1602 A.D. (German title: Anno 1602) is an easy to learn game. You and all your opponents start out with ships, and then it's island picking time. Once you've established your first island, you'll quickly be reminded of any city building game. With a few quirks. First of all, many buildings have a radius of influence. Higher level residences will only appear if they are in the radius of more and more other buildings, such as baths, schools and doctors. So you expand and expand on your island as all the opponents do on theirs.

Additionally, every player retains his ship from the start, which which he's able to sail around and buy goods from different islands. They all come to your island too, buying your things and, if they have it, selling you what you have flagged as needed. Not all islands are alike, they all have different climates. That means not all farms will work on your island. Same with ore, not all islands have it, and not all have the same ore.

So eventually, you'll load stuff from your island on the ship and sail forth to establish another colony or two. Here comes my gripe, though it's pretty obvious by now. The game is very insular. Everyone builds for himself and has his own problems to cater to, and the most interaction you'll get is the constant sailing back and forth of ships. Military is clumsy to handle, and it's obvious that this is not the focus of the game, either. I wasn't able to load any of my men onto a ship. You can fit the ships with cannons, but taking over other islands seems impossible.

Overall, the building and trading aspects are great, but the warfare feels simplistic and out of place. It's fun for a while, but it gets old.