It's About Pirates Endless Mode Guide: Survive the Leaderboard

A grounded It's About Pirates endless mode guide: what the press kit confirms, which ship systems matter, and how to prep for leaderboard runs.

What Endless Mode Actually Is in It's About Pirates

Endless modes are where pirate survivor games usually show their teeth, and It's About Pirates ships with one. This It's About Pirates endless mode guide sticks to what the developer's press materials actually confirm — no invented wave counts, no made-up score formulas. That restraint matters, because the official material is brief, and it is easy to fill the gaps with guesswork dressed up as fact.

The core loop is straightforward. You command a ship in an action-packed pirate roguelike, blast through relentless enemy waves, collect loot, and upgrade your vessel between fights. Weapons, items, and your captain combine into builds, and the seas get more dangerous as you go. According to the official It's About Pirates press kit, Endless mode sits alongside that campaign structure as a place to "test your skill," with a leaderboard attached for players who want their name near the top.

In other words, it is the mode built for people who have already learned the systems and want to find the edge of their competence.

Confirmed Systems That Carry Into Endless Runs

The press kit does not publish separate Endless mode numbers, so the useful move is to understand the systems you bring with you. Everything below comes from the same source page, captured on 2026-11-09.

SystemWhat the press kit statesWhy it matters for a long run
Captains10 different captainsYour starting identity shapes what the rest of the build can become
Factions6 factions with unique abilitiesA faction ability is a free lever when damage or survival stalls
ItemsOver 140 items to shape your buildItem synergy is where scaling usually comes from in survivor games
Ship partsOver 150 unique partsParts are collected through play, so your pool grows over time
AimingAutomatic or manual aimingManual control raises your skill ceiling; auto lowers your attention load
WeaponsFlamethrowers, harpoons, mortars, and a wider arsenalDifferent ranges and firing patterns cover different gaps
Adventures30 adventuresThese are where you discover parts and expand your collection
LeaderboardCompete and claim a place among the top piratesGives an external benchmark beyond simply surviving

Source: It's About Pirates press kit on impress.games, captured 2026-11-09. All figures describe the game as a whole; the press kit does not break them down by mode.

What the source does not say

Be skeptical of any It's About Pirates endless mode guide that quotes exact wave numbers, spawn rates, or score multipliers. The press kit does not document Endless mode's scoring rules, its difficulty curve, whether runs have a hard cap, or how the leaderboard is filtered by platform or region. Those details may exist in-game, but they are not in the material this article is built from — so treat confident claims elsewhere as unverified until you see them in your own client.

Prep Steps Before Your First Serious Run

1. Build your part collection first

Ship components are discovered while sailing adventures and completing quests across different pirate realms. The official material does not state that a wider 150+ part collection improves Endless-mode performance, so that benefit is for reference only until verified.

2. Learn three weapons before you judge one

The arsenal spans short-range sprays, harpoon-style tools, and mortars. Spend a few adventures rotating through each family so you know their firing rhythm. You cannot evaluate a build in Endless mode if the only weapon you recognize is the one you started with.

3. Decide your aiming mode deliberately

Automatic aiming lets you focus on positioning and upgrade decisions. Manual aiming hands you precision at the cost of attention. Pick one on purpose, practice it, and do not switch mid-run — this It's About Pirates endless mode guide's simplest advice is also the most boring: consistency beats tinkering.

4. Learn what each captain and faction actually does

With 10 captains and 6 factions carrying unique abilities, the combinations are the real difficulty dial. Read the ability text, then play a short adventure to feel it. Knowing whether your faction is a damage multiplier or a survival crutch changes what items you chase.

Build Principles for Going Long

The press kit describes combining deadly weapons, powerful items, and a fearless captain into unique builds, with increasingly challenging enemies standing in your way. That one sentence implies the whole Endless mode problem: your build has to keep pace with a threat curve you cannot see in advance.

  • Depth before breadth. Over 140 items means you will rarely see the same ones twice. Investing in a few synergies usually beats collecting one of everything.
  • Cover your range gap. Flamethrowers and mortars live at opposite ends of the distance spectrum. A build that only functions up close has a predictable failure point.
  • Treat survival as a damage stat. In survivor games, staying alive longer is more total damage. If a run keeps collapsing at the same moment, the fix is usually defensive, not offensive.
  • Change one documented combat variable per run. If you swap captain, faction, and weapons at once, you learn nothing. Treat any combat effect from the 150+ collectible parts as for reference only until verified.

This is where community reports become useful. Player experience shared in forums and videos can tell you which combinations feel strong after a patch, but those are impressions from other people's runs, not documented mechanics — weigh them accordingly.

Using the Leaderboard Without Letting It Own You

The press kit lists a leaderboard where you can "claim your place among the top pirates." That is a benchmark, not a tutorial. Early on, use it as a sanity check: if your best runs sit far below the visible board, your build is probably missing a scaling engine rather than a few lucky rolls.

Two cautions. First, board positions shift constantly, so any number you read in an It's About Pirates endless mode guide — including this one — is a frozen snapshot at best. Second, a leaderboard rewards the top of the curve, which means the strategies that work there can be miserable to play while you are still learning the weapon families. Chase your own improvement first.

FAQ

Does It's About Pirates have an endless mode? Yes. The official press kit, captured on 2026-11-09, lists "Test your skill in Endless mode" among the game's features, alongside a leaderboard for competitive players.

How long does an Endless mode run last? The press kit does not specify a time limit, wave cap, or ending condition. It presents the mode as a skill test, so expect duration to depend on how well your build scales rather than on a fixed timer.

What should I unlock before starting Endless mode? The press kit does not describe any unlock gate for the mode. Captains, factions, weapons, and items are documented gameplay options; whether the 150+ collectible ship parts improve Endless performance is for reference only until verified.

Where can I check the game's features directly? The It's About Pirates Steam store page and the developer's press kit are the places to confirm details. Anything this It's About Pirates endless mode guide states about numbers traces back to that press kit snapshot and nothing else.