Honsou Gaming

After watching a live feed of someone playing settlers 7, I couldn’t not buy a copy. It is as true to the first and second Settlers which I had enjoyed as a child. If your too young to of been playing games on the Commodore, I will explain briefly why settlers 1 and 2 were great (and why the rest were crap).

Settlers 1 was an automated empire building game with an extremely deep economic layer which was pretty complicated but also very rewarding once you got it right. Yours little people would go around doing things on there own, while you gave them the means of doing there jobs more productively and efficiently. A wheat farm would be placed on fertile soil, nearby a granary and then a bakery. Pretty much everything in this game required such a line of productivity, with some of the more complicated buildings and soldiers requiring a vast and complicated economies. It was a brilliantly addictive game and very memorable, which was eventually ruined by the third game which turned it into a rts.

My little kingdom!

Settlers 7 is a beautiful, very detailed and thought out game that the developers should be proud of. It stays true to the first games, but also adds so much more depth in other aspects. While you would think the warfare is simplified, you still have to really plan out your economy to have the best troops, and then what places best to attack and fortify against your enemy.

The combat is pretty cute. When your general meets another, they both dismount and the soldiers form a line, and then charge. The game in general is pretty cartoony, but it adds to the style of the game. When zoomed in you can catch alot of detail, especially in the animations of the workers. Sometimes you have time to observe your little town, watching someone bake a loaf or a hunter taking meat to the butchers who makes “fancy” sausages.

This is a jumbled impression of the game. It is vastly complex and detailed, and a brilliant game for those who enjoyed Pharaoh, sim city or the old roman city building games. It also feels like sins of a solar empire sometimes. If those big grand games are something you like I can definitely recommend Settlers 7.

The DRM

Now, the main reason why I wanted to write about this is the DRM Ubisoft has implemented. There is no doubt that they are losing alot of money because of the DRM. Basically, you have to be online to play the game. If your offline = no game. If you travel, or have a shady Internet connection then you may have some problems with this game. I plan on testing how robust your connection has to be since some people fear that their tiny small connection might not work for this game.

I have had no problem so far with connectivity. I have a tiny upload speed so anyone worried about the upload requirement, that’s just aload of crap. I think they recommend 124k upload, I can only upload at 30k and Its perfectly fine. Its an extremely bad shame that they implemented this kind of DRM. For most people not buying this out of protest would run the game fine and probably love it. I felt that buying it it sends support to Ubisoft, but I believe in awhile they will drop this DRM because of the huge public backlash they have on their hands.

Lastly, for those who say this pushes them to pirate the game, and helps the pirates cause…There is no crack for this game! (yet). This would indicate that the DRM is working. Perhaps in Ubisoft’s eyes, all the games not pirated is money saved. Most people who would of downloaded this out of protest to bypass the DRM are a tiny minority, so in theory this DRM is working. If a crack is released soon then its failed. If  a crack is released in a few months then it would take the sting out of the piracy they would of had at the beginning.

Gamers are very capable of making a loud protest, but you can also support this fantastic developer for this amazing game which frankly, is a rarity in this no-risk gaming industry. If you do not support these kinds of games now, then they will simply not exist in a few years, and you will have generic franchises (including all the sequels).

If you read this and find it interesting please share. I would really like to know peoples views on my view about this DRM.

Kai.

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