In a perfectly self-sufficient society, every person would generate a service that someone in the town needs, eventually fulfilling every person's need. This has been the basis of nearly every form of organization and government in history. In The Settlers: Rise of an Empire, this society, its growth, and its maintenance have been placed at the player's fingertips.
In the game, players must build up a thriving medieval city from a handful of nobodies. At first, people will need things like lumber and stone to create homes and farms. After meeting those basic needs, they begin to diversify, becoming specialists like butchers, blacksmiths or other types of goods producers. These new types of workers produce new goods for all of the settlers, but might require new resources. Finally, citizens will need something to break up the monotony of their lives, so entertainment and luxury become major factors in peoples' happiness.
Settlements now have women, making romance and population growth important for success. Another major addition will be the inclusion of seasons. These affect what settlers can grow, how easily food can be obtained and many other little yet far-reaching effects to change up the pace of the game. This should keep the pace changing as the year rolls by. In addition, environments and their citizens will have different tasks and looks as the seasons shift.
Rather than the fertile lands of Eurasia (a staple for previous games in the series), Rise of an Empire will involve the beginnings of a new colony of some civilized nation. This means that the new settlement will be in some harsher location like African deserts, Antarctica tundras or otherwise treacherous terrain. This means for instance, deserts pose a large threat of people dying from thirst. Therefore, maintaining a steady water supply proves most important.
Settlers' visuals definitely stand out. Not only has Blue Byte gone to painstaking lengths to create fantastic models and graphic elements. The sheer level of detail truly brings a settlement to life. The butcher stands in front of his shop making sausages in true-to-life animation, while the lumberjack cuts many notches deeper and deeper into trees just outside town.
Furthermore, instead of relying on cluttered menus, players utilize visual cues to recognize whether non-player characters are hungry, thirsty, uneducated, bored, tired or generally unhappy citizens who will not or cannot work for any reason.
Look for The Settlers: Rise of an Empire this September.
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