Anno 1404: Gold Edition

Beautifull graphics and soundtarck, immersive gameplay, Anno 1404 is one of the finest in the series. The Orient and Venice add a bit of spice to the in game economy. The game grabs your attention completely and the session lenght reminders come in handy to keep you in check with reality.

I had read about the Anno series for years as I was reading about new video games for years and always thought I would give it a try. With some GOG sales I finally bit the bullet and bought Anno 1404. Long story short, I had a blast doing the Elector scenario. It took me hours to just reach the final part of victory, having 2,000 noblemen. But I finally made it. I dont know if there is a mode that explains you how to play but the scenario just dropped me with very little explanation and I had to google time and again specialized forum and websites to understand how to progress. But I imagine this is explained in another mode / part of the game. I liked this game as it is really cute and fun to play. You just do not see time fly by. The difficulty is present but not overwhelming. The various things you have to build / cultivate / buy kinda make sense. The gameplay is definitively there. The graphics are really nice done. Now, the bad parts: the music is quite repetitive. the sound samples spoken by characters are always the same. On my 2015 laptop with 8 Gb of RAM, an SSD and a dedicated graphics card, the game was taking FOREVER to start. I don't want to imagine how slow it must have been with a 2009 average computer. Overall, I had fun. I dont know if I will play other modes or scenarii but so far I give Anno 1404 a solid 4/5.

If the game crashes on starting a new game, you can fix it by setting the setting the date and time format to match the windows language. Note: I found this fix on the gog forums and as silly as it might sound, it worked for me (Windows 10 OS) On windows 10, go to the old control panel and under "clock and region" go to "change date, time, or number formats". Here under "Format" select the option that matches the Windows language setting.

I enjoyed the game and it looks great. The way it evolves and how calm everything is, is soothing and enjoyable. But I feel like it needs to hold your hand more. Sometimes I felt a bit lost, saw no tutorials and didn't really grasp how one thing affected the other.

This is the best game in the Anno series. The interface is perfect, the atmosphere is perferct and unlike modern games, the game is not balanced down to the point of forcing a single way of playing. You can explore quite a lot of different approaces in the game and optimize your city planning or competition strategy. A relaxed, enjoyable game.