Nantucket

Fun game.

Has decent character growth. Felt bad when I would lose some of these guys I had built up and took to see their families and had trained them from cabin boys to capable crew.

As abhorrent as whaling is, this game (based loosely on Herman Melville's famous tale) shares the perils and misfortunes of such historic endeavours along with the fleeting success of the same. The tutorial in the game is a must for new players, as it gives quite a good introduction to the game mechanics. The game itself, once embarked upon, includes random and not so random encounters. With each encounter, the chances of your choices are fully displayed giving the player at least the odds for making an informed decision. But just as with any life choice (including level up options and skill point assignments) once you've made your decision, there's no going back (unless you saved of course). 4 out of 5 stars (with one star withheld for the subject matter).

Game is fun, but the UI could really use some improvements. Especially in combat, there are too many times where you are "stuck" not being able to do anything while the other side is "acting", and even access to the menu is blocked. You can't even quit the game in those situations.

There are almost no whaling games out there but luckily Nantucket exists and is a great game. It can be rough at first especially when you get tag teamed by whales who stun every attack but once you find your stride everything starts to come together. It's also fun the whole time even when you're being mollywhopped by a group of whales or sharks.

If I have one complaint it's that the game takes just a little too long when turns are being played out and you can't increase the speed of the messages.

The tutorial teaches you the game and is short but it really takes your hand and drags you through it without giving you a moments pause. It's effective tho and teaches you enough to play but leaves you to figure things out.

Also real world knowledge of whaling in New England has been useful in finding whaling spots.

Interesting and quite unique game

TLDR: You will enjoy this game if you are fan of exploring, great discoveries era and wales

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Minor Spoilers ahead.
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You are a guy who wants to kill Moby Dick. In order to do that, you need to hire a crew, gather money to buy resources and ships, have countless of adventures until you trace the big white and have the power to put a bullet in his eye.
Leveling:
You can be a Hunter ( which will further specialize in Harpooner - hunting whales or a Fighter - fighting pirates and other enemies), Sailor ( various sailing bonuses and some skills helpful to prevent larger whales from capsizing your boats for example) Craftsman ( cook and can also reroll dices) and Scientist which is the defacto healer.
Furthermore, every man of your crew can have any of the jobs above, and you can also hire cabin boys which doesn't cost resources and can be promoted in any way you want, but it takes longer to level up.

Game Loop
You buy resources and hire your crew and then you travel the world between various ports, hunt whales, kill pirates, avoid various natural hazards, do quests, sell the blubber, oil and whale meat for a profit, rinse and repeat until you advance through the story long enough and have enough resources to take down Dicky Moe! You have various whale types to hunt, with different skills, drops, hunting locations and migration patterns. You also have a morale system and other small neat features, which most of the time not game changeing, they are fun and can be used for some variety in game.
Ships
You can improve your ship with various upgrades and also buy bigger ships with more whaling boats.
One problem i see here is that your crew needs to have certain skills in order to buy a bigger ship and you having limited crew space means you need to fire men and hire other man in order to buy the ship. That is frustrating especially if you raised a cabin boy and now you need to fire it because it doesn't have the needed skills.
Difficulty and Role Play
In the beginning and until you understand the mechanics the game can be hard and unforgiving. After you buy your second ship, which has 2 boats, therefore more firepower and a bigger hold you will start to make a big profit and the game starts being too easy ( like many games do). The trick here might be to roleplay a bit and make it harder. You can hire a weaker crew, stop farming whales and just hunt if you encounter one, choose weaker skills and roles. I am doing this in my current playthrough and it's loads of fun, feels quite realistic, always wondering if you will have enough money to buy food or if the next encounter will be your last.
That doesn't mean danger is not present at every step, fighting enemies is dice based, so there is a big amount a chance involve. One tale smack from a bigger whale while you had bad dice rolls and your game can be , well, game over.
The final boss, Moby Dick, or Dicky Moe how i like to call it , Tom and Jerry reference :P is quite a lot more difficult than normal whales, but with a bit of researching and strategy you can take it down.

Like i said in the TLDR, game is fun and you can easily sink 50-100 hours into it. Have fun!

Gives me so much sperm, seamans and Dicks. 4/5.

Sink all coffins and all hearses to one common pool!
and since neither can be mine,
let me then tow to pieces,
while still chasing thee,
though tied to thee,
thou damned whale!