I think I'm going to skip this game. It has TAGES with machine limit activation.

You go and enjoy. Let me know if TAGES gives you any problems (as I would like to know of any and all risks/problems it might give my machine if I do get it).

Damn you Island Dog !

The game looks fantastic, but I won't give in. Activation limits are not my thing, nor do I wish to be charged for phoning support once the limit of three is reached. So tempting, but I have to draw a line on principle.

I don't like the fact that you "plop" down buildings just like that. Its supposed to be a city sim. What kind of a city sim has insta-construction? I can just materialize entire neighbourhoods out of thin air!

Bah. Everything is geared towards those hyperactive kids with the attention span of a duck these days. Speed, speed, speed. Yuck.

Err, how about you try the game before saying that? Getting a large city running will literally take you days of playing, and hurrying things will most likely just leave you with an empty wallet and angry population.

I can confirm that this game is a really engrossing time-eater!  hehe 

Be careful, or it'll be the next day and you won't have slept a wink yet. 

I have the Wii version and it's just right - they nailed both the controls and the gfx.  It's not just a cheap spinoff.

Anno games are definitely worth getting!

I *have* tried the game - its just not my style. I like to see some dynamic content within my city, not just ambling citizens, an occasional cart going by and preset building animations. That, plus there is no sense of actually building a city - all the structures just appear out of thin air and the cost is deducted from your storehouse via magical teleportation nodes I assume. Settlers are a much better "city" sim than this.

Music is good though, as are the visuals. Basically, by my definition of a city sim, this is a very pretty, very nice sounding Settlers regurgitation. No wonder since its done by Bluebyte. They probably wanted to "streamline" stuff with the Anno series. Gah. Gone are the days when you had to actually send out prospectors to find ore and resource deposits...

Would it be so difficult to actually make a city sim where you plan out your city and then watch the newcomers build their own huts on allocated grounds, see them upgrading their buildings, and actually construct the special buildings you have ordered? Where tearing down buildings also costs money and time? So that you can't instantly correct your planning mistakes, perhaps? Traffic congestion maybe? A bustling city like that, with all those carts and that narrow main street...

I found this game very easy, even on the hardest possible difficulty setting. It only gets more complicated later on, but if you plan stuff ahead a little you can't really go wrong. Its also really daft that production buildings don't require any food. I guess they have robots working there. So you can have an island full of hemp plantations all happily producing without a single bite of food in the storehouses. I guess they are so high on the stuff they don't notice they're starving.

I loved 1701, 1404 looks great. I'll gladly pick the game up... just as soon as they drop the install limit. Until then, well, I don't rent PC games.

As for multiplayer, having played a few games of MP 1701 let me just say: there's nothing more pointless than multiplayer in a city builder.

its quite a good game, i got it at awhile back for 35$ (retail box), and am very happy with it, only used 1 activation so far and I bet Ubi will release a patch down the road to removed the TAGES once demand has died down.

Indeed... but not from playing it!

And to see a Stardock member advertising for people to install malware saddens me a bit. I guess we will soon see Elemental War of Magic annouced with TAGES or maybe SecuROM.

Awac A,

So...just because a product comes with any protection at all, is REASON enough to steal now?  So if I lock my car around you, I can expect it to disappear?  I should just trust that you and others won't steal it, and leave it unlocked?  

I get it, offend the "sensibility" (oxymoron on it's own) of a pirate and he/she gets to feel JUSTIFIED in their theft.  So the only way to stop thieving is to stop attempting to protect things.  WOW, why didn't someone think of that before?  I've been locking up my bicycle, locking my home and my car, password-protecting my PC's.  My god.......I'm going about it all the wrong way!  I'm just INVITING theft........thanks for setting me straight!!!

/sarcasm

the Monk

Well certain types of DRM is a deal breaker for me. I simply won't buy it, and I didn't steal it either. I did play the demo, before I knew about Tages and it looked like a game right up my alley. Of course they could wrap the demo up in DRM crap too for no apparent reason just like Spore and I believe it was Spellforce 2 that gave me Starforce once through their demos. I did pass those games over for DRM reasons alone though, and i believe Reclaim Your Game mentioned the one removed Starforce from the US versions with a patch, still not good enough for me though, don't want something like Starforce on my computer again.

There is a certain amount of DRM I will put up with, disc checks, cd keys, for online services which I refuse to pay full retail price for (not getting the cd, the box, the manual... basically little publishing costs and still pay the same price to make walmart happy.... nonsense). I'll put up with online activation. But if it comes in a box and it doesn't have multiplayer and still requires online activation, no way.

As for pirates, hey the gaming industry seems like the dim witted kid in the back corner who watched the music industry fail at their attempts at the black board over and over again and still thinks its a good idea to try the same approach. It's fuel for the pirates. You gotta know that by now. As for me, I went through roughly 15 years of not buying music (and not stealing it either), so I can certainly manage to avoid buying titles from a publisher whose goal in life is to screw their existing customers while doing nothing to stop pirates.