In all honesty I hadn’t actually heard anything about this game before playing the demo, other than that it was going to be released this month. I had no idea whether to expect something along the lines of Settlers 5 (horrible) or whether it’d be a return to the Settlers 1-3 roots (great). Turns out it wasn’t much of a disappointment after all! Read on for the details…

The very first thing I noticed when firing up the Settlers 6 demo was the amazing visual quality. It’s design falls in between Settlers 3 and Settlers 5, offering a more realistic and lively terrain than Settlers 3, but more cutesy/artsy buildings and settlers than Settlers 5. It’s amazing what Blue Byte has managed to pull off, as these graphics easily rival that of just about any other recent RTS. I particularly liked when the seasons changed and it started snowing, leaving the landscape covered in a white blanket, which then thawed as better weather soon followed. The weather effects are great!

Unfortunately while the graphics are impressive, they initially also seemed very taxing. Even on my system (Core 2 Duo E6750, Geforce 8800 GTX) I was appearing regular stuttering… until I turned up my scrolling speed. Seems it’s just shoddy screen scrolling implementation, rather than genuine performance issues… although I could be wrong.

Heroes and Prestige…

Interestingly Settlers 6 differs significantly from it’s predecessors, now introducing important hero units in singleplayer games. These characters are basically handled like heroes in the Heroes of Might & Magic games, being the focal point for not only storytelling but also army control, diplomatic relations and city expansion. An odd, but entertaining, deviation from the mold.

City management has changed tremendously as well, being a more phased approach akin to Age of Empires, but tied in to your hero. Basically when you complete a specified set of accomplishments your hero will gain in rank, which in turn promotes your city and allows you to build new buildings. The city itself also has a new meter, indicating it’s prestige, which is basically how happy the populace is. More happy settlers means stronger soldiers and even more settlers.

City Building and Combat

The city building aspect of Settlers 6 is a mixture of Settlers 2 and 3, featuring much of the same resources as Settlers 3 - and adding a couple new ones, such as hunting and herb gathering sites - while including the road-paving that was so prominent in earlier Settlers games. It’s also seen a few tweaks here and there, such as wealth meters for non-production buildings and the ability to upgrade your buildings for increased productivity.

Some more prominent changes in city building are that mines and certain other buildings can now only be placed in very specific, and therefore important, locations. No more sending out pioneers to scout the nearby mountain rang: mines now show up as such when you send your troops to explore neighboring territories. The main new resource is gold which is gathered by tax collectors and used only for the most important of buildings, and combat units.

Unfortunately combat isn’t quite as engaging, as it mainly boils down to Settlers 5 style combat. Very low unit counts (no more 1000 units in an hour) and generally uninteresting, clumsy-feeling, battles are abound here. Fortunately this isn’t the focus of the game, but of course it is a necessity eventually… so it’s kind of disappointing they didn’t just go with the more enjoyable Settlers 3 style of combat. Combat could very well be a deal breaker for many Settlers fans in this game.

Diplomacy and Territories

The single map included in this demo featured a seemingly small map, with a huge amount of different civilizations on it. Some of them friendly, immediately offering to trade, while others (bandits) tried collecting protection money and yet others simply invaded me on first sight. It doesn’t seem like you can change any diplomatic relations with anyone, but at least it’s kind of cool that you can find some early allies to trade with - particularly with the new implementation of resources like stone, lifestock and ore.

And with that we arrive on the topic of territories. The maps in Settlers 6 are divided into set territories, each with their own names, resources and value. No longer will you just build an outpost to steadily expand your empire and instead you’ll simply gain control over a Z-style fixed territory.

If this were Settlers 3 then the new territory system wouldn’t work at all, but now that resources like stone and ore are very limited… it’s a feature that turns the game into a significantly more strategic affair. Now you’ll have to think properly about which territories you need to expand to… and frequently push hard for certain territories because some of your own resources are running out. It’s a nice twist, that definitely changes the way you play the game.

Further Thoughts

With Settlers 6 comes a new singleplayer story, which thus far seems unimpressive. The tutorial apparently serves as a prelude for the story, but it was far from engaging. Then again, I don’t remember a single Settlers game with even a half-decent storyline… and this one actually seems like it might be… half-decent.

The lively terrain and autonomous settlers are still exactly as you’d expect of a Settlers game and dead soldiers still rise from their corpses in cute little colored souls. Likewise the music is as peaceful as it’s ever been and never detracts from the game… although the voices tended to get my sound crackling, which sucked.

There are a bunch of other additions to the game, such as the ability to host parties or sermons and a marketplace at the center of your town. Not to mention settlers going on strike and displaying their emotions in icons over their heads - and buildings

All in all, the Settlers VI: Rise of an Empire demo felt quite unlike any other Settlers game, but strangely familiar at the same time. The beauty of it all will likely have fans staring at those settlers doing their thing in amazement for many hours and most of the gameplay innovations felt good. That said, there were some negative experiences as well, not the least of which was combat (and the ridiculously hard AI, with no AI settings).

It’s hard to recommend this game to anyone. Fans of the series could, but will not necessarily, like it… and the same goes for people who’ve never played a Settlers game. It’s a unique, fresh take, on the city builder genre - and you’d best give the demo a try for yourself to determine whether you want the full version.

Rating: Try before you buy
(although it almost hit a Recommended)

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