You there, Join the bucket brigade! - Settlers 2 10th Anniversary

[Heliocentric]

This game is one more people should play, its a remake of the pinnacle of the Settlers series and it just ended up on GoG
http://www.gog.com/gamecard/the_sett...th_anniversary
Its not really an RTS, its not really a city builder where you are watching your "areas of influence" of buildings ala anno/sim city. Its actually a logistics and infrastructure* game, everything that needs to be anywhere must be delivered, anything needs to be produced or processed needs to be transported and everything that needs to be transported or delivered depends on your road network. This might sound remarkably dull, but if you try the demo you might find the mix of little men scurrying about at your whim and genuine strategy soothing.

*I'm making a new genre L&I, I will not be contained.

[Fanbuoy]

How micro managey is it? For example, do you just have to provide means of transportation or do you need to tell everyone where to go and how?

[arathain]

It's all automated. Your little chaps will use the road network you've built to bring goods to where they're needed. You can set global priorities for your goods, so if a chap arrives at a junction and there are several goods waiting he'll move them in the order you decide. Still, much of the trick is to arrange your structures and roads so that you avoid pileups, which means goods sitting unused.

There's next to no micro. It's all about constructing a well functioning settlement. The joy is that every activity is animated, so you'll get a busy, thriving village that's a joy to have created.

[DevinSmoth]

Sort of Majesty-like maybe?

[vinraith]

I saw that this was up on GOG and immediately thought of you, Heliocentric!

I tried this one awhile back and couldn't find a foothold, but then I went in expecting a city-builder so perhaps I was looking at it from the wrong angle. Got any start-up advice?

[rsherhod]

Played the demo for Settlers 4 about 10 years ago. Always meant to buy it but never did.
I thought the city building aspect of Stronghold was kind of similar.

[sinister agent]

Settlers 4 was pretty horrible compared to the first two. They became fairly typical RTS games after either that or the third, I forget, but in the first two you had no direct control over any of your people, so couldn't just punt a blob of soldiers at the border and wait.

I never really got into the second one, but I loved the original Settlers. Wonderful game, although get it on an amiga emulator if you want it to sound lovely rather than horrible.

[trjp]

You make it sound more like Sid Meiers Railroads than anything else

I like SMR :)

[sinister agent]

It has more in common with it, sort of. It's the sort of game where you don't win with build orders or troop formations, but with good use of the location and resources you have available. If you built a sensible road network and organise your industries and production orders well, you'll have an edge over the neighbouring player who has more soldiers, because they'll be unable to reinforce their losses in time, and will fall prey to resource shortages because production is backed up by a clogged infrastructure.

It may sound dull, but even as a kid it was mesmerising. Helps that it was charmingly pretty and relaxing, too.

[Heliocentric]

I saw that this was up on GOG and immediately thought of you, Heliocentric!

Then I'm doing my job properly.

Got any start-up advice?

Yes, forget the campaign, its fine for a non gamer but will bore the socks off you, play a skirmish map with no opponents. Get a feel for everything, once you think you get the general idea try a match with an easy AI opponent, and so on. When you can take on 7 Hard AI's (ps they don't cheat like most strategy games, they are just damn good) then pm me and I'll play you online and make you taste bitter tears.

You make it sound more like Sid Meiers Railroads than anything else

I like SMR :)

Actually, it really is, but with occasional strategic invasions and artillery in the shape of the catapult.

I never really got into the second one, but I loved the original Settlers. Wonderful game, although get it on an amiga emulator if you want it to sound lovely rather than horrible.

settlers 2 gold is on gog as well, and it just plain outclasses settlers 1, it gets everything the first game did and makes it better.

[sinister agent]

Thinking about it, it might be the Roman theme of the second one that put up a barrier to my interest. I don't mind Roman themes generally, but liked the vaguely medieval one of the original.

[Berzee]

Downloading the demo now!

[Moraven]

Settlers 2 Gold is great, other than a few game breaking bugs time to time. Was able to get through the campaign. Then all the continental maps would keep bugging out.

Never realized there was an 3D updated game. Will get this and replay Settlers 2 for the 4th time. (original, gold, and game boy DS)

[vinraith]

Yes, forget the campaign, its fine for a non gamer but will bore the socks off you, play a skirmish map with no opponents. Get a feel for everything, once you think you get the general idea try a match with an easy AI opponent, and so on. When you can take on 7 Hard AI's (ps they don't cheat like most strategy games, they are just damn good) then pm me and I'll play you online and make you taste bitter tears.

Ah! I'm pretty sure when I tried it in the past I tried that campaign. I'm just as glad to be able to skip that, so I'll take your advice to heart. No guarantees on when I'll get back to you for a match, though, my backlog is freaking appalling.

[trjp]

So you get me all tempted but I think "No - I'll play Railroads again instead"

and then I remember it came from D2D so I need the Gamefly app which won't accept my password (the one which works on their website) so I reset it and it updates itself and then says the download for Railroads is 'not yet available' so I have to find a support link and email to ask about that and then I realise I need to restart the client and it finds a download but that fails and so I manually restart it and it finished and installs but demands I login AGAIN to activate my game and then says I don't own it

Gamefly - unless it's a Steam code, steer well clear of the fuckers...

So - Settlers then...

[Heliocentric]

Never realized there was an 3D updated game. Will get this and replay Settlers 2 for the 4th time. (original, gold, and game boy DS)

Yeah, spare ships actually taxi goods like they were meant to, but don't build more than 30 ships of the AI starts to creak (5 will give you all the shipping you need anyway)

If you manage to lock down a smaller island you can focus its production so that it only makes bread, meat or lumber or such, then freight that where its needed automatically, if the areas are connected by land ships wont be used, so if you have 2 distant areas connected by a long thin stretch of road you might want to cut the path eventually so that the shipping can take over.

[Lukasz]

Played original campaign last year. It takes ages and is in fact quiet boring 40 percent of time. This kind of ga,e requires a second monitor so you can watch some tv show or youtube while waiting for your soldiers to finally beat the shit out of the enemy.

[Raaritsgozilla]

I played The Settlers IV a few years ago and couldnt advance past a certain point in the campaign so I quit. That and the little men/children kinda annoyed me.

But I have played 6 and enjoyed that, just forgot about it because its not on my steam games list. Thats annoying.

[burningpet]

Wot?! they remade settlers 2 in 3d? not sure how i missed those wonderful old news!

Seeing the series progress made me sad a little bit more from each iteration and iteration, although they kinda, sorta, almost came back to it in 7, it was still not able to capture the old charm. and DRM. horrible horrible DRM.

[sinister agent]

So you get me all tempted but I think "No - I'll play Railroads again instead"

and then I remember it came from D2D so I need the Gamefly app which won't accept my password (the one which works on their website) so I reset it and it updates itself and then says the download for Railroads is 'not yet available' so I have to find a support link and email to ask about that and then I realise I need to restart the client and it finds a download but that fails and so I manually restart it and it finished and installs but demands I login AGAIN to activate my game and then says I don't own it

Gamefly - unless it's a Steam code, steer well clear of the fuckers...

So - Settlers then...

Yeah, I've pretty much had to pirate most of the games I bought from Direct(" to " - Ed)Drive since they were taken over by GameWhatever to get them to run. The old system was a tad awkward, but you got the installers without any bullshit, whereas the new owners insist on forcing you to join their special wanking club just to play the games you bought from before the wanking club even existed. They can shove it up their arse.