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DevBlog: “Industrial Zone” Pack Cosmetic DLC
Hello Anno Community,
We are slowly but steadily getting closer to the release of our new Cosmetic DLC, so you know what this means: a dedicated DevBlog with some juicy details and insights while waiting to decorate your Anno cities with the new ornaments!
The “Industrial Zone” Pack is the second Cosmetic DLC of 2022 and marks the eighth Cosmetic DLC release for Anno 1800. As the name clearly suggests, the focus of this new CDLC will be the construction and industry districts of your cities. You, the Community, have been quite vocal about the need of some ornaments dedicated to this topic. Afterall, it is a quite fitting theme for a game that takes place during the industrial revolution, isn’t it?
This CDLC consists of 28 brand new ornaments and, as mentioned in our previous Union Update, it is divided into two main themes: Construction and Railway. Let us take a closer look at them together!
Construction Ornaments
Construction and work sites are extremely common in the real world: scaffolding hiding the faces of a building during renovation, construction sites on roads slowing down the traffic, while curious kids try to peep through the construction fences, fascinated by those big cranes destroying and moving materials around. With the Construction-themed ornaments, you will be able to recreate the busy life of construction workers in your Anno cities.
A construction trailer, a construction crane, and even a sawing station! All these and more for you to recreate the perfect atmosphere in your industrial districts. In total, there are 15 Construction ornaments, with some of them having different variants. Construction fences and water pipes are among the most interesting ones, as they allow you to build “modular” structures, as you can see in the screenshot below. Intriguing, isn’t it?
Railway Ornaments
Railways and transportation are essential for construction and your industry as a whole, as they help you to keep things running – and literally keep the lights on. Among the Railway ornaments you will find two types of Railway Halls, a Railway Platform, and a crane to make the loading process easier for the Anno workers.
But that is not all, Annoholics – together with the ones mentioned above, there will be even more railway-themed ornaments! In total, there are 13 cosmetic pieces for the Railway theme, and some of them have different variants, just like the Construction Ornaments. Oh, and of course, safety is important, so do not forget to place the Guard Hut and Railway signs in your industrial district, too!
And now our favourite part of the DevBlog, the Q&A with our Art Team, who are of course the minds and hands behind our CDLCs. We asked some questions to Raphael, Lead Artist on Anno, to get some insights on the creative process behind this CDLC.
Generally speaking, what is the process behind the creation of an ornament?
First we do some research and then we start with a lot of small 2D scribbles. We then choose the best ones and make a rough 3D Version to check dimensions and how they look and feel in the game. Once we decide on the final design, we use a traditional 3D workflow to create the ornament.
Which ornament was the most challenging to create and which the most fun?
The construction crane was the most challenging but also the most fun. It was difficult to find the right design that fits the time and make sure the scaling works with all the buildings and other ornaments. We had to make sure it is high enough, so it is still visible when placed in the middle of the residences. It was a lot of fun to create all the little details like bolts and welds that make the asset more believable and bring it to life…
The industrial theme could be considered quite wide and open; how did you decide on the final ornaments for this CDLC?
For us it is always important to make a good selection for the player and give them the possibility to combine the ornaments in many interesting ways. Because we already have a lot of ornaments in the game, we also need to make sure we do not repeat ourselves too much, this also plays a key role in the selection process.
If you had to pick one favourite ornament for this CDLC, which one would it be and why?
I like the scaffolding because it lets me change the look of the existing buildings and really brings that construction vibe across.
To sum it up, with the “Industrial Zone” Pack you will be able to bring out the dirty, grey side of your cities, that represents the heartbeat of the Industrial revolution and development. Plus, here’s a tip from us: this new CDLC works wonder together with the Sewers cosmetics from the “Pedestrian Zone” Pack CDLC and the Industrial ornaments from Bright Harvest.
The “Industrial Zone” Pack will be available for purchase for the usual 4,99€ (or your regional equivalent) starting from June 28th.
If you have further questions related to the Cosmetic DLC, do not hesitate to ask them in the comments below or reach out to us on Facebook, Twitter, or our official Forums.
Happy city-building, Annoholics!
List of all ornaments
Construction Ornaments
- Construction Trailer
- Construction Crane
- Construction Site
- Pile Diver
- Sawing Station
- Sanitary Pipes
- Copper Pipes
- Water Pipes
- Scaffolding
- Construction Fence
- Construction Fence Entrance
- Water Pipe Network
- Elevated Water Pipes
- Water Pipe Connector
- Pipe Passageway
Railway Ornaments
- Large Railway Hall
- Small Railway Hall
- Railway Platform
- Coal Tower
- Railway Guard Hut
- Railway Crane
- Oil Tank
- Water Tank
- Railway signal
- Railway Electric Pole
- Railway Yield Sign
- Elevated Railway Signal
- Railway Warning Sign
Comments
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Hello, I wanted to know if those who have season pass 4 get this package for free?
Adding my voice to the request for railway tracks to be fixed, along with the other Annoholics here. I love everything about this game, but this one little detail really irks me and breaks the immersion – grass tracks just looks incredibly out-of-place running through cities and industrial areas, and it feels like it would be something that could be easily and quickly fixed with an updated ground texture (not asking for two completely different tracks, just a new texture that has less/no grass and more gravel).
Hopefully the amount of desire for this amongst the comments here will be loud enough to be heard – please change the texture of the train tracks! It’s clear it’s a point on contention amongst players, and with this new Industrial CDLC it seems like the perfect time to action it! Thanks!
Lending support to my fellow Anno 1800 lovers below I also am requesting a fix for the grass under the railroad track. This is such a highly polished game and the one flaw that myself and everyone has been noticing that takes away from the immersion is the grass under the railways. It destroys the look and feel of the environment. I beg and plead you Anno team to take a look one more time to see if there is not another solution to the problem? Thank you!!!!
I add my voice to the request for a change to the texture of the railway track – I heard that it would be too complex to add two different railway track tiles (a grass and a concrete one), so if that is the case please consider adjusting the base texture to have more gravel and less grass, so that it fits in much more nicely when running through an industrial area. Having grass in industrial areas looks strange, but having gravel tracks in rural areas won’t look too odd because that’s how railway lines are like in the real world.
A stone or concrete based railway pleaaaaaaaaase
Too strange to see grass between concrete floors, especially inside a great industry city
Seconded.
I third the motion. We need concrete railroads man
While we agree that different ground plates for the railway would be a good fit for cities, we currently consider the effort to do it properly too high, especially considering other tasks we have right now.
Thank you for your response, Ubi-Thorlof. It’s nice to hear you do recognise different ground plates for railways would be a good fit for cities. Whilst the effort to do it properly is too high right now with the current workflow, does it mean that it is something you’d consider for the future?
Glad to hear the dev teams are considering! Thanks for reply Ubi-Thorlof, it’s all right. If the teams are too busy, have you guys consider some kinds of skins roads CDLC?I think a lot of people would love to use different roads between their warehouse and factory, at least i would love to.I will be very happy to pay for a great nice white road with street light, or even some plants between it if the roads were build in 2 blocks wide.Just like the anno 2070’s green boulevard or father promenade!
This is a missed opportunity to add different skins to the rails themselves. The grassy underground fits terribly into the city.
Seconded.
I’d very much like to see an update, or even a season 5, that allows naval warfare to be a bit more challenging. It’s fairly easy to take out the AI early into the game, midway, and even after leaving the AI to there own devices for a 100+ hours of gameplay. 2-3 Big Bertha (big betty?) on an AI beach, a few harbor guns, and their 4-8 ships don’t really provide a challenge. I grew up with warcraft, starcraft, command and conquer, and total war games. These games have shown me how fun large battles can be. Let’s get some large military sea battles going. give us more of a challenge. make us build 10+ harbor defense units, and 10+ defense ships per beach in order to survive. Yeah i get that we can dumb down our start game and abilities to make it even harder to defend ourselves, but then again, it isn’t that hard. I’ve bought every DLC and CDLC (except for two holiday theme packs), so please, keep taking my money!!! I’d happily buy a season 5 if I meant there was more variety other than building buildings(including beauty building), managing resources and trade routes.
Sir this is a tradegame not a wargame XD
But yeah I get that AI is easy to handle in terms of war
yes, that’s very clear, but having a larger variety on options usually works out favorable in many instances. Having a variety of foods, a variety of tv shows/movies genres, a variety hobbies and activities all allows people to enjoy life a little better. imagine if we were only allowed to eat one type of food 24/7 (fried insects), watch one genre/style of tv shows or movies, and have only one type of hobby.
I’m asking to the devs, please add some extra code into your files that increases the amount of defenses and ships that the AI produce, possibly with a option in the beginning of the game that cannot be changed later. People will start talking about it, it will be a big deal, many youtube videos will appear online show some great seas battles, and more people will purchase who have a higher interest in wargame activities within a “tradegame.” It’s an amazing game already, but everything could be enhanced to touch upon more unique tastes and desires. This game could be one of those games that people talk about 20 years from now saying, this game is still amazing to play today in 2042…
While I understand the background for your request and I myself also enjoy playing RTS games, all-out war and massive battles have not been a key focus for Anno in general and Anno 1800 in particular. We believe military and the option to use military force to reach your goals are part of Anno and with every new game we discuss what’s the best fit.
Maybe, if the hard AI is not providing the challenge you need, you might find that in a multiplayer match.
DLC 11 will do a few changes to the military, but generally, we won’t be doing a major overhaul of the military system or the military AI for Anno 1800. Part of the reason also is, that only a smaller portion of our playerbase seems to favour strong military engagement – and when we have to decide what to dedicate our development resources to, it tends to be the feature, from which we think most players will profit.
I 100% understand. I figured I ask, or give my opinion. I love the game either way, and it actually is a game people will talk about in 20 years from now, and how deep and complex it is. Fingers crossed for DLC 11 military changes.
Thanks for your reply, and looking forward to the other releases during the rest of this year, and beyond. If you decide on a season 5 for next year, you’ll have my money, along with any CDLC included. I hope all Annoholics (and semi-Annoholics) agree.
Congrats do them. I hope we keep developing new things!
Yeah living cities need buildings under construction not only finished ones. Can’t wait to try
I love it. When you buy an Anno DLC, you know it’s really worth it. Thanks
Id rather buy another NPC like dr hugo mercer which has an extra opponent a questline new items AND ornaments
Any plans on adding 1 more npc like that?
Hey there. Right now there are no plans to add more NPCs to Anno 1800, I’m afraid.
Right now… hmm…