Anno 2070

Imagine something like this: a handful of journalists sitting around a table with representatives of Related Designs, Blue Byte and Ubisoft. Representatives that include Creative Director Dirk Riegert and Christopher Schmitz as executive producer.

In front of us a screen frozen on the logo of Anno 1305. Introductory words are spoken. About the series. About direction. Anno 1404 felt like the natural conclusion to the franchise in its current form.

"Now we have to take a big step," says Schmitz. "Revolution, not evolution." Cue trailer.

Slowly the Anno 1305-logo moves aside, and a world becomes visible. A world no longer as beautiful or peaceful as in previous titles. A world that's no longer of distant past, but of near future. The world of 2070.

It's a staggering shift in vision for the developer, and its a vision that is starkly depressing compared to the lush fields and sparkling oceans of before.

A rust-brown land mass on which everything is mechanised; even the loggers are robots. Pigs are shipped on conveyor belts into a factory, fields are irrigated. We gaze at the screen, and quietly wait for something that doesn't appear - a text flash of 'April Fools', something to acknowledge that this is merely a prelude joke to the full, proper reveal. It fails to materialise, and its up to the developer to explain the time shift.

Christopher Schmitz assures us that this is no April Fool's joke. In the new game, the developers plan to address the question of what will become of our world in the future. "Everyone can develop different strategies," says Schmitz. "It doesn't have to be always a heavy industry, the player can also try to be more sustainable."

There follows a video with that shows an island in Anno's traditional colours. We see green meadows, small houses and in between windmills. There's hints of the time frame through - between the clouds, an Ozone Maker provides clean air. It's futuristic science fiction, yes, but its also grounded in discoveries being made today.

Before it started work on the game, the developer researched heavily, speaking to a number of university researchers to work out how the world could potentially be shaped in the future. An approach was not so dissimilar from the previous Anno games, and means this title at least has some credibility in its world-building.

An immediate question arises: why put this under the Anno name, rather than a new bold franchise?

"We didn't develop a science fiction game - so no aliens, no space opera," the developer explains. And as the presentation rolls on, you see what he means. I notice several classical elements of the Anno series, such as islands, trade, or ships. We come to a harbour, buzzing with activity, and many people are on the road. This is the Anno we remember. Strange becomes familiar once more.

In Anno 2070 there are two major factions. The Ecos, whose architecture is beautiful and focus is fitting in with the natural world as best possible. The Tycoons in turn are extremely efficient, but so if their construction, with little thought for aesthetic pleasure.

Related Designs has made a point to not let both sides wallow in their initial stereotypes. So for example, the Ecos should not come as uncool granola tree-huggers. Yet while the Ecos are more sophisticated, but they also generate more tax than the tycoons.

To extend that idea further, the game is not divided in good and evil.
The game world is dynamic, and, while there's much that the developer can't reveal yet, we know there are a number of organisations which you'll be able to join, much like the Greenpeace and NATO organisations that exist today.

Support of these different groups of Ecos or Tycoons will allow you access to different things - and you can easily switch groups to alter you're preferred playing style.

Of course city-building is still a large part of the Anno experience, but the future has brought with it its own special constructions.

Monuments that embody your city's character are imbued with special properties. Large video screens will allow you to play custom content. Do you want to educate the population, train them, or lull them with soft words to manipulate them easily? That such influence exists is extremely simple yet clever, and perhaps suggests something of the gameplay that may emerge from it.

But you've got to work towards this gleamed metropolis. You begin with a small floating island, an ark if you will, from which you build upon. It offers a shipping yard can build ships, and a landing platform welcomes trade from the outside world.

There's talk of theme parks, hotels, or research stations, to name just a few examples, that are to be integrated as well. Exploration of your surrounding area can yield bonuses - as we discover a discarded aircraft carrier in the waters nearby that houses a black market dealing in rare items.

You'll not only be producing goods in 2070, but energy as well. But reliance on energy production brings its own problems, as the natural disasters of the old world are replaced by man-made ones of the future.

Our oil rig, for example, blows up. With an oil slick bleeding into the water around it, we send fire teams and cleaning boats to tackle the disaster, but with our costs previously covered by this sole resource, we find ourselves suddenly lacking the funds to salvage the situation. The lesson is there; cast your net wide rather than rely on risky technology.

Despite parallels to real-life crises, the developer isn't playing the moral high ground. There is no right or wrong way and Related Designs has equipped both sides with advantages and disadvantages.

Whether they really succeed in that balance, offering two paths without bias due the sensitive topics covered (2070 will introduce the Anno world to nuclear power) remains to be seen. but whatever changes there are, Related Designs has a maxim to maintain: Anno has to remain Anno. Something, the dev tells us, its succeeded in doing.

They told us that they really played out almost every scenario - Stone Age to distant future, even Anno 1305, but this world and reality of 2070 won through. Sixty years in the future is something everyone can half-imagine, and the gameplay isn't, to quote the team, "old wine in new bottles". Yet even with the new inclusions, there's a familiarity here. "Anno", Christopher Schmitz repeats like a mantra, "remains Anno".

Anno 2070 brings a breath of fresh air in the series. We are excited to see how deep we can dive into this future vision, and whether the Anno world will stray into military mobilisation, or retain the pacifism of trade and diplomacy.

On that, the developer states only the the military will not play the same role as previous games. Related Designs know the future, but for now its not sharing. We'll have to wait until later this year to find out what that vision is.