Anno 1800 Console Edition brought 2019’s great PC colony builder to PS5, and we’re happy to say the transition went incredibly smoothly. What was once the realm of mouse and keyboard now fits incredibly comfortably in every DualSense bell and whistle-enhanced console.
In case you didn’t know, Anno 1800 is a strategy management simulation set during the Industrial Revolution where you play as an entrepreneur looking to build a thriving commercial empire. On a remote archipelago outpost, you must harvest raw materials and manufacture consumer goods to ensure your people always have access to all the luxuries of modern life. Your rude and well-prepared townsfolk will eventually evolve into elements of the impoverished bourgeois middle class, and even aristocracy, as long as you think the benefits outweigh the downsides.
As each new social class is unlocked, so are new buildings, expanding your operations and allowing you to make contact with the world at large. Others occupy nearby islands. Choose between AI with unique personalities and playstyles (like in the Civilization series) or up to 16 (!) human players, depending on your preference.
This console edition is the same great game, packaged with all the free updates the PC version has received in the meantime. All in all, this is a highly replayable, arcade-like strategy experience (at least compared to something like the more meticulous Transport Fever 2 of late), and it’s available on both PS5 and PS4. It’s rare.
It has an expansive and fully voice-acted single-player story campaign that teaches the ropes and spices up the fun with a tale of Dickensian family intrigue. After the untimely death of a merchant tycoon’s father, his evil mustachioed uncle, Everard, banishes you and his brothers and sisters from the estate and makes them bear the funeral costs.
To maintain the solvency of the family, it is necessary to take over the family business and establish a thriving trading company. It all starts with the farmer. Building a rustic hut for them is the bare minimum and easy enough to accomplish. All you need is construction materials and some cash. But to keep them happy, you need to build and operate a fishery (fish), grow potatoes to distill into coarse alcohol (schnapps), and raise sheep to weave woolen fleece into sturdy clothing (work clothes) is required. That’s in addition to needing a market to buy everything and a pub to drown out their sorrows after another long day.
Farmers are the easiest to satisfy, but they need a constant supply of the listed materials, so they need an industrial park and an accompanying logistical support network to produce and distribute everything in a timely manner. There is. Once enough of your citizens’ needs have been met, you can upgrade your home and move it from your current social tier to the next.
To get an idea of what an exponential snowball this is, the third class of citizens (of six), craftsmen, is to buy sausages, bread, soap, canned food, sewing machines, plus farmers. requires everything that does. Fur coats, rams, colleges, churches and variety theaters are within easy reach. It only escalates from there with the exotic needs of engineers and investors who need to establish colonies in the New World to provide luxuries like coffee and chocolate.
Plus, if access to these amenities is interrupted at some point (or employees get too close to their bones), they might throw out their tools and start a riot. The rioting workers clearly don’t have a job (and definitely don’t pay taxes) and instead spend their days convincing the oppressed masses to organize against you. , this could lead to a chain reaction to form a violent regime-ending mob.
The game’s strategy revolves around optimizing the layout and building order of your budding colonies. Using her one of your ships, you can communicate with your neighbors, trade with them, and engage in diplomacy or outright warfare if necessary. Combat is pretty limited and not the focus here, but it’s an option available when all else fails.
New to the PlayStation iteration, of course, is a completely revamped control scheme that transforms the traditional PC strategy experience quite nicely. It certainly takes some getting used to, but once you’ve got your hands on the sea, diving into the heart of its particularly troublesome streets is easy with DualSense. There is also a new Annopedia that contains nearly every detail you could ever need about the game’s many complex mechanics.
The Console Edition runs beautifully most of the time, especially when zooming in on busy boulevards, with a few frames dropping, but not enough to detract from the experience. The size and scale of the colony is a sight to behold, especially handcrafted by someone who is offended by the notion of asymmetry. can also be heard.
However, even with the extended tutorials and Annopedia, you can expect a considerable learning curve. Anno 1800 is a fairly complex game, and it’s not always “fun” right off the bat. Rather, the fun comes from competing on the world stage, optimizing the enterprise, nurturing the ever-demanding public to greatness before the events that happen along the way.
