"Like a glass of cool apple juice on a hot summers day. And also it's your birthday."

Throughout the course of history, simple ideas have always been the way forward if you really want something to catch on. Look at the invention of the wheel, for example; that's pretty straightforward. But jazz things up a bit, stick an axel between two wheels, add a ridiculously complicated method of propulsion and bingo, you've pretty much got yourself a car. Except, of course, I haven't, because I haven't taken my driving test.

Anyway: The Settlers then. A prime example of a simple idea of a computer game that works so fantastically well any future editions have been pretty much entirely pointless. I've no idea what number sequel they are up to, I think it's something like “The Settlers 5”, last time I checked they'd began adding additional titles after a colon (The Settlers: Naked Army) or whatever. This is always a sure sign that they've taken the amount of times you can add a number on the end of a title and still maintain a straight face, to the limit. The Settlers though, the original and one of the greatest games on the Amiga, if not on any computer games playing thing ever!

Whilst I was far more youthful, I had the utter delight of wiling away my summer mornings playing this game with a good friend that lived not more than 4 doors down the road from me, split screen two player, my red army against his blue. And no word of a lie, it was utter bliss. The Settlers is, at its most basic, like being a God but without any of that pesky responsibility. You start off, as the game begins, with your magnificent castle, a fortress of truth and light, surround by a small amount of territory controlled by you. What follows from this, I hear you ask. An absorbing economic simulation with cute cartoon characters? Well yes, to be blunt. Build a castle, a butchers, a bakers, a farm, a windmill, and a host of other buildings and watch in delight as your tiny inhabitants scurry around building, baking, butchering, farming and a host of other things, all before your very eyes.

Obviously all these individual buildings are connected to each other in an intricate, complex web, so for example, the corn you get from the corn farm is taken to the windmill to be turned into grain, and then in the bakery baked to form bread, which is then used to feed your miners. They then, their tummies full, mine iron ore which is treated and used to make tools. It's all very daunting at first, but quickly becomes second nature. Building little forts and stuff, and having them occupied by soldiers gains you more land, the aim being to expand your empire so you engulf as many natural resources as possible, until finally you end up border to border with another player, be it human or computer controlled. Clearly the aim is to attack him in an epic, drawn out confrontation and seize his little forts, slaughtering his soldiers and setting fire to his carefully constructed buildings in a furious, unstoppable way. It's all rather good fun.

So to summarise then: a rather good game when played alone, but one that really comes alive with multiple players. The graphics are somewhat dated now, but seeing as how the games probably shareware, you can't complain really can you? Add in a classic theme tune, which I still remember to this day, and all in all you've got yourself a pretty formidable strategy game, and one which puts to shame a lot of these more recent games. Now if only someone would go and release it on the DS, I could be playing wireless 4 player link up Settlers with all my friends, instead of all this The Urbz nonsense. Not that I'm bitter or anything! Ah ha!

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 05/15/05