Anno 1800
I came across the opinion that Anno 1800 is the kind of game you play non-stop for several weeks and then suddenly stop and never return to again. This statement is incredibly accurate. An unhealthily addictive gameplay allows you to overcome the rather high entry barrier, followed by sudden boredom after another marathon session, during which the narrator literally begs you to turn off the console and take a break. It’s a game that’s really tough for noobs and casuals, but for completely different reasons. So I recommend it as fervently as I discourage it.
To call Anno 1800 a “dopamine dealer” is an understatement. It’s not “addictive” in the truly destructive way gambling is, but it has this fun little quality where you sit down for a short session at 9 p.m. Suddenly, it’s 2 a.m., and you still have the thought, “okay, I’ll just do this one more thing and go to sleep.” And then it’s 4 a.m. Only a few times in my life have I stayed up with a game until 2 or 3 o’clock in the morning. One of them was Anno 1800 – a strategy and economic game, where combat is secondary, yet the constant supply of canned food for your Artisans is nothing short of thrilling. This simple “just one more” mechanism, which connects all the most addictive things in life, from eating chips, through binge-watching a TV series, to games like Stardew Valley and Anno itself, is the primary reason why this game is so captivating and simultaneously why it’s unsuitable for casuals.
If you have time to play for two hours once a week, and after half an hour you’re interrupted by a baby crying, a boiling pot, or an urgent phone call, it will be a frustrating experience. The comprehensive development of an island city-state with an advanced economy based on long supply chains of raw materials, semi-products, and finished goods requires focus. Constant interruptions and short, “stolen” gaming moments will not allow for concentration. Anno perfectly induces a state of “flow” – that pleasant feeling, the holy grail of any work, when a task maintains the perfect balance: it’s simultaneously easy enough to perform smoothly, without effort and disruptions, with steady, easily maintained concentration, and yet still challenging enough not to become a tedious triviality. In other words: a challenge that you can meet without struggle…
…did I say that Anno 1800 is easy in its own way? It might have sounded like that. But it won’t be easy for n00bs. Anno is unlikely to become your other half’s favorite title, if they until now only played Windows Solitaire in the ’90s. Your dad liked The Settlers, and you think that now, years later, ten times longer and more branching supply chains will fascinate him and lead him back to gaming? Abandon those hopes. Although it’s hard to lose in Anno, although it has selectable difficulty levels, a very good tutorial, game speed adjustments, up to the “active pause” (when time and events in the game stand still, while we can still carry out actions, issue commands, build objects, etc.), and an averagely experienced player will recognize certain mechanics and patterns typical in strategy games, still, we are talking about micromanaging an entire vibrant metropolis, which will quickly consist of several interconnected port cities and several overseas colonies. Managing such an organism manually in real-time (even with pause-on-demand), constantly bombarded with notifications about anything and everything that happens? And if we’re playing on a console, there’s the added challenge of handling all this with a controller instead of a keyboard and mouse.
No n00b with a background of casually playing Candy Crush on a mobile will come out victorious from such a clash. As well as no casual gamer will find 100 hours a month to immerse themselves in gameplay with breaks only for absolutely necessary duties. Therefore, with regret, but firmly, I state that Anno 1800 is an excellent game which I cannot recommend on the Izzy Mode page.
Final Izzy Mode Score for Anno 1800
Casual score: how suitable the game is for casual players – casual players who like a challenge from time to time, but generally just wanna’ have fu-u-n🎵 a few hours a week without stress and just for the fun of playing. The higher the score the more casual-friendly the game.
n00b-o-meter: how suitable the game is for n00b players – new players whose gaming career started and ended with Candy Crush, Tetris or browser games or even never played a game and would like to start. The higher the score the more n00b-friendly the game.
General Izzyness Level: between Izzy Mode, Normal, Hard and Nightmare – how would the title score in the difficulty scale known from games?
