Anno 1701: Dawn of Discovery (Nintendo DS)

I was quite impressed with the games controls, in fact they make controlling the game feel effortless. All you will use (unless you want to pause or save, in which case you hit start) is the stylus. The stylus can be used to select buildings, whiz across the screen or access the games various menus. When a menu is selected it expands out to give access to multiple options and screens. This frees the screen from clutter.

My biggest issue with the game is the viewing perspective. The game is isometric, which normally wouldn’t be a problem, unfortunately there is no option to rotate the screen. This means that you generally can’t see smaller items behind larger buildings. It therefore becomes difficult to see where your roads are. Often I found that some of my buildings weren’t connected to the road network because of a break in the road I couldn’t see. Also I lost several buildings to fire because I thought they were connected to the same road network as the fire station, it turns out they weren’t. Whilst this may sound like a significant issue it rarely causes much frustration.

I would have liked to have seen a better developed military/combat portion of the game. It wouldn’t have to be too much more, just a few extra unit types and structures. Also there is no option to play over the internet, which will limit the games replayability.

In conclusion Anno 1701: Dawn of Discovery is a welcome addition to the catalogue of DS games. It is one of the stronger god sim/population management games that I have played. It is a solid title and deserves to sell well.