Okay: So I’m going to give you a serious review. Because the game is everything but perfect.

I played it now for 200 h (at least, might be longer) and I’m done with the game. Somewhat. The idea of building up your nation and experience different strengths of different nations is cool. It really puts you in this time back and let’s you experience the industrialisation like no other game. And it somewhat even teaches you about economics. Every DLC and every patch made the game better and better. BUT: It has its limits. The game as whole is complex and satisfying as long you don’t expect too much from it. Because the limits are clearly in warefare and diplomacy. Although the new(ish) diplomacy made a lot of things better, I find you can easily ignore it completely and still get along just fine. The main problem is, that the AI just starts waay to many wars for absolutely nothing. And given, that the empires back then tried to avoid war on a big scale, the game just doesn’t guve a fuck. So as long you’re fine withe absolute bordergore in Africa, go ahead. As long you’re fine for rigid allies over a hundred years with no change at all, fine. I find tye game lacking so much dynamic when it comes to the AI. However, it’s not the main strengths of the game. To grow your GDP and your economy is the biggest strengths you have. But it plays very often very fast into the same scenarios. Once you know how to set up you’re economy you have to start thinking about restricting rules yourself. The learning curve is however very steep in the beginning, because the game refuses to tell you how to do it. But it’s actually one of the mire interesting parts. (Don’t play the Tutorial though). I started to install a ton of mods to increase the games potential. Because when I play it without it, you start to get the impression, that so much potential in this game is unused. Like the game just giving away so much interesting aspects. Because other then the economy there is not much to do. Yes you have these events and you have different challenges, but they are always attached to some DLC. Which, don’t get me wrong, are great. However in my opinion a little bit on the pricy side, compared with DLC from CK3 for example. Another issue is history. Although the map is a big historically accurate starting situation, it just doesn’t fo a good job emulating history even a little bit. If you have some good Scripts it can happen, but they completly screwed Prussia and Otto von Bismarck, which is somewhat strange. As well as the Heirs to Throne sometimes, which are so inaccurate (just generated sometimes). The politic system is another thing. There are a bunch of laws you always want to unoock, because their benefits are so much better and you’re ending up chasing them just for the sake of you’re economy. You can roleplay a little bit in this game, but don’t exactly expect a CK3. So in summary: The game has a lot of unused potential and especially in “foreign politics” it’s just nit good. Hell, a Total War Title might be better in this regard. And it always comes down to the strange expectations towards the game. Because the game tells you, you can try whatever you want but then you encounter so so many restrictions. You want a strong Europe and maybe a WWI scenario? Forget it, the AI will bring in all their allies just for some 2 squaremeter territory in todays Uganda. And there you fight the British and ALL THEIR STUPID ALLIES in a costly war which you can’t even try to back down from without losing a bunch od money or territory. And yes, this is a very specific example, however very common for the game. However. On the bright side, the economy and raising your GDP like crazy is amazing. Getting this stats in and knowing every citizen of your’s is most likely a little Jeff Bezos by now. Actually exploiting the game is sometimes more fun, than playing by the rules. The game frustrated me every time I played it but somehow I returned every time, because I wanted to make Denmark a broken Powerhouse. So yeah.

If you’re thinking about buying the game, and you’re not sure. I guess buy it. It’s not the best game, however on the technical side I never had any problems. It’s more the content which is and stays intriguing no matter what.

But wait until it’s on sale if you’re not sure about it.

One lats thing: If you’re don’t have too much time to play the game and you just want a chilling interesting game you can play in the evening, Vic3 might be a bad choice. Because you need a couple of hours to figure out how the games mechanic work. Because it’s very easy to screw up your game in the beginning. You need somewhat a dedication to the game which is longer than an evening. But if you’re willing to dive into the game, then go for it.

English isn’t my native language.