Blue Byte and Related Designs recently finished their latest trading and building game, Anno 2070 – this time set in later part of the current century, in a world where climate politics underlie the tale of commercial striving – and released it onto the wild seas of the internet. I’ve been wading through its depths for the past week or so and I am now able to tell you Wot I Think. > (more…)

This year has been unusually rich in the kind of game that I most enjoy: those that are open-ended, or provide a sandbox world for me to mess about in. We usually get a couple of these every year, but in 2011 we seem to have run into a minor bounty of the open stuff, which is good news for explorers and meanderers alike. I’ve gone into a bit more detail about why this pleases me below. >

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Anno 2070 came out on Friday. Did you see? It’s Anno, but in the future! Although I’m now so used to having ridiculous year names from science fiction like “2011″ that I can no longer register “2070″ as sounding that far away. Heck, it’s reasonably likely I could live until 2070. I think futuristic sounding things now require at least a “2200″ century, if not ideally the third millennium. Please take note. Anyhow, the Anno launch brought with it an Anno launch trailer, which is below. And I believe one of our number is currently playing the game in order to let you know what you should think about it.

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