll likely get steamrolled by someone in a premium ship or backed by a clan with absurd resources. You lose your ship, your cargo, and your time. And of course—there’s no real safety net. Which brings me to the paywall. If you want to stay competitive, your options are: (1) join a big clan that already owns the server, or (2) start paying. Pay for DLCs, pay for ships, pay for upgrades. Want to experiment with ship builds or have backups for when things go sideways? Better open your wallet or prepare for another 10-hour grind to rebuild what you lost in 10 minutes. This isn’t player-driven economy; it’s pay-to-recover. Combat? It could be the best part of the game, but even that’s weighed down by janky mechanics. Boarding actions are a confusing minigame that punishes new players, and damage models, while detailed, often don’t translate into meaningful feedback. You can land what feels like a perfect broadside and get nothing, while your opponent deletes your sails and immobilizes you in a single volley. And the wind mechanics? Sure, it’s realistic… until you realize the wind system exists mostly to waste your time or trap you in fights you can’t escape. There's a fine line between immersion and masochism, and Naval Action dances over it in a drunken jig. The game’s playerbase is dwindling, and it shows. Ports are empty, PvP is a coin toss between being ganked or chasing ghosts, and the devs have a long history of ignoring player feedback. Balance changes are inconsistent, and new content is either locked behind paywalls or dropped without context. In short, Naval Action is a game that could have been incredible. But instead of refining its systems, supporting casual and solo players, or offering a fair way to progress, it doubled down on tedious mechanics and monetization. Unless you enjoy endlessly sailing an empty map just to get gatekept by mechanics or paywalls, steer clear.

It's a good game. It used to be better, and that's the issue. I've had this game for years, and clocked in like 300h before it all went downhill. I'm jumping back in because they removed the wipes. Honestly if you're a sailing fan, and wanted a similar experience to naval combat during the sailing age, this is the best there is for now. The beginning grind is hard, but once you get to sail ships rank 6 or 5, that's where it gets real fun (imo). It's free, the community (even though they leave bad reviews, rightfully so), is great, hop in, ask for help and I assure you someone will help you right away. All I want is fishing to be back :(

ive had this game for awhile (i would say about 2 and a half years) but i played it off and on which is why i only have about 61 hours. but even with my short play time i had a really good time with this game, until i found out that they removed basically everything from the game and added gunpowder which is such a pain in the ass to get. and if you plan on downloading this game, DON'T. you'll probably spend more time getting ammo and gunpowder then actually fighting. and the ship you spawn with doesn't even give you cannons.

This game has been abandoned by it's creators and now by it's player base. over 50% of the content has been removed and none added. The devs seem to just live on DLCs and empty promises. This game is a scam. I've been hanging around in it with friends, for my friends, but I can't wait for us all to migrate to greener pastures. I DO NOT recommend this game.

I've only played this less than a handful of times when this was in alpha with some friends. I preferred the PVE server because i'm a casual gamer and i don't like dealing with grifters, grievers, cheaters and generally toxic behaviour that can be found on the PVP scene so with that gone there's literally no reason for me to want to play. After learning about the game wipe from my friend Kirk who spend 1500+ hours on this game just to have his endgame items deleted was the last straw. Even though I bought into this in 2018 which arguably was it's PEAK era very hopeful time of development for this game sadly the DEVS have done nothing but anti-consumer practices and added DLC gore with an exorbitantly inflated price for something that should just come as something to grind for in game from the start is just beating a dead horse to mulch. I want my 20 bucks back you fuckers because I'm not ever playing this game again. I'd Rather send that money to the guys making AHOY or something else that's deserving of respect and support and to those of you reading this thinking "Oh its free to play why are you making a big deal?" NO IT IS NOT. Especially when some of the main features that were just there in ALPHA are now LOCKED behind a paywall.

i loved this game for a long time. im sad it was sold to a dev that truly doesnt care about users. i cant recommend anyone buys this anymore. its a real shame. i miss my trade runs. goodbye naval action