@ubi-barbalatu

Please do take this response into serious consideration. This game has so much potential, unmet by the current Beta version.

I would be delighted by a Settlers game that looks and feels like this, but it must be so much deeper than it is now. Anno 1800 was extremely successful despite being a single player sandbox. Evidence that this doesn’t need short multiplayer matchups to survive? Please give us the vision of the 2019 game. Please please please. This could be such a special game.

Play styles where it isn’t necessarily a rush to war, rather war is a means to expansion, capturing areas critical to expanding supply chains. Supply chains from which unique modifications to troops emerge. From which different play styles emerge / supply chains that dictate how you play (at that specific stage the players game). Have certain resources? Go more fortress/fortification. Have more steel, unique metals / alloys and enable unique troop armaments, more infantry focused. Have more gold, less agriculture available? More merchant focus. As supply chain complexity scales, be rewarded by how they unlock special troops, capabilities, modifications, buildings. E.g. Produce moral boosting goods? More sustainable army. Better leather boots, faster troops. Add steel studs to boots, your troops can better cross ice or rocky terrain. Have rum, troop morale and fighting ability / attack damage is sustained despite low health etc.

Many interesting ways to weave supply chain output into differentiations of military units / ships / building functions / wrinkles in game mechanics that keep the game interesting.

This game could do for Settlers 2, 3, 4 what Anno 1800 did for 1602. If it did the community would immensely reward it.

The bones are here. That’s what makes this sad. Looking at this is like looking at Anno 1800 with only two Citizen tiers and a quarter of the resources. Yes, it might enable more predictable and shorter game matchups and in doing so enable competitive play. But, would it really be fun beyond a few hours of play? Imagine Settlers having a season pass that adds new regions of the world, in turn adding more resources, and new supply chain outputs and units. All of this impacting the finances available for, efficiency of or units available to your military. Making trade offs around protecting / build new units vs expanding trade routes or territory. Needing certain goods to raise citizen happiness, which in turn raises the taxes available for spending on your war machine. Being able to get around this by minting coins, OR creating incentives to field a military that can secure gold access (like the Spaniards back in the day) that allows for military spend and empire building beyond taxation income.

This is given just as illustration, the point being, it’s easy to see how special this could be.

And, with a little more depth, you bet your hind part that a good chunk of Anno players would run over to this game even if they are new to the series while they wait for the next one. Or while they continue to play it. Why not capitalize on that player base and the historic Settlers player base? Seems less risky than going it with this.

@editorial So relieved that we may still get the game we all wanted!! Thank you for listening to the community as well as not giving up on this game.

Anyone else just checking in on the off chance they might still delay launch and go back to the drawing board with this? This is NOT settlers. Ya’ll talking to your audience with ear plugs in.

@ubi-barbalatu we are hanging in! Your post gives us just a glimmer of hope.

Understand the frustration you hear on this forum happens because the player base cares and sees the potential. We really felt like this had a chance to be the best Settlers game in a long time.

Thank you for checking in.

@editorial this is embarrassing, ouff, well get it over with so we can move on

@guest-c4g169nn well, their official forum rep noted that they will be addressing feedback and announcing changes but that it was taking them some time to get together a comprehensive response to share with the community.

I am, perhaps stubbornly, interpreting this as a reality check received, and that they’re coming to terms with the need for a course correction. But, who knows, don’t hold your breath

No shame, huh? Just a quick cash grab while closing down the project to recoup some of the wasted budget? How else can the community possibly read this? It took a year to make [censored] changes that ignored the community and could fit into a month 1 patch? This would be watered down even as a mobile RTS. Pretty please cancel this and give it to the Anno team.

@oldtokken24 Yes, I am one of those Anno 1800 players yearning for a new game.

On release, 1800 exceeded any expectations I could reasonably have had, delighting me more than 1602 did over 20 years ago. Since then, I’ve purchased every season pass of 1800 without blinking in addition to gifting friends and families copies of the game.

Settlers 2 and 3 were games I found even more compelling than 1602. And (thanks for the link); the 2019 version seemed to promise a similar renaissance for the Settlers series.

I agree, Anno is a very different game; and also one that is appealing to a very similar audience.

Re: Ubisoft’s vision for the game. Where RTS games like AOE4 and SC2 (which I love and played extensively, including in beta testing) derive difficulty and satisfaction from build order memorization, constant adjustments, unit tactics etc. and provide a rather intense experience (fast paced processing and action); Anno and Settlers were something totally different. Where AOE and SC are exciting, frenetic, and immediate; the gameplay of Anno and Settlers has IMO always been more meditative, creative, expansive (I.e. quieting the mind to keep track of and hold in tension as much complexity as possible). The management of complexity is the progression and challenge, IMO more directly than the in game opponent. The in game opponent is what pushes you to elevate, optimize, scale up.

I’m not describing it perfectly, point being, I think players come to Anno/Settlers for very different reasons than AOE and SC. In simplifying Settlers and going more RTS, you (Ubisoft) completely misunderstands what players come to this game for.

No one on the team has enough passion for games to speak up and do something about this?

@macdeiv speaking the truth

“League of Settlers?” Or wait, “League of New Allies” no, Settlers of the Storm

@Humblebum and the first place I thought of to find others who would celebrate this was this games forum lol

@RhinakBlork games like tiberium twilight, settlers online, and diablo immortal all have their audience, but…

Anyone else just checking in on the off chance they might still delay launch and go back to the drawing board with this? This is NOT settlers. Ya’ll talking to your audience with ear plugs in.

No one on the team has enough passion for games to speak up and do something about this?

No shame, huh? Just a quick cash grab while closing down the project to recoup some of the wasted budget? How else can the community possibly read this? It took a year to make [censored] changes that ignored the community and could fit into a month 1 patch? This would be watered down even as a mobile RTS. Pretty please cancel this and give it to the Anno team.

@editorial this is embarrassing, ouff, well get it over with so we can move on

@editorial y’all that ambivalent to how much the settlers community resents this bs? It’s rare I even check on updates anymore because I know how disappointing it will be…

@editorial So relieved that we may still get the game we all wanted!! Thank you for listening to the community as well as not giving up on this game.

@legolaserdu77 More likely, they gave up on developing the game until some guy came along and said: "Hey, we don't need to finish this, we can just package up 2-3 of the finished game play loops, cut the rest, and go to marketing."