This review need not be very long for those who have played and enjoyed other titles from the Anno series. In fact, all you really need to know if you are in such a position is that Anno 1404 offers more of the same, but with more complex economic chains, improved visuals and a few slight gameplay and interface tweaks.
All in all it is arguably the best Anno game yet released, and it is well worth the money for fans of the series.
The first thing that struck me when I set out on the first scenario in the campaign was that the game looks absolutely amazing. In fact I spent my first five minutes in Anno 1404 simply scrolling across the terrain, zooming in and out and gaping at what truly is an incredible looking game. The detail, lighting and water effects, textures, weather and shadow effects are all absolutely top notch. The buildings are immaculately modeled, and the individual pebbles on cobble streets are rendered with superb vibrancy as the wonderfully animated townsfolk tread their walkways. Dolphins and whales slowly make their way across vast and magnificently rendered oceans, and clouds and eagles cast shadows across the terrain as they float by serenely.
Of course there is a lot more to Anno 1404 than meets the eye, but it is reassuring to know that this deep and addictive economic management sim is realized with graphics that measure up well to the latest FPSs and RPGs.
On a basic level, Anno 1404 is easy to pick up and play. Thankfully, each scenario starts off simply and then grows progressively complex alongside the player’s city. Usually this involves building a marketplace and some housing as well as securing the most basic resources, such as wood and fish.
Once a decent supply of wood is in place and the peasants are fed, players will look to build some hemp fields, along with a few weaver huts so that basic clothing can be manufactured. Players will then need to build a few cider plantations which, like the hemp fields and other fields that become available later on, require fertile soil. Of course it is important to make sure the buildings are all connected to store houses with roads so that the goods can be transported between key locations.
Players will also have to build churches, prisons, fire wells and other civil buildings as the city grows. Once the player has fulfilled all of the needs of its peasant class (fish, cloth, cider and religion) a portion of these will become citizens. Citizens come with new requirements, such as a desire for entertainment.
Once the player has citizens in their town they will be able to build newstructures, such as iron-ore and stone mines. Citizens come with their own range of requirements, and the player will essentially shape the economy around the needs of the people. Before long players will be coordinating complex supply chains and harvesting basic resources such as wood and using them to produce things like furniture, ships and war machines.
Once the citizens needs are all met a portion of them will become Patricians, and from there they can graduate to Nobles. Each time the player’s civilization progresses they unlock a series of new buildings and resources. These resources and production chains quickly multiply and it soon becomes difficult to coordinate and balance the city’s economy. For example, building rope manufacturing plants is important if you want to build ships, however, these buildings require the same hemp that the weavers huts use. If the player’s rope manufacturers begin cutting into the hemp supplies that are required to produce cloth then they can find themselves with a shortage of clothing, and citizens will start to leave the city.
In order to produce weapons players need to produce smelted iron. Smelted iron requires a smelting hut as well as a steady supply of coal (coal mines and charcoal burning huts) and iron ore (iron ore mines). The same smelted iron is needed to produce tools which are important for building and maintaining a city. This and countless other economic chains intertwine, making balancing the city’s economy a challenging affair.
Added to the challenge of maintaining a healthy economy, capable of keeping the people happy, is the fact that all buildings cost gold to maintain. The more production buildings in place, the more expensive it becomes to keep the finances in the green. These are largely supplemented by taxes which are adjustable (and have their own set of complex consequences), but trading excess goods, especially those which require established microeconomic infrastructures such as tools and weapons, can be very profitable. Gold is important as it is required do almost anything, from laying the most basic dirt roads to training soldiers and building war ships.
One of the most enjoyable additions which Anno 1404 enjoys over its predecessors is the implementation of Honor Points. These are earned by completing quests such as “supply x with y resource”. Honor points can be used to purchase special items, such as upgrades which can be made to ships (increased firepower, trading capacity, hull strength) or even production facilities (The ‘Wooden Press’ increases cider output in a city by 25%). Honor points can also be used to purchase Prestige Points which help improve economic and political ties with another fantastic addition to Anno 1404; the Orient.
Working alongside oriental civilizations is imperative for the growth and advancement of a city’s population. The earliest and most obvious requirement which can only be fulfilled by relations with the East is the desire for spice. This can simply be brought, or alternatively, using the aforementioned Prestige Points, players can govern their own ‘Nomad’ settlements complete with spice plantations, silk plantations and more. Eventually players can produce their own Persian rugs which are excellent for trading purposes and are also valuable when players are trying to maintain a strong presence of Noblemen in their city.
There is also a military element to the game, which does its job satisfactorily, but in many ways is just a distraction to the star of the show which is the city management. There are no unit types, and players can either build small or large soldier encampments. Likewise, players can only build small and large warships. Although more detail could have been added here, it is probably best that this element was left as basic as possible.
While Anno 1404 is an excellent game, there are a few things which could have been better. Firstly, there were one or two broken quests in the campaign. This would result in 30 minutes of working towards a goal, only to discover upon completion that the game is stuck and it is impossible to progress. The only option here is to start again. Throughout the lengthy campaign this only occurred twice, and thanks to the ability to speed up game time, it was easy to replay the missions, repeating your previous actions and speeding up to the point of quest completion.
Secondly, the learning curb could have been less severe. While the game is deep and complex, there is little in the way of guidance, and the only way to learn in Anno 1404 is by trial and error. This was admittedly not a major shortcoming, as in many ways it adds to the intrigue and challenge of the game. There were however a few times when not knowing how to perform basic tasks was frustrating, and a quick Google search would inevitably reveal that other players had been stuck with the same problems thanks to a lack of in-game information and a rather uninformative manual.
Having said all that, Anno 1404 is probably my favorite PC exclusive game of 2009 so far. Performance is scalable using the visual settings and will run well on mid range PCs. If one has the power to crank everything to max (as we did with our Phenom II 955 BE and 2xHD 4870s) then it truly is an amazingly rendered world. The sounds are also excellent, with an epic score bound to suck players in and detailed high-quality sound effects to round off the edges.
The campaign is long and engrossing, and beyond that players can enjoy a variety of different single player modes. The sheer depth and intrigue of the game is not short-lived, and players are bound to find countless hours of high-quality gameplay in Anno 1404.
If you are a fan of civilization management, and enjoyed previous Anno titles, or other games such as The Settlers, Caesar or Patrician then you will absolutely love Anno 1404.
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