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In At Worlds Ends, Captain Jack has died and is sent to Davy Jones' Locker.
While there, he gets his own island and his old ship.
However, everyone else who gets sent to Davy Jones' Locker seems to simply get a small rowboat.
In-universe, why is Jack so special that he gets a completely different afterlife from everyone else?
Those dead people in the small row boats weren't on the 'other side' of the Locker. Davy Jones was supposed to ferry these souls to the 'other side', but Jones neglected his duty and now they just wandering / floating around in this sort of netherworld limbo.
TIA DALMA: They should be in de care of Davy Jones. That was the duty him was charged wid, by the goddess, Calypso. To ferry those who die at sea to de other side. And every ten years, him could come ashore…to be with she who love him…truly. But the man has become a monster.
RAGETTI: So he wasn't always…tentacle-y?
TIA DALMA: No. Him was a man, once.
Presumably Jack Sparrow is actually in the 'other side' in the "place of punishment" Tia Dalma spoke of, hence his surroundings are different. If Jones did bring Sparrow to the 'other side', then that would make sense since punishment awaited Sparrow and Jones disliked Sparrow so much.
As for why the ship is down there with him, the films make it clear that the Black Pearl was originally taken to the Locker when it sank, but Sparrow made a deal with Jones, so Jones had brought it back to the surface for Sparrow. Now, in At World's End, Sparrow himself and the ship have both been taken by the Kraken to Davy Jones' Locker (on the 'other side') to a place of desolation and punishment.
From the wiki:
The Kraken dragged the Black Pearl down to Davy Jones' Locker, along with its captain. Both were marooned on a seemingly endless desert.
Because as Tia Dalma explains in At World's End
Jack Sparrow is taken, body and soul,
to a place not of death, but punishment.
The worst fate a person can bring upon himself...
...stretching on forever.
That's what awaits at Davy Jones' Locker.Source
And what Davy Jones' Locker is ;
Davy Jones' Locker, also referred to as the Land of the Dead, was a dimension to which souls claimed by the sea, or devoured by the Kraken, were sent. Though it was sometimes used as a term to refer to the bottom of the ocean, Davy Jones' Locker was a barren wasteland. People imprisoned there are technically not dead, but they cannot die. This is why Tia Dalma couldn't bring Jack Sparrow back to life–like she did with Hector Barbossa–as he was trapped, not dead.Source
Because Jack Sparrow only cared about his freedom and for his freedom he would often make or break a deal (example - deal with Davy Jones to resurrected Wicked Wench). For Jack the Black Pearl was a symbol of his freedom because he has gone through a lot of uncomfortable times for his freedom (few examples - how he got the Wicked Wench, lost Wicked Wench, forced to work with for EITC compromising on his lifestyle and freedom, why he liberated the slaves from cutter Beckett because the slaves would lose their freedom.)
When Cutler Becket destroyed the Wicked Wench in front of Jack so the ship sank at the bottom of the sea, then Jack trying to save the ship and summoned Davy Jones to free him and resurrect the ship for a service after 13 years on Dutchman. Jack later named the ship the Black Pearl.
Jack was clearly hurt when mutiny led by Hector Barbosa and he lost the Pearl. So Jack tells Elizabeth why the Black Pearl actually means freedom to him.
Davy Jones knew for Jack his freedom meant everything, so instead of killing him torturing him and keeping him in the locker from where he couldn't free himself (as Jack was a known trickster) would be more painful than death. Jack started to hallucinations as he couldn't do anything having his Pearl beside him. By this he also made Jack realise that the freedom was not the Pearl but the open ocean and in DMC Davy Jones say he is the sea/ocean.
So this was the best experience for Jack as per Davy Jones.
Maybe the souls seen were not yet at Davy Jones' Locker but were simply onroute. Jack Sparrow, being dead longer, was there already. It might just be a matter of time.
