The Settlers VI: Rise of an Empire Gold Edition

by UBI Soft

Product Features

• The Settlers - Rise of an Empire -
• Build bustling towns in a medieval world. Richly detailed, realistic world
• Each Settler figure has his or her own daily routine, with a range of different actions and behaviors that can be observed at all times
• Spur your settlers on to ever greater efforts, develop a flourishing economy, satisfy the needs of your citizens, and protect your people from danger
• Eastern Realm Expansion Pack -

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B001BBOZYY
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.5 x 0.5 inches ; 3.2 ounces
• Media: DVD-ROM
• Release Date: September 16, 2008
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,747 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
  • #72 in Video Games > PC Games > Strategy

Product Description

The Settlers VI: Rise of an Empire Gold Edition includes the Eastern Realm expansion pack that provides new landscapes, characters, and challenges as you creates your own empire of bustling cities in a captivating medieval world. After the crushing of the Red Prince, the empire of Basa is being rebuilt, but the important trade route to the distant Hidun, to the empire of the great mogul Praphat is blocked and neither goods nor news are getting through. Time has come for your knights to help the Mogul to restore the empire to splendor and glory and to fill the deserted provinces again with life.

8-map campaign, Single and Multiplayer Maps A new climatic zone - Based on an Indian environment, you will experience a new exciting flora & fauna, new buildings and characters A new hero - The knights are joined by the daughter of the mogul of Hidun - the Princess Saraya Trade-Post - the new trade-post gives you the opportunity to install an automatic monthly exchange of goods in a self-specified way Wells - Along with the marketplace-well, you can build your own wells to save more water during rainy seasons to save enough for dry periods Geologist - The new geologist will be able refill all stone and iron quarries as well as springs Rainy Season - As certain recourses will not be available and paths will not be passable, the rainy season is a new challenge Embellishment Objects - A large number of beautiful embellishment objects will be available to personalize & decorate your city

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

81 of 89 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Game For Dummies, like Me!, February 26, 2009

By 

CronanBor "cronanbor" - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: The Settlers VI: Rise of an Empire Gold Edition (DVD-ROM)

The Settlers VI: Rise of an Empire Gold Edition

What I'm not: I'm not a teenager who can neglect his homework, play for hours every day, and talk to his friends about how to kill the bad guy.
What I'm not: I'm not a war general who knows to put the archers on high ground and flank the cavalry with spearmen.
What I'm not: I'm not someone who works for the department of zoning and planning.
What I am: Just someone who likes to play a game and win more than lose.

What this game is not: This is not a fast action paced game where you tell your wife you're too busy upgrading units, don't answer the phone because you're bein attacked by aliens, or hold in that bladder tight because any minute now and you lose.
What this game is: It's a slow paced game. You can kick back, sip coffee, smoke a cig, and even walk away to attend to real life concerns and still come back with everything intact.

What this game is not: This is not a high dedication game. You don't have to dedicate eight hours a day, seven days a week to upgrade your cooking skill.
What this game is: A couple of hours of fun. The time stamp has given me an average of two hours of game play per completed campaign map.

What this game is not: This is not a game designed for the strategic expert or the officer of city commissions. You don't have to know anything about planning a city or war strategies to have fun and win the scenarios.
What this game is: A game for dummies. It literaly tells you, "Click on the flashing button. Now place the cursor over the blue signal on the screen. There! You just created a building, now watch." And, "Click on the catapult, now click on the flashing icon to activate it. Now click on the glowing target." I need someone to hold my hand and walk me through some of these games. I've played other games with hundreds of buildings and all they do is, "What would you like to build first?" I don't know, i'm not a zoning commissioner.

In summary, this is a slow paced, low action, high in telling you what to do and when to do it game. You can walk away and come back if needed. You can spend a few hours and have fun. You can take your time to think about what to do next. You can win every scenario. This is the game for me. I hope they make more like these.

27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very Surprised - Great Game!, December 10, 2008

By 

waterbowl - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: The Settlers VI: Rise of an Empire Gold Edition (DVD-ROM)

I bought this game on a whim without knowing much about it. I am glad I did. I never played the earlier versions of The Settlers, so I'm coming into this one with fresh eyes.

This game is more about city building than it is about combat. There are only a few units to recruit. You can recruit swordsmen and bowmen, with a few siege weapons. That's all that you can get for combat. That might sound really bad, but the strength of the game lies in managing your settlers and city. I don't really find combat all that fun, it's more of an afterthought than it is a major part of the game.

The only way you win in combat is by having a superior numbers of troops. However, there are a few things that come into play. The happier your citizens are, the more damage your troops do. If you're on your own land, as opposed to an enemy's land, you'll do more damage as well. It's not rocket science, but you do have to keep an eye on a few things. It's another reason why this game is more about managing your settlers, even their happiness affects combat.

How do you manage your settlers? By building bakeries, hunting huts, barracks and so forth. You can't directly control your settlers, they do their chores on their own. To keep them happy, you have to make sure they have enough beer in stock and medicine available, as well as other needs. The game does lack depth, other than keeping them happy, all you can really do is raise and lower taxes. I should mention, you can also trade with surrounding villages, but that's where most of the interaction with them ends. Other than doing a quest for a village, all that you can really do with other villages is trade with them(or destroy them if they are an enemy).

Settlers: Rise of an Empire has some really high quality graphics. When I think of graphics, I don't think of what looks flashy, I think of what looks like art. This game has really wonderful graphics, full of color and life. It's the first game in a long time that I actually admired it. It has a charm and a retro feel about it.

I do enjoy the music and sound in the game. Your settlers themselves don't say much, but your heroes that you can control and interact with do a lot of talking, and their voice acting is very good. Some of the music is catchy, like the great festival music.

This gold version also comes with the expansion pack. I finished the original campaign, but haven't gotten through the expansion campaign yet. It's more of the same with a few new things added, like a new hero to control and maps to play on. I had fun in the original campaign and I am having fun in the expansion so far as well.

This is a really fun settlers game that's easy to get the hang of, there is nothing complicated about it. For people wanting a city building game with depth, this isn't for you.

I have nothing bad to say about the game. It played pretty smoothly, didn't crash at all, and was fun. The gold version does not include a physical manual however, so that is one small minus for it. The game does come all patched up so you don't have to worry about downloading anything extra for the game.

One small note about the campaign that you'll play: It starts off really easy, like a tutorial, but it does get harder when you get more into it.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Solid choice for an historic city building game, December 22, 2008

By 

Donald D. Steffy "dsteffy510" (Northern California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

= Fun:4.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: The Settlers VI: Rise of an Empire Gold Edition (DVD-ROM)

This is a solid choice if you enjoy city-builder games.

You are mostly gathering resources, growing your settlement, expanding your territory, and fulfilling various scenario tasks, all within a usually very creative map that includes valleys, river crossing, mountain passes, and other fun strategic stuff. Maybe half of the scenarios end with you destroying another faction, but this is definitely not a military-focused game.

The good:
-Very solid game engine: never a bug or crash after 5 months of playing on Windows Vista 64-bit with a GeForce 9800GTX and graphics settings maxed-out
-Immersive period graphics and another solid ambient period music score by Dynamedion (Best German Soundtrack 2007)
-Creative maps/scenarios that are generally not too difficult and typically take around 3 hours each
-Vegetarian rating allows you to replay old maps using a different strategy
-Active user community creating custom maps for you

Cons:
-Somewhat restrictive camera angle
-Less complex than other similar games (Anno 1701), although what it lacks in complexity in the game engine, I'd say it makes up for in the variation and creativity of the maps/scenarios.