One of the best parts

It was actually my first settlers, it then finally came the second part, but the opinion of the settlers-the-first-hour despite never could so captivate me. The whole gameplay concept was also different. No more waypoints, controllable soldiers all attacked well with each other and for fun was taken care of:

With the addon are 4 people available in multiplayer and Skirmishgefechten, and their respective campaigns, which are sorted by difficulty. The mission briefing is thereby maintained before each mission of a voice, really good speakers.

The territory is increased by building towers and castles, as it was also in the second part already (first I have not played since I came too late), but the settlers to move freely on the ground, have to construction sites So no more Wegrouten be created. Frequently "belaufene" paths are then leveled with time by itself, so that the settlers get there a speed bonus. The aim is to build a functioning economy through to weapons production. Everything enumerate would be too complicated, but basically it is simple: On the one hand food must be found to ensure that the mines provide income for weapons production, on the other hand has a building material for houses here, so that the population has accommodation, otherwise strike people theoretically have no place and refuse to work.
The population, which always runs as a carrier of the houses then takes the respective required profession. What goods stored, how many settlers may assume what professions, everything can be adjusted.
One fuchst purely quickly, even if it sounds like a lot. A tutorial mission creates fast for the most important things a remedy.

But what should be clear: This is not Anno. The aim is to train soldiers, preferably as soon as possible. There are swordsmen, archers and spearmen, each for a different situation. If the force is large enough, it goes on to the opponent. If all the enemy towers and fortresses were occupied, the game is won. To support also specific international siege equipment can be built and priests are trained in every nation with other magical powers.

Graphically this game is 2D, but really with an awful lot of attention to detail: everything looks consistent, you miss nothing. Plus, there's an excellent soundtrack that accompanied the whole event.

The AI ​​is grenzdebil: You can use or do not build ships, they can not do anything more with various bottlenecks and behaves strangely. This is annoying, here was sloppy. There are also some bugs: The willingness of the settlers, bringing coal bags to where they will be used for each new bag gradually decreases until it falls to zero. Thus, there is a theoretical maximum production capacity, because many bags are then simply left standing, although really enough support and space available. According to the developers but a feature, well, at least it spares older computers when not so much may be happening.
But a much more serious bug is probably missing animation for an Egyptian archers, which have been fully valuated representatives can not fire to the south and instead blithely going around in circles.

If nothing works, there is still a level editor with which everything can be realized what the developers were also in the missions, is also not really a lot. Too bad that it is always red in the singleplayer and the color can not choose in multiplayer battles. This was changed in the sequel, I would not prefer.

Conclusion: A very successful building strategy game that can inspire with knuffigem settler Wuselfaktor and a quite dynamic process. Who wants to enter times in the Settlers series, should begin herewith or with the second part and stop after the Fourth. For me, the other Anno clones are nothing.