Posted on: April 25, 2016
Ramevox
Verified ownerGames: 650 Reviews: 68
Good for what it is.
The sixth installment of the series is the best one since the Settlers 4. It's not a big achievement taking in consideration that the Settlers 5 is an atrocity and the Settlers 7 are awfully shallow with their meta-gameplay and victory points system. The Rise of an Empire is a solid and competent enough title to keep you playing for more than few missions before you uninstall the game due to boredom. Sure, the overall art direction is painfully generic and the campaign's story is unnecessarily stretched. I couldn't care less about the Red Prince and the cancerous outro animation. On the other hand, the graphics quality and attention to details makes the game look really good 9 years after the release. Even the Settlers 7 look worse. The gameplay itself suffers from the control zones system and simplified production chains. It's definitely not the Settlers game I'm still waiting for. You will not be sending geologists and scouts, you will no longer have trench wars against the opponent for that piece of mountains with iron deposits. You will just get that outpost and here you go, all in a neighbourhood is yours. Your settlers all have similiar needs, the bigger the higher your knight unit is promoted. Production chains are all made only of two layers - the resource and the final product. The difference from the classic settlers is that the products are being used to satisfy population's needs. Said sliders can be treated as the third layer of production chains and tie themselves neatly to keep you invested in managing and expanding your influences. Sometimes you will have an opportunity to trade with the AI, but that again requires cash from taxes - the better your settlers do, the higher your income is. The campaign and custom games are entertaining thanks to competent designers. The game introduces the most developed military segment from all Settlers titles that revolves mostly around resource hungry (stone) siege equipment and thieves. It's worth a try.
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