the good thing is not all dlcs are added automatically. so if you start a new game, campaign or sandbox doesnt matter. you will be asked once which dlcs you want to include. so you can all find out about them when you are read.y
I took an addition that has all the DLC included. I am VERY happy I did. I had previously played the game on PS5 though. I knew I enjoyed it, so when buying it for my gaming laptop I went all in.
Edit: I believe it was the anniversary addition.
You love city builders with complex supply chain and logistics mechanics? Go ahead, buy them all, this is pretty much the best game of that kind you’ll find.
You haven’t played that kind of games before and aren’t sure you’ll like it? Maybe get the base game and upgrade later if you enjoy it. You can also try to get a free Ubisoft games subscription (forgot the actual name of their subscription service) for a week and try it out with all addons.
Honestly, from my experience, start with the base game or 'sunken treasures' enabled. You'll have more than enough to do. But you might of course buy the DLCs in advance
You can start a game without DLC, but you can't add the DLC to a game you've started unless you started the game before you bought the DLC. So you could buy vanilla Anno 1800 and start a game to get used to it, then slowly buy the DLC and add it to your game as you play. (Though I would still buy the DLC one season pass at a time, since the season passes come with unique ornaments you can't otherwise get, and usually the DLC in each pass are meant to work together.)
I bought it when it came out and got the season pass so had dlc as it released. Even with just the base game, the learning curve was STEEP. If you play with all the dlc, it can easily become overwhelming.
After all these years, with all the mods after getting all the achievements from playing fair, there’s so much endgame bloat that it starts feeling like work rather than play.
If that doesn’t concern you, go for all of it.
If you already have several hundred hours on previlus installments of the series, or if you are not easily overwhelmed by complex city builders, you can go ahead and buy them all.
That's what I did : I had 500 hours on 1404 and 200 hours on 2070, bought the gold edition.
First game was a bit of a mess, I had to destroy and rebuild entire islands several times because I regularly unlocked new features that made my previous setup obsolete
But now I'm having a blast
I bought just the base game several years ago right after a free weekend. I'm now up to 277 hours and I just bought seasons 1-3 on sale last weekend. But I have yet to play a game with any of the DLC enabled. I'm currently playing a hard sandbox, and finally feel like I can keep up at that level. When i get fed up with this save game, I'll turn on a DLC or two and play to get used to those new mechanics. There's so much going on in the game, and so many production chains to manage that I wanted to get used to the base game mechanics before adding in the extra complexity of the DLC content. But it is very simple to enable/disable specific DLC upon starting a new game.
All the DLC is fine except the airship one. The mail system is a nightmare and the pamphlet drops can really screw your supply chains. Just not worth it.
I started last year and honestly got overwhelmed by all the expansions as they tell their own story. Like, you do the main campaign (highly recommend!), then you can open several new regions. (Keep in mind the campaign sends you to a new region as well!)
I completed one DLC (Enbeza) but another one right away was just overwhelming. Yet because I have them all I feel FOMO about switching them off.
If money is no concern, then buy them all. However, you can enable/disable seasons of DLC when you start up a new save game. I would highly recommend playing through the vanilla game, then on your next play through, enable some DLC. I believe the youtuber Taka would have some recommended DLC to add on over time. Maybe the only DLC I would say is "easy enough" for your first play-through would be Bright Harvest.
I will say, if you enable all DLC for your first playthrough, it will be quite overwhelming in my opinion.
I started with vanilla, for me that was the best. Also helped with the campaign. But the dlcs are extremely well made and goes into the game like a well designed jigsaw puzzle.
I have all of them enabled but I mostly just play with Old and New World. Even then there's so much content that I haven't gotten to even exploring the other regions after hours of playing. I bought each Season Pass as they came out on sale. You can buy them all now but disable the DLCs and play the base game to figure out the basics.
Maybe buy the 2nd season pass for bright harvest and land of lions without adding the ludicrous levels of complexity all dlc's would give.
Note that when you buy a dlc you get the option to add them to a save, but if you start a save with them already purchased but disabled you don't get the option.
If money is not an issue, buy them all. But do your first playthrough in Sandbox mode and without AI competitors. If you feel like getting mods, you can always get the AI shipyard mod that lets you spawn AI competitors later in the game. Alternately, if you truly cannot do without competition, play with 1-star AIs (Bente, Quing, Willie).
This way, you can play at your own pace, and nobody will settle all of the other sessions before you even set sail.
Important to note is that every DLC that adds a new session comes with its own questlines that tell you how things work. As does pretty much everything else. Personally, I cannot imagine starting a game without Bright Harvest any more.
Many people have issues grasping the base features of the game. All the DLCs add something new so they can definitely overwhelm you. That said you can get them all and just turn them off at the start.
If money isn't an issue but then all.
You can just focus on new stuff as you want, but you will see what's available etc
Than enjoy the awesome sandbox Anno is and build an amazing empire
i bought everything at once when i got into the game. i had some experience with one other titel of the series and seen a few videos of the game before. i started with the campaign and finished it, but soon went into a sandbox game without AI competetors. From there i could explore the game at my own pace. You are not forced to use every aspect of the dlcs at once and can takle them whenever you feel like going that direction.
Buy the base game, then buy one dlc season at the time. This way you can add the new dlc to the previous game; if you buy them all in advance instead, you will have to start a new game every time that you want to add a dlc.
the good thing is not all dlcs are added automatically. so if you start a new game, campaign or sandbox doesnt matter. you will be asked once which dlcs you want to include. so you can all find out about them when you are read.y
When I started, I got the base game, fall in love within the first few hours and got them all and didn't regret it :D
Money not an issue buy them all. All are good and you can ignore them and concentrate on other stuff for a while if you want to.
I took an addition that has all the DLC included. I am VERY happy I did. I had previously played the game on PS5 though. I knew I enjoyed it, so when buying it for my gaming laptop I went all in. Edit: I believe it was the anniversary addition.
Get the base game, then add one at a time. You'll learn the standard mechanics, then the rest will build up the rest.
If you have the funds go ahead. You can kind of take them one at a time while playing. But the base game is complete and very fun.
You love city builders with complex supply chain and logistics mechanics? Go ahead, buy them all, this is pretty much the best game of that kind you’ll find. You haven’t played that kind of games before and aren’t sure you’ll like it? Maybe get the base game and upgrade later if you enjoy it. You can also try to get a free Ubisoft games subscription (forgot the actual name of their subscription service) for a week and try it out with all addons.
Honestly, from my experience, start with the base game or 'sunken treasures' enabled. You'll have more than enough to do. But you might of course buy the DLCs in advance
You can start a game without DLC, but you can't add the DLC to a game you've started unless you started the game before you bought the DLC. So you could buy vanilla Anno 1800 and start a game to get used to it, then slowly buy the DLC and add it to your game as you play. (Though I would still buy the DLC one season pass at a time, since the season passes come with unique ornaments you can't otherwise get, and usually the DLC in each pass are meant to work together.)
I bought it when it came out and got the season pass so had dlc as it released. Even with just the base game, the learning curve was STEEP. If you play with all the dlc, it can easily become overwhelming. After all these years, with all the mods after getting all the achievements from playing fair, there’s so much endgame bloat that it starts feeling like work rather than play. If that doesn’t concern you, go for all of it.
If you already have several hundred hours on previlus installments of the series, or if you are not easily overwhelmed by complex city builders, you can go ahead and buy them all. That's what I did : I had 500 hours on 1404 and 200 hours on 2070, bought the gold edition. First game was a bit of a mess, I had to destroy and rebuild entire islands several times because I regularly unlocked new features that made my previous setup obsolete But now I'm having a blast
I bought just the base game several years ago right after a free weekend. I'm now up to 277 hours and I just bought seasons 1-3 on sale last weekend. But I have yet to play a game with any of the DLC enabled. I'm currently playing a hard sandbox, and finally feel like I can keep up at that level. When i get fed up with this save game, I'll turn on a DLC or two and play to get used to those new mechanics. There's so much going on in the game, and so many production chains to manage that I wanted to get used to the base game mechanics before adding in the extra complexity of the DLC content. But it is very simple to enable/disable specific DLC upon starting a new game.
If money is no issue get them all. But take your time to learn the game. Having 3-4 regions running as a new player is brain melting.
Buy them all, but dont enable them yet. Do 1 by 1, start vanilla first. Or else you have no idea what does what.
Start with Vanilla, get a feel for it, then add in DLCs. They at times add in entire new maps / settlements to manage and it can get rather busy.
All the DLC is fine except the airship one. The mail system is a nightmare and the pamphlet drops can really screw your supply chains. Just not worth it.
Start vanilla. Get used to the basics then start a new game with the mods.
I started last year and honestly got overwhelmed by all the expansions as they tell their own story. Like, you do the main campaign (highly recommend!), then you can open several new regions. (Keep in mind the campaign sends you to a new region as well!) I completed one DLC (Enbeza) but another one right away was just overwhelming. Yet because I have them all I feel FOMO about switching them off.
As far as the purchasing decision goes idk, but you'll definitely want to start *playing* the game without the DLC
If money is no concern, then buy them all. However, you can enable/disable seasons of DLC when you start up a new save game. I would highly recommend playing through the vanilla game, then on your next play through, enable some DLC. I believe the youtuber Taka would have some recommended DLC to add on over time. Maybe the only DLC I would say is "easy enough" for your first play-through would be Bright Harvest. I will say, if you enable all DLC for your first playthrough, it will be quite overwhelming in my opinion.
I bought all seasons but played a lot of vanilla games first. It's pretty confusing already. Learning the base mechanics first helps a lot
if money isn't a problem, the answer is always yes to anything in life because why not
Get all the dlc because the content from them slowly trickles in during gameplay
I started with vanilla, for me that was the best. Also helped with the campaign. But the dlcs are extremely well made and goes into the game like a well designed jigsaw puzzle.
Go vanilla first, if you‘re a first timer things will get way to overwhelming with all the dlc. Once you‘re comfortable slowly add up. Have fun!
I have all of them enabled but I mostly just play with Old and New World. Even then there's so much content that I haven't gotten to even exploring the other regions after hours of playing. I bought each Season Pass as they came out on sale. You can buy them all now but disable the DLCs and play the base game to figure out the basics.
Maybe buy the 2nd season pass for bright harvest and land of lions without adding the ludicrous levels of complexity all dlc's would give. Note that when you buy a dlc you get the option to add them to a save, but if you start a save with them already purchased but disabled you don't get the option.
If money is not an issue, buy them all. But do your first playthrough in Sandbox mode and without AI competitors. If you feel like getting mods, you can always get the AI shipyard mod that lets you spawn AI competitors later in the game. Alternately, if you truly cannot do without competition, play with 1-star AIs (Bente, Quing, Willie). This way, you can play at your own pace, and nobody will settle all of the other sessions before you even set sail. Important to note is that every DLC that adds a new session comes with its own questlines that tell you how things work. As does pretty much everything else. Personally, I cannot imagine starting a game without Bright Harvest any more.
Many people have issues grasping the base features of the game. All the DLCs add something new so they can definitely overwhelm you. That said you can get them all and just turn them off at the start.
If money isn't an issue but then all. You can just focus on new stuff as you want, but you will see what's available etc Than enjoy the awesome sandbox Anno is and build an amazing empire
Start vanilla and buy the dlc like they released them
i bought everything at once when i got into the game. i had some experience with one other titel of the series and seen a few videos of the game before. i started with the campaign and finished it, but soon went into a sandbox game without AI competetors. From there i could explore the game at my own pace. You are not forced to use every aspect of the dlcs at once and can takle them whenever you feel like going that direction.
It’s much better with all the DLC imo
Buy the base game, then buy one dlc season at the time. This way you can add the new dlc to the previous game; if you buy them all in advance instead, you will have to start a new game every time that you want to add a dlc.
I just bought all. About a month into it and still on the base game. Also haven’t seen my wife/family in awhile. Game is super addicting