Is there any way to overcome the max cities or max units? I would imagine it can't be that drastic but an earlier google search came up with nothing. Takes me forever to go through a turn in end game but I figure if I get back into this game I'm going to relax those restrictions.

I have never encountered an issue with a limit on the number of towns and colonists. Even if there is one, I doubt you will see it if you play the game normally (with the goal of having the independence war as early as possible to increase the score).

Its pretty easy to hit the cap in a game you are playing for max points. I dont recall the exacts, but its like 40 something colonies and 255 units. Anyway, to your question, I am not aware of any method of removing it. And much to our mutual loss, ColFans is dead.

It must be an engine limitation, such as others were common at the time (for example, only four "players" can exist at once, so one European nation is always removed in order to make room for the Royal Expeditionary Force).

I think Colonization favors each European nation focusing on their corner of the map so massive empires are not as common as in Civilization. I have only reached the unit number limit once, and never the colonies one. It was annoying when it happened though.

I vaguely remember the unit limit now (I haven't played the game for long time). It's probably more like 1024 units though (255 would be way too few), although one should check the exact number. As for the colonies, I've never had this problem. As mentioned above, Colonization is a very different game from Civilization despite the looks, and there are no benefits to Civilization-style expansion. It is better to have two colonists working in one colony than each founding his own colony, if they are going to produce the same resources. I typically win with 10-12 large colonies with maybe 1-3 additional resource colonies in the hinterland, so I don't see how one can reach 40 unless playing for the lols. The logistics of it and the amount of micromanagement will kill all fun.

Its 255 (or so) on the map. Colonists and such inside a colony dont count. The colony limit is based on the European powers. Again, I dont recall exactly, but you have to take them over to get additional colony count, that kind of thing.

Now, to the ancillary statements because any conversation about this game makes me happy... Two colonies with one colonist is unquestionably better than a single colony with one colonist, simply due to the base square not needing a colonist to produce resources and the base colony production of liberty bells. So even if the colonist is needed to produce food, the base resource of the colony tile always provides more than a single. In fact, generally speaking you should use your first two colonists to drop two colonies immediately. Extrapolating a bit further, as you grow it is also allows you to avoid the Tory penalty longer as you have more spots for more colonists. You are correct that you dont "need" a Civ like expansion, but it is certainly possible and has value if you choose to do so. And frankly, required if you expect to get a max score on Viceroy.

Now, this does assume that you are playing with a goal in mind other then simply winning the War of Independence. A perfectly noble goal and a wonderful choice for many players. I am sure you have noticed, and seemingly already have done so, winning that war is relatively easy on all levels. Almost impossible not to without ignoring aspects of the game (which has merit as well, like eschewing European trade, etc). I believe there is a thread on this forum for game variants in fact.

Edit:
Additional data, if not an actual answer...

https://www.gog.com/forum/colonization_sid_meiers/255_units_and_other_limitations

Yeah, that sounds more like it. I think that's what the OP must have been referring to. Certainly, in the beginning of the game it makes sense to play it like you say. However, what I really meant is that with two colonies, the amount of logistics doubles (and logistics is a huge part of the game). In the early phase, this is not a big issue, but in the longer run it becomes real pain, so it is preferable to have a relatively small number of very large colonies rather than a lot of very small ones. Also, when you have two colonists working in the same colony, you will want to also bring a farmer and a statesman. In the long run this combination plays better than having two separate one-man colonies. You also get other benefits, too, like being able to build a stockade and a customs house later.

Of course, one can use different strategies. I like role-playing the French sometimes and build a chain of small resource-focused colonies and have wagon trains bring the resources to ports. But even in that case I try to keep their number reasonable. It would be different/more fun if trade routes actually worked well in the game.

Its funny you mention that. One of the ways I enjoy playing sometimes is only using the automated trade routes. Amuses the hell out of me for a while but it is pure pain when it glitches out as I usually have 30-40 routes set.

I know I'm very late to this post, but if anyone's still watching, I think the limit on number of cities and units is a constraint either set or reflected in the structure of the save files. I've been looking into the save file structure (trying to find a way to extract data on the Indian villages so you can keep track of those you've visited - forums.civfanatics.com/threads/colonization-dos-utility-to-keep-track-of-indian-settlements.667883/), and the way it saves the data, I don't think there'd be a way to add more cities or units than it already allows. It was all very inflexible about how it stored data, to minimize the amount of space required most likely.

As mentioned many moons ago... pre covid lock down in the US!!! Its like another world now. Anyway, you can overtake the European colonies and stretch the colony limit. And since settlers working in the colonies dont count toward the unit cap (only those on the map), you should be good to press it.

Great googley moogley, I love this game.

I love it too. Especially after I switched to the All-Food-All-Dragoons Strategy as I call it, it becomes wholly different gameplay, very Civ1-like and very enjoyable. No trade, no micro-management, actually most tedious part is moving the army for me. For encouragement, I'm attaching a pic of my other window literally now, and it's before the revolution.

I can confirm the limits:

- 48 colonies on the map (it's a total across all players)
- 300 units on the map (a total across all players and indians and across naval/land/wagons/artillery)
- the field workers do not count nor do the building workers
- in order to breed new colonists, the world needs to be under the 300 limit after your enemies end their turn; the fresh colonist spawns outside the colony's fence and so it gets lost when the world is at the limit :/

Explain!

Eh? The screenshot is pretty self-explanatory, but here I go:

- Viceroy, any nation
- do not sell anything to anyone
- only produce food and bells
- make some money by scouting
- make serious money by razing

Basically ask yourself "how can I minimize my manual workload each turn?", rinse, repeat.

What follows from the above:

- only create colonies where they have a minimum of 2 squares of Plains
- train statesmen/soldiers/pioneers in Europe
- no colleges, no universities
- schoolhouses everywhere, because farmers
- buy/breed horses
- buy muskets

It turns out that when you cut away that wagon train cruft, or stop moving some master distiller to another continent, you can really grow to huge population and service each new round real quick.

I have reached the limit again! In my current game I have a massive empire (I tried a different playstyle in which I was almost permanently at war with every other European) and I built such a massive army that no new units can be created. The game shows an error message (new unit cannot be created) every time I try to build an artillery or take a colonist out of a colony. Other nation's offers to hire mercenaries have the same result (they take the money but no new units appear!)

This made me declare independence earlier than planned, because well, I just couldn't prepare better. :D The restriction doesn't seem to affect the King's army or the foreign intervention force (they must have been taken into account in advance or follow other limits).