The Settlers closed beta preview – an interesting spin on a classic

gamepur.com:

Fans of the Settlers series have had to wait for quite a while since the last installment of the strategically-minded city-building series. The Settlers 7: Path of Kingdoms was released to solid reviews eleven years ago, but a new game is almost here. We were lucky enough to get a chance to play and experience the game firsthand ahead of the closed beta going live. 

The Settlers is a real-time, city-building strategy game where players need to develop their fledging society, fulfill its needs, and keep everything balanced on the path to victory. What has always made The Settlers enjoyable is that what you see is what you get. Everything that the townspeople do on the screen is done for a reason; the actions playing out while you are carrying out your plans all have a purpose.

All this is beautifully brought to life with the new installment through deliciously detailed animations. It is lovely to watch people pick up and put down resources, such as loading tree trunks into a saw to turn them into planks. If these types of strategy games often feel obtuse, then The Settlers has removed the casing, and players are free to watch the cogs ticking over. 

While there was no way for me to play the campaign, I was able to play a Skirmish mode against AI and other players. Like similar strategy games, the challenge is to do things as efficiently as possible. You want to explore, gather, mine, and build with a purpose, and to somehow do everything you need to do before the enemy starts to harry your settlement too badly. 

The first concern is time management. Rather than having your woodmen run around carrying logs, you can build a warehouse near them, then connect their logging site to the warehouse so they can drop off the logs.