Anno 1404: Gold Edition

Steps: - Make sure that the region, region format and language settings are the same! - Play and enjoy! This is one of the best entries in the series. The music is a masterpiece of gaming music. It's a hard game, and I had to become an adult to finally appreciate it!

A solid entry in the Anno series with plenty to do, as ever. A campaign, a sandbox and a few scenarios will keep you busy for a fair few weeks. 1404 asks some interesting political questions - fully rhetorical as part of an historical theme - and isn't ashamed to ask them. Whether you agree with any of it is your own personal decision and whether or not it gets in the way of your enjoyment. There is an element of gradual railroading here, and at times intrusive nannying "in your best interests" to visit an npc or two. This is its worst flaw and for this there's the slowdown option using a tool bar, be nannied at your own pace, so to speak. And they still hadn't managed the option of curved or circular roads; everything is to be built in a grid system whether you like it or not.

As an avid PC gamer since 1993, I am suprised I had never even heard of the Anno series until December 2019. My entrance to this series is Anno 1404 and I am enjoying it very much. I love any genre of game with a "medieval/forest/castle" sort of setting. I have been a huge fan of Banished and I would call Anno 1404: "Banished with prettier graphics and more stuff to do." Or "Age of Empires perfected." I found the Campaign tutorial to be very helpful, especially being totally new to the Anno series. Give it a shot. I bought it during the winter sale and here I am almost a month later still playing it each day and not even halfway into experiencing everything the game has to offer. I can also see this having excellent replay value. Even if I had paid full price, it would have been money well spent. I'm looking forward to trying out the other Anno games.

When this game was released it was incredibly impressive in almost every aspect. And even now, revisiting the game after at least a decade, the mechanics are very effective and the visuals are surprisingly appealing. There aren't many recent games that can compete with Anno 1404, despite the leaps forward in tech and budgets. This is a gem

Let look at what we have here, really well done music, art, sound and the game mechanics are fun and deep. You have multiplayer options and not just a meaty single player campaign but may scenarios and such. You don't just get Anno 1404 but you also get the Venice expansion fully officially patched up and now DRM free yes that is right the DRM was a major pain previously and I seriously consider it turned many people off buying the game, but now that is not a problem so if you are into the Anno series and or city/ economic builders pick this up and it should be a very prized game indeed.