The Settlers franchise has seen 6 games in its long history, and it’s easily one of the most recognizable RTS franchises around, and since Age of Empires and Caesar have faded away, only Settlers and Civilization remain as the ones standing. With Settler’s 7, does the title add new depth to the franchise? In short, yes. But it comes with more baggage than it should (read: problems).

Settlers 7 will make any Settlers fan feel right at home, and the first thing you realize, is just how gorgeous the game is. It’s easily the best looking RTS on the PC at the moment. Settlers is and has always been about building your town, trading and micromanaging everything. Settlers 7 is no different, and while it appears more streamlined, it’s still a complex game with plenty to do.

However, that’s where the main problem also lies with the game. There’s too much to do, too many strings to pull for a simple thing to accomplish. Say you want to build a house. First you need to get wood, then process the wood, then you need other building materials, then you need the builders etc. — and all of these things you have to micromanage, just to build a house. It’ll easily take you half an hour to do. If you have the patience, you’ll probably welcome this kind of depth, but honestly, it’s really pushing our patience. Oh, and don’t forget that you need to maintain that house once you built it, with food etc. Another disappointing aspect is that map sizes are quite limited, meaning that you kingdom will be limited as well. This is no good news to the hard-core players who like to build up huge economies. There’s simply not enough space to be immersed like in the good old days with Caesar 3.

Luckily, the game does support multiplayer, and it’s surprisingly well made and balanced. Unfortunately, the game features a crippling DRM system where you constantly have to be online in order to play. On more than one occasion, we experience issues with connecting to the server, and were left out and simply could not play the game. This is unacceptable. Overall, the great visuals and depth of the gameplay will certainly satisfy fans of the franchise, however, sometimes things seem a bit too complicated when they could be simple and streamlined.

The Good:
Great visuals.
Deep gameplay.

The Bad:
Cluttered interface at times.
Too complicated for its own sake.
DRM is crippling.

Overall score: 6/10