opinion: Out of nowhere, Ubisoft surprised us with the announcement of a fourth season for Anno 1800. Great news, but it won’t be easy.
Little peek behind the scenes: I’ve been thinking a few times in the last few weeks about how to pay tribute to Anno 1800 again in an article towards the end of the year. For me, the game has once again been the best building experience in 2021. However, it seemed to me that this milestone was slowly running out of fuel.
After Season 3, the impression remained of a brilliant farewell. The cruiser sails towards the sunset, into a safe harbour. The passengers wave with white handkerchiefs.
But then Ubisoft comes along and rudely interferes with my Christmas plans. So much for my emotional farewell article on Anno 1800, which would surely have moved many to tears. Because the cruiser keeps chugging along – no one is crying, everyone is happy.
Anno 1800: First info on Season 4 No, this is not a joke. They’re serious.
And so am I, because suddenly the melancholy is over. I’m back in full Anno fever and thinking about how I can spruce up my New World a bit before the first DLCs roll in. At the same time it dawns on me that Season 4 will have a much harder time than all the others before it.
The secret to success of the Anno DLCs
But let’s stick to anticipation for now. Judging by the first comments, I’m not the only one who is looking forward to even more content for the building game. Meanwhile, it’s hard to imagine that the season concept initially caused bellyaches among some fans.
But those doubts have been put to rest pretty consistently by the developers at Ubisoft Mainz. No one who has played Land of the Lions, Roofs of the City or Speicherstadt mourns the add-ons of earlier days. At least I can’t imagine that.
The DLC and season policy has turned out to be a complete success and has produced an Anno that is simply without equal. Of course, if you want to have everything, you have to pay a lot of money. With the main game, easily over 100 euros, unless you buy it during a discount campaign. And that’s just the Season Passes, theoretically anyone can pay even more for cosmetic content.
But for that you also get a package that always feels complete in its entirety. The DLCs are much more than just soggy flotsam floating loose on the surface. Each DLC enriches the game experience, fits almost seamlessly into the existing game and thus has a perfectly understandable raison d’être. Even Botanika, which in itself hardly justifies the purchase price, but as part of the first Season Pass offers great new options.
A new Anno? I don’t need it (yet)
That’s why I personally can’t yet agree with the occasional other voices who, instead of another season, would rather Ubisoft Mainz slowly put the focus on the next Anno. I think Anno 1800 still has potential. But above all, I don’t know where I would like to see Anno next at the moment.
It will be an extremely difficult task for the team to follow up Anno 1800. Even the basic game without DLCs was already a masterpiece. It will take time to deliver a successor of the same quality. And who knows what new ideas the work on the DLCs can bring forth? I think I could even wait another three or four years for the next Anno. So about as much time as I need to do everything in Anno 1800 anyway.
New end-game challenge … For the developers
With all the anticipation, however, I am more excited than ever to see what awaits me in Season 4. Unlike Season 3, I don’t know anything about the new DLCs. All that is known is that this time they are developing DLCs for the New World. That makes sense, since there are enough regions and the optimisation of the Old World in the last season was already very effective.
Despite this, I’m still undecided as to what these DLCs are actually supposed to offer me. I have no doubt that there is a lot that the New World is missing. For instance, larger islands have already been hinted at and I’m pining for them. But in my opinion, the biggest challenge is not to overwhelm us even further.
Anno 1800 has, I think, reached its critical point with Roofs of the City. Any more complex and the game would only be suitable for a pretty peaky target group. It already feels a bit like you have to be mercilessly effective and masterfully plan for the skyscrapers, or alternatively spend a lot of time and patience. Those who prefer to play in a relaxed way will have a harder time with it. For example, I already prefer to play in co-op, because otherwise everything gets on top of me.
I therefore hope that Season 4 expands Anno 1800 in a meaningful way without driving the complexity into the absurd. I can imagine that this is not easy. And apparently one reaction to this is the introduction of scenarios. This seems a bit as if they want to keep the innovations for the endless game small and enhance the DLC independently with detached scenarios.
On the one hand, Season 4 must build on the successes of the first three and offer the same strengths, but at the same time it must not risk Anno 1800 bursting into flames with complexity.
