Anno 1602
Anno 1602: Creation of a New World, entitled 1602 A.D. in North America, is a 1998 construction and management video game developed by Max Design and published by Sunflowers Interactive. Set in the early modern period, it requires the player to build colonies on islands of various sizes in an archipelago as they manage resources, exploration, diplomacy and trade. The game design is noteworthy for its attempt to implement a 'progressive' artificial intelligence, meaning that the pace of the game changes in response to how quickly players act.
Anno 1602 was a commercial blockbuster that attracted buyers outside the usual demographic of German computer games, including a significant percentage of female customers. It was the German market's best-selling computer game of 1998, and remained the region's highest seller of all time by 2003, with over 1.7 million units sold in German-speaking countries. The game was less successful in international markets, but ultimately sold above 2.7 million copies worldwide by 2004. Anno 1602 began the Anno series, which led to the sequels Anno 1503, Anno 1701, Anno 1404, Anno 2070, Anno 2205, Anno 1800 and Anno 117.
Gameplay
Anno 1602 is a mix of simulation and strategy gaming where players create a realistic and lively world, modeling it to their liking. The player controls an unnamed European nation in 1602 AD that is looking to expand their power into the New World. As the game starts, the player will need to find a nearby island, colonize it, and start building up an economy. The US release contains all 6 scenarios that were included in the original European release, as well as 9 new scenarios, along with a "free play role". Progression centers around satisfying the evolving needs of the colony's population. The ultimate goal of the game is to discover chains of islands, settle them, develop on them, and then trade with other players. Players can also trade with their own colonies, and various neutral CPU controlled players such as native tribesmen. As players build homes, the residents go through various social classes: Pioneers, Settlers, Citizens, and Merchants, each demanding more sophisticated goods such as cloth, alcohol, tobacco, and spices. Meeting these demands unlocks further buildings and economic possibilities. Failing to meet needs can lead to population decline, riots, or loss of tax income.While military conquest is available, Anno 1602 is often praised for allowing peaceful strategies. Players can win by economic dominance and trade efficiency, without relying heavily on military force. However, military units such as musketeers, cannons, and warships can be used to defend or attack colonies, and players can engage in combat against other computer-controlled factions or multiplayer opponents. The player can choose to play out one of the game's many scenarios or engage in a free form game. The game also features online and network play with up to 4 other players simultaneously. Because the network play is less sophisticated than that of modern games, lags and disconnections often occur. Despite this, Anno 1602 is still occasionally played by small groups of LAN PC gamers, or by players over the internet. The game is also playable via null modem connection.
Civilizations
Anno 1602 is designed to be as nationalistically neutral as possible. After entering a character name, the player is asked to pick one of four different colored banners to represent their country. The absence of different civilizations with different characteristics contrasts with other games such as The Settlers, and Age of Empires. Diplomacy is also limited in this entry of the Anno series. Players can interact with neutral factions, but these interactions are relatively shallow compared to later entries. The emphasis remains on economic growth, production chains, and resource management.Technology
Unlike other games where technology plays a major role in one player defeating another, Anno 1602 instead makes technology upgrades more relevant in inner-colony affairs. Instead of buying upgrades to ships to perform better in huge naval battles, it is often the case that upgrades are made so that the ships can carry more cargo, and therefore make the colony more money. The majority of the buildings in the game also can / must be technologically upgraded throughout the game to please the colony's citizens, which produces more cash for the colony, with which the player can continue upgrading their nation and expand to other islands.Buildings
Anno 1602 is about discovery. As the colony grows and spreads, the player gains access to more and more building types and citizens construct bigger and more impressive housing for themselves. The player is required to reach a certain population level before access is gained to weapons factories. Once the player has the factories, a large number of buildings are needed to produce weapons, and additional buildings to construct units. After the buildings are constructed, the player must pay a constant flow of money to keep each building running. This "line of production", though difficult, has been incorporated into newer games such as Stronghold.Custom scenarios
Anno 1602 allows for the creation of user-made maps, using the Scenario Builder. This tool is simpler and easier to learn than comparable editors used in more modern games, but it has fewer capabilities. This, along with instant "Random Maps", keeps many players coming back to Anno 1602. The game features a progressive difficulty curve, with scenarios introducing new mechanics over time.Not all versions of Anno 1602 shipped with a map editor, therefore several fan-made editors were created.
Development
Anno 1602 was conceived in April 1996 at Max Design, a Schladming-based game developer founded in 1991. Following a period of financial turmoil in which the company neared bankruptcy, the team began Anno as a spiritual sequel to its earlier title 1869 – Hart am Wind!, a competitor of The Patrician. The team at Max Design numbered only four members: designer Wilfried Reiter, brothers Martin and Albert Lasser and artist Ulli Koller. Anno 1602s design occurred gradually. From December 17-22, 2018, the game was given away to Uplay users for free on PC.Distribution and commercial performance
Debut
Anno 1602 was a commercial hit. In the German market, the title debuted in first place on Media Control's computer game sales rankings for the second half of April 1998, and held the position after six weeks on the charts. By that time, it had sold 200,000 units. Der Spiegel reported in June that this performance made Anno the title with "the best chance to become the German number one this year". The game subsequently received a "Platinum" award from the Verband der Unterhaltungssoftware Deutschland, for sales of at least 200,000 units throughout the German-speaking world: Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Anno 1602s streak at #1 ended in the latter half of June when Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines captured the spot, which it maintained for 16 weeks. Sunflowers' game remained at second on the Media Control charts for the last two weeks of June, July, August and September.File:CD-R.jpg|thumb|right|According to PC Games, Anno 1602 succeeded in the German market partly because it shipped on extended-capacity CD-ROMs to impede "piracy".
Accruing 360,000 domestic sales by September, Anno 1602 was the German market's best-selling game during the first nine months of 1998. PC Games Petra Maueröder wrote that Germany was "plagued by the Anno 1602 fever" in the half-year following its release, while Max Falkenstern likened it to a "pandemic" in . The game's sales for the period resulted in a 300% increase in Sunflowers' year-over-year revenue, to DM 20 million. Remarking on this success at the time, Eva Müller and Hans-Peter Canibol of Focus noted that Sunflowers had become "one of the few German companies that asserted itself in the American-dominated market". Sunflowers forecast sales of 600,000 units for Anno by the end of 1998, based on its performance earlier in the year. The game claimed second on Media Control's charts during the last two weeks of October, below Need for Speed 3, and then dropped to #3 for the second halves of November and December. Sales had risen to 400,000 units after six months of availability, and Anno 1602 ultimately became the German market's best-selling computer game of 1998. At the 1999 Milia festival in Cannes, it took home a "Gold" prize for revenues above €15 million in the European Union during the previous year.
The high sales of Anno 1602 in German-speaking countries derived partly from Sunflowers' copy protection scheme, according to PC Games. Although the game launched as a direct competitor of StarCraft, it significantly outsold that title in the region by the end of 1998, despite the latter's success worldwide. Petra Maueröder reported that, because StarCraft had shipped without copy protection in Germany, its piracy rate there reached nine illegal copies for every legal version sold. Conversely, Sunflowers attempted to combat pirates by making Anno 1602 "one of the first games" printed on extended-capacity CD-ROMs, a writer for PC Games noted. These exceeded the storage limits of standard discs, which made Anno 1602 incompatible with most consumer CD-Rs and burners of the time. The effort resulted in faulty disc shipments, a common issue for extended-capacity CDs, but was ultimately judged by PC Games as "a complete success, despite the availability of cracks".