Five unorthodox PC games to watch in 2009

Time's nearly up for 2008, so what's coming exclusive to PC gamers in 2009? Sequels, prequels, and plenty of stuff you've been hearing about for ages (The Sims 3, StarCraft 2, and Diablo 3, oh my!). So how about a few you maybe haven't?

Anno 1404. I'm a sucker for the Anno games. Have been since 1602 A.D. (the game, that is). They're slow-bake real-time strategy puzzlers colorful as a bag of Skittles with piles of rustic medieval (i.e. lovingly romanticized) European charm. Think hornpipes and dulcimers, ringing smithy hammers and waves smacking against trade wharfs as you pore over interdependent trade chains and poke around conifer-carpeted landscapes for ore, salt, and metal mines. Anno 1404 shuffles things over to the Orient circa the early fifteenth-century, promising all the coffee, mosaics, and carpets you can cram into your Hanseatic or Chinese river ships, along with bigger islands (ergo bigger cities), a sandbox goof-off mode, and "dozens of embellishing objects" plus "new customizable elements" to "express [your] vision and...shape the character of [your] cities." ETA: March 2009.

Drakensang: The Dark Eye. It's the sequel you haven't been waiting for to a beloved RPG series you probably don't remember, but you'll want to keep an eye on this one anyway, even you DragonAgeDiablo3StarTrekOnline nuts. Drakensang's already got the visual chops, but it's little wrinkles like experience points you can spend on the fly and tinker-friendly tactical combat that may clear away the same-ol-same-ol combat cobwebs. I've been playing the final version for the last few week (watch for my review in February) and I'm having a blast. ETA: February 2009.

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