For me, Europa Universalis IV is the best Paradox game simpley because it has the most variety and balance. What I mean by that is that Crusader Kings focuses strongly on characters and diplomacy, while economy is very marginalized and governing your state is somehwat whacky, as you're just one character, not the state itself. Victoria's main focus is economy and internal politics, while waging war and conquering lands isn't as fleshed out or even important. Hearts of Iron is my least liked game, I think, because it's just 'take some tanks and fight everyone' with much less thought required to actually govern your country. Europa Universalis, however, does it all and does it well. Diplomacy is super important, economy consists of many systems working together pretty well, governing your country can be done in different ways thanks to idea groups and wars are really engaging as well. Other games specialize in just a few select aspects of running a country, while EU4 does it all. Yes, diplomacy is simpler than in CK and economy is simpler than in Victoria, but all aspects are fleshed out enough and work together really well. In addition to all that, the timeframe also makes a difference. You can really feel that you lead your country through the centuries and the campaigns last long enough so you can put your heart into them, as opposed to Vic or HoI campaigns that can be done over one weekend.
Absolutely agree. I started my journey into paradox with HOI4 and about 500 hours later I decided to give EU4 a shot. I don't know what it is, but it captivated me so much more than HOI4. The time periods, the mechanics, everything blended together so well. And almost every playthrough I've had has been different. Sometimes Russia will be formed, sometimes Lithuania will crush them, sometimes the Ottomans will fall apart, etc etc. It's just such an enjoyable game.
people been saying same thing about ck3 and vic3 lol. im srsly concerned about eu5, a lot of things i've seen so far don't look very "europa universalis"
EU4 took my whole life, I also started PDX games with CK2, but it’s EU4 that kept me going. Right now I have 4864 hours in EU4. By far the most I spent in a game. And I still feel like a noob.
I agree this game has so many features that are not in any other paradox game because I used to play HOI4 and it felt so unreal after wars the player just annexes the whole country which just felt wrong compared to every single other peace deal in history and when I started playing EU4 it added so much more realism and strategy also: first
Exactly! There kind of is no "cheesing" in EU4, it feels more like you just need to know how to stack modifiers and tech but even that takes ages, so I don't really see it as the same thing, and keeps mostly realistic throughout! great job
Tf are you brabbling about? Hoi4 is set in WW2, where things like not being able to annex an entire country does not exist, because you have no reason to not annex or puppet all, when you're the world's enemy, Germany. Your point is stupid. The system in EU4 makes a lot less sense for the era than HOI4, even though the specifics for the HOI peace conference are fucked.
I have some problems with how war-score works. In a nutshell, mechanic creates a massive gap between the moment of victory, and the feeling of victory. I’ll illustrate with an example. Imagine you’re doing re-reconquista. You play as Granada, manage to make some allies and after a long, difficult, and fun, war you’ve managed to best Castile, and take some land. After a few years you attack them again. The Iberian wedding has happened, and they’ve allied Portugal, but after a while you prevail. In this moment you feel victorious. You’ve managed to best the Iberians. You fully occupy their land, and then… let most of it go? And then you have to wait a decade so you can have the same fight, but less challenging? You just keep waiting for hours, until you can finally finish them off. It doesn’t feel like you’re a victorious Amir, reconquer, Iberia for Islam, rather it feels like when you’re finally called at the dentists office. The emotion isn’t satisfaction, but relief. Now, this is an unusual example. Generally in the early game most of your imitate rivals can be conquered in one or two wars. Most of the time this doesn’t kick in until around the late 16th, early 17th centuries, which is when most people stop playing. This, among other things, is why the mid game of EU4 is so boring. Fixing this issue would require essentially rebuilding the game, which is why I hope project ceaser has more fun and engaging ways to discourage blobbing.
This is actually a good point that EU4 is already kind of a staple paradox game. EU5 Seems like it's gunna be stepping that up to the next level, but I never really considered EU4 as that. I agree that it's map is the best though, (with possible exception of Imperator, that game's map is amazing its a goddamn globe) EU5 Maps are looking pretty clean, although they are doing the Zoom-mapmodes thing which I kinda hate. If people don't pick up EU4 and at least give it a go with the subscription they are seriously missing out. Banger game, although if its MP could run faster it would be an absolute banger of a game for lil MP games - which atm Stellaris is kinda the best at getting together dominating with a couple of friends in MP. EU4 Lacks the internal micro early game to play that well like that, which is kinda why small nations are so fun. Lots of Early Game Struggle so by the time you're big you've actually got stuff to do. EU5 will probably be great for that though, getitng together dying to the black death. Will be fun times.
Imperator Rome has the best of all worlds. Better combat than Eu4, better economy, (Vic2), 3d characters, (ck2), etc. Eu5 is definitely going to be what Imperator should’ve been at launch.
I've always had a pretty on and off relationship with EU4, I'd always rank it as one of my least favourite Paradox games, but I think I was really just looking at it the wrong way. I always saw it as a shallower version of CK2 with much more gamified and abstract systems that just appealed to those who like to map paint with less options for roleplay allowing you to get immersed in your nations history. This video, however, has made me think of the game in a different light. Cohesive nation states play a much bigger part in this period in history than in the early and high medieval time, so playing as a state instead of a character makes a lot more sense now I think of it. I've played the game for a couple hundred hours already but I haven't played it at all in the past few years, I think I'm gonna give it another go though. I was already really hyped for EU5 and this has made me even more excited.
I find HOI4 Very good in multiplayer , you can dedicate an afternoon and an evening and playing it with friends at home and finish the game. Hard to do with EU4. But in Solo I prefer EU4
Victoria: Revolutions was my first Paradox game and EU4 was my second. Have played basically all of them, but EU4 is just so balanced and stays grounded. Nothing really out of the ordinary or weird. Balanced on diplo, economy, and warfare while ck or victoria or hoi seem to concentrate only on a one of those each. EU4 is for sure their best game overall.
2:24 according to wikipedia, that twitter poster is actually right about Leningrad. The German army was ordered not to storm the city when encircled for pretty evil reasons.
Eu4 is the only paradox game where i prefer vanilla over like wacky modded stuff. With other games like hoi4 theres always stuff like road to 56 or the 17 million alt history scenarios. With EU4, I only use visual mods and one which massively expands the dynamic province name list for alot of cultures and renames every country to their local endonym for themselves. It says alot how good the base game is and honestly how much more there is to do here than in hoi4. Theres like 50x the amount of time and 10x the amount of playable nations.
I wholeheartedly agree with everything that's been mentioned in the video. CK2 brought me in as well and, due to nostalgia and personal reasons, it will always be my favourite game, but one cannot deny that EU4 is their best game so far. And to add two more reasons; -mission trees (their absence is felt in CK2 and Stellaris) -not too complicated (100 different buildings and ship components in Stellaris)
this might be true, but thing is, EU5 is a paradigm shift from EU5. In reality it won't compete head to head, I think it will be so different that it's going to feel like a different product altogether rather than a pure comparison, like CK2 and CK3
did you know that you can play as japan, change to christian, become hre emperor and have mandate of heaven at the same time? worth doing.. its pretty op, i just did it.. dunno if anyone else has done this before?
@@AndysParadox well.. conquer japan as fast as possible... take exploration & expansion ideas first.. take out some of the tribes near japan.. i released mongolia from some nation who had alreayd conquered it.. and i fed mongolia TONS of provinces.. cos im not interested in anything other than trade and coastal stuff myself.. made them a march... made them huge... kept giving them half of china.. warred ming non stop... first declaring on ming, then, one tributary after another.. mongolia gets really big so they do all the carpet sieging for you... every so often i invaded all the small indonesia areas.. whilst trying to colonise closer & closer to africa.. then invaded kilwa etc the islands around africa, by the time i got to west africa, castile was already there... warred castile & portugal... tooka ll their colonies plus one province near barcelona... then warred burgundy and took province of holland.. by now i was already mandate of heaven.. originally was gonna move my capital to holland for england trade node but realised i cant move my capital inside hre province so did a war with genoa and took that one province.. i allied all the electors waited took all the open events and converted to catholic while all that stuff was happening.. possibly based on luck and hoping all the events come up quickly unfortunately in the meantime the stupid league war happened and the protestants won, so i had to change religion, un ally all the old electors, ally all the new protestant electors, improve relations and wait for the new emperor to die and got voted in... got it roughly by 1600.. im sure someone whos really good at the game could get it earlier than that.. dunno if there is a record speed for doing it? but basically you become super op once you have all the hre bonuses and all the mandate bonuses
@@sasi5841 its a bit more complicated than that as japan.. you have to keep taking all the open choices in events and eventually become catholic.. you need to get exploration & expansion and spread to africa and towards castile & portugal asap.. then take a province in europe, improve with electors, move capital etc. i want to know what is the quickest time someone could do this to become hre emperor.. is it quicker to conquest thru russia region to europe? rather than colonising? you are not a horde so not that easy, unless you vassalise a horde and feed them most of the land?
I agree completely. I still remember when I was in high school amazed at Rome: Total War and a friend said to me: "nah, this game is easy, there is only a handful of nations and you can conquer the whole map. I play a game where you can pick any nation that existed on the planet at any point in time and it is just impossible to conquer them all". I thought such a game was just some myth, computationally unfeasable, something I was seeking for years. The game was EU2. It was frustrating at first, a game where things were slow and indirect... No internet guides back then, only a short and incomplete manual. But once I started getting the hang of it.... man, so rewarding! I've seen many Paradox releases, some good, some bad, but always EU has been the firm Paradox spine that never let down. I was fully against mana and thought I would hate EU IV, but man even with mana the game was just so good... To this date EU IV has the best diplomacy I've ever seen in any game.
I have now played Ck3 and Vic3 and I would like to get into eu4 but the barrier to entry is just so high like you can't play the base game because it misses just some really essential features and the whole games cost more than €300
Brother, do the subscription! You can test out everything for like 6 dollars a month, and if you like it, it's still a massively cheaper option than to put out for every single sold DLC. You won't regret it!
@@meindert16 My favorite nation is probably France due to all the possibilities, it's stong all-around but you can still mess up if you don't act correctly or are unlucky with Burgundian succession. France, Portugal, Austria, Ottomans, England, probably those as your first to get your bearings. Portugal will probably offer you the most peace and easy transition out of these ones
This is kinda what I mean yeah. CK3's gimmick is the character drama which you may or may not like as you're trying to build your realm. HOI4 is the super-complex military building and some crazy political shifts. EU4 is kinda just grand strategy, simple as
Funny, I was first introduced to paradox with Victoria… no numbers. It was an incredible complex game, nothing since has seemed to complex and complicated. I probably have 3k hours in it. Crusaders kings two ruined EU3 & 4.
Hmmm I felt it was never as replayable as ck for me as the characters will always be unique and the situations different,But it been a long time since I played eu so maybe it’s not to bad.
the replayability of EU4 lies in the different states and their different gov and religious mechanics, plus in the different idea groups which make for completely different playthroughs! :)
EU IV is absolutely the heart of Paradox, and it's a strategy game of incredible depth, it deserves plenty of praise for its achievements. At the same time, I absolutely hate EU IV, as good of a strategy game as it might be, it's a terrible simulation of the era, and I completely disagree on how immerssive it feels. Most challenges of the era historically were fights between the 'estates' to really forge a state in the modern sense, that internal politics should be the foundation of the gameplay and struggle, and in EU IV it simply isnt. M&T tried to fix this, but while it did plenty of impressive stuff, it's also, in my opinion, way too clumsy to be enjoyable. Yet EU V has absolutely impressed me with how aware they seem to be about this, and how much better the game seems to be on fulfilling the simulation/immersion aspect that I felt its predecessor failed at, and that has me very excited. Remember that EU was originally just a boardgame for people who thought history was neat. But its come a long way since then, and so has Paradox, im sure they were just as bugged as me.
Yeah, the biggest issue with EU4 is just how much happens within those 400 years. How EU IV works is actually not too bad at capturing say, the Napoleon Era, but how things worked at that point does NOT apply in 1444. And the game had to figure out how to build a game which can consistently reach that point, with all the mechanics pushing it towards that direction. I think EU V will be taking the opposite approach, where everything will be built with 1337 (and the Late Middle-Early Modern Ages) in mind. I think it'll struggle with representing later periods as a result, but that'll make it a super unique experience from EU IV.
because mana. at the end of the day, eu4 is all about mana dip, adm, mil, splendour, pope points, legitimacy, prestige, reform progress, military profes eu4 wouldnt be as enjoyable without mana
I don’t understand EU4. The games to old that RUclips play throughs don’t show you how to play. They just play. Which is fine, but I have no idea what’s going on
"Not overly genocidal to your neighbors" --> working on fast trade companies of castillian culture and catholik religion. Trans atlantik slave trade is about to lavk goods in 20 years. You surley have to tryhard to get this gebocidal in stellaris
I know. I'm not against it inherently, but I hope they don't become a major deal. I don't particularly like Paradox's 3D models as I find it makes everything feel less realistic, but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt for now.
Mission trees ruined a lot of what made eu4 fun. I think it will kill the longevity of the game by making countries repetitive and samey (You always do the thing to click the button to give you free stuff, never deviating from the railroad). It's still a great game, but I feel a lot less addicted to it when I boot up the game and hover over a country on the map. Instead of imagining a dynamic adventure with that country, I'm given a chore chart of things to conquer. Usually I just close the game after thinking about it for a few minutes.
For me it's pretty crazy that people complained about too much railroading in EU2 - which to be fair was more forced. EU3 moved away from it and eventually EU4 came back but via slightly different route. Well, no one is forcing anybody to use those mission trees at least.
@@andrzejnadgirl2029 They are quite literally forcing you to use them in some cases, some event chains and formables that used to be in the normal game are tied to completing missions.
Your point about ck3 being wacky is totally unjustified. Paradox has stripped vanilla ck3 from all fantasy elements which are now possible only with mods, not even dlcs
that doesn't mean it's not wacky, you still find yourself in sometimes weird and personal situations that come across as wacky like incest, like breeding dynasties behind the scenes, just wacky stuff altogether. Add the 3D models that look theatrically animated and it gets quite wacky. Not saying it's bad, just saying it makes it feel very different from a game like EU4.
I think the addition of mission trees kinda ruined the game. The game feels way to railroady, and you don't feel like you have any interesting choices to make, since your mission tree dictates everything you should be doing and hands out rewards for it, that you can't replicate without the missions. At first it wasn't that bad, but after the Emperor/Leviathan DLC, Paradox seemingly realised, that they don't to design any new mechanics and systems, and started to only design highly scripted mission trees. Instead they should have continued to develop systems, that make the game more dynamic and more replayable. Why not expand on the personal union system, to make it so you don't largely depend on your mission tree for them? Why not add an interesting disease system? Why not rework trade a bit to make it more dynamic? Why not make diplomacy a bit more interesting, by adding defensive leagues, or more peace deals like dismantling forts? Why not add some systems that actually keep nations from snowballing to insane degrees? Eu4 is a really good game, it's a pity they stopped actually developing it, and instead tag on mission trees that add nothing of value.
Absolutely not, it improved the game alot. You dont have to complete the missions at all, and each mission tree gives what most players will generaly seek for their nation.
@@TamanskayaDivision The missions simplify what you want. Even if we assume, that most players always want the same thing, now that thing is robbed of its strategical depth, and reduced to "do what the mission says".
I found eu4(and in turn Paradox) in late 2017 through those "old" 57second eu4 meme videos and I was like "yo what game is this, looks good", ended up buying it for my self in 2018 just around the "Rule Britannia" expansion pack and immediately got addicted, I didn't have a good pc at the time so it'd be one of the few games that I'd play and I sank hours in it . And that's all with the base game too cause I'd be a year since I started getting the dlcs (back when you couldn't even change occupation or even develop your provinces🥲) flash forward to 6 years later, 2K hours on it+ I own all the big paradox titles hoi4,ck2,ck3,vic2,vic3 and imperator, but still eu4 remains the best one for me: the grand scope of 4 centuries, the way the exploration of the world is handled, the mechanics, the simplicity of the economy, the satisfactory way conquest is handled, the visuals and most importantly the thing that separates eu4 from the other paradox titles the flavour. Be it the mission trees, the event lines, the ideas, the modifiers or even something as simple as geography makes every nation feel a bit different.All of this plus my personal nitpick that I don't care about individual characters (rulers like in ck or imperator) or about population management (like in vicky or....again imperator (which is actually a very enjoyable game)) makes eu4 (imo) Paradox's greatest game and that makes me anxious about eu5, that it won't be able to live up to it's predecessor..... But we'll wait and see about that
EU4 is quite literally the most bastardized and warped PDX title imaginable, even the most diehard redditors will agree that for the most part the game has suffered from totally unnecessary bloat and confused game direction for the last 6 years. It's totally and completely fucked, no PDX title has suffered this much as EU4. I don't know how you could even remotely say that this is their magnum opus. In many, many ways it has gotten objectively worse from where it was in 2016. Institutions are a mess, the entire world is at the same technological development throughout the entire game. Natives are extremely half-assed in their implementation, and the AI is totally unable to handle their improper presentation as modern nation states. The removal of native CBs means that you always end up with wildly ahistorical situations like Mesoamerica thriving into the 18th century, colonial nations will uniformly all openly embrace and accept natives resulting in very little cultural change. By the end of the 15th century, practically the entire world is colonized including Alaska and Australia and even Africa. On the other hand, Europeans are also totally and hopelessly incapable of expanding abroad beyond areas that can be directly colonized, failing to even make a serous foothold in Indonesia or India. It didn't used to be like this, but I feel that the last 6 years of development have been so confused and directionless, they're forced to do Project Caesar because it's impossible to unfuck EU4.
And Vicky3 is the other uncle who cant stop yapping about the economy and politics every dinner.
Hah true!
If vic 3 was at least good at this things...
And that same uncle knows nothing about economy or politica
@@funtecstudiovideos4102 it's good at economy at least
@@tboicovasGlorified Excel spreadsheet that I somehow still enjoy
For me, Europa Universalis IV is the best Paradox game simpley because it has the most variety and balance. What I mean by that is that Crusader Kings focuses strongly on characters and diplomacy, while economy is very marginalized and governing your state is somehwat whacky, as you're just one character, not the state itself. Victoria's main focus is economy and internal politics, while waging war and conquering lands isn't as fleshed out or even important. Hearts of Iron is my least liked game, I think, because it's just 'take some tanks and fight everyone' with much less thought required to actually govern your country. Europa Universalis, however, does it all and does it well. Diplomacy is super important, economy consists of many systems working together pretty well, governing your country can be done in different ways thanks to idea groups and wars are really engaging as well. Other games specialize in just a few select aspects of running a country, while EU4 does it all. Yes, diplomacy is simpler than in CK and economy is simpler than in Victoria, but all aspects are fleshed out enough and work together really well.
In addition to all that, the timeframe also makes a difference. You can really feel that you lead your country through the centuries and the campaigns last long enough so you can put your heart into them, as opposed to Vic or HoI campaigns that can be done over one weekend.
Absolutely agree. I started my journey into paradox with HOI4 and about 500 hours later I decided to give EU4 a shot. I don't know what it is, but it captivated me so much more than HOI4. The time periods, the mechanics, everything blended together so well. And almost every playthrough I've had has been different. Sometimes Russia will be formed, sometimes Lithuania will crush them, sometimes the Ottomans will fall apart, etc etc. It's just such an enjoyable game.
Absolutely and exactly!
Lets see what happens with project Caesar
It looks like pdx's magnum opus
Very excited to see how it turns out, I also love that they're taking a completely different approach with ton of community input! This is growth!
@@AndysParadox community input will 100% help
people been saying same thing about ck3 and vic3 lol. im srsly concerned about eu5, a lot of things i've seen so far don't look very "europa universalis"
@@yb1149 One thing to note is that EU5 is not being made by the same team that made ck3 or vic3.
@@yb1149it doesn't end in a 3 it will be peak
EU4 took my whole life, I also started PDX games with CK2, but it’s EU4 that kept me going. Right now I have 4864 hours in EU4. By far the most I spent in a game. And I still feel like a noob.
Hahaha wow, that’s is a LOT of hours, actually slightly more than twice my own! Good job, glad you like it :D
I agree this game has so many features that are not in any other paradox game because I used to play HOI4 and it felt so unreal after wars the player just annexes the whole country which just felt wrong compared to every single other peace deal in history and when I started playing EU4 it added so much more realism and strategy also:
first
Exactly! There kind of is no "cheesing" in EU4, it feels more like you just need to know how to stack modifiers and tech but even that takes ages, so I don't really see it as the same thing, and keeps mostly realistic throughout!
great job
Bro was first for real
Tf are you brabbling about? Hoi4 is set in WW2, where things like not being able to annex an entire country does not exist, because you have no reason to not annex or puppet all, when you're the world's enemy, Germany. Your point is stupid. The system in EU4 makes a lot less sense for the era than HOI4, even though the specifics for the HOI peace conference are fucked.
Well Hoi4 is based on WW2, which was a total war. They really did just completely annex their enemies.
I have some problems with how war-score works. In a nutshell, mechanic creates a massive gap between the moment of victory, and the feeling of victory. I’ll illustrate with an example. Imagine you’re doing re-reconquista. You play as Granada, manage to make some allies and after a long, difficult, and fun, war you’ve managed to best Castile, and take some land. After a few years you attack them again. The Iberian wedding has happened, and they’ve allied Portugal, but after a while you prevail. In this moment you feel victorious. You’ve managed to best the Iberians. You fully occupy their land, and then… let most of it go? And then you have to wait a decade so you can have the same fight, but less challenging? You just keep waiting for hours, until you can finally finish them off. It doesn’t feel like you’re a victorious Amir, reconquer, Iberia for Islam, rather it feels like when you’re finally called at the dentists office. The emotion isn’t satisfaction, but relief.
Now, this is an unusual example. Generally in the early game most of your imitate rivals can be conquered in one or two wars. Most of the time this doesn’t kick in until around the late 16th, early 17th centuries, which is when most people stop playing. This, among other things, is why the mid game of EU4 is so boring.
Fixing this issue would require essentially rebuilding the game, which is why I hope project ceaser has more fun and engaging ways to discourage blobbing.
i remember EU 4 before mission trees and god i dont miss that time lmao
same, I love my mission trees!
call me crazy but i consider EU4 have the best looking UI for any strategy games
honestly... real
Making a eu4 viceo essay on hoi4’s anniversary is crazy
Just kidding I love eu4, it’s my favorite game of all time
hahaha I didn't even realize! accidental shade posting
This is actually a good point that EU4 is already kind of a staple paradox game. EU5 Seems like it's gunna be stepping that up to the next level, but I never really considered EU4 as that. I agree that it's map is the best though, (with possible exception of Imperator, that game's map is amazing its a goddamn globe) EU5 Maps are looking pretty clean, although they are doing the Zoom-mapmodes thing which I kinda hate.
If people don't pick up EU4 and at least give it a go with the subscription they are seriously missing out. Banger game, although if its MP could run faster it would be an absolute banger of a game for lil MP games - which atm Stellaris is kinda the best at getting together dominating with a couple of friends in MP. EU4 Lacks the internal micro early game to play that well like that, which is kinda why small nations are so fun. Lots of Early Game Struggle so by the time you're big you've actually got stuff to do. EU5 will probably be great for that though, getitng together dying to the black death. Will be fun times.
Imperator Rome has the best of all worlds. Better combat than Eu4, better economy, (Vic2), 3d characters, (ck2), etc. Eu5 is definitely going to be what Imperator should’ve been at launch.
Very much looking forward to EU5, it looks to be massive.
Mana: The Game
Love me some mana in EU4, gotta gobble up that mana, no way around it
Wasn't that Magic: the gathering?
All I can say, if they screw up Eu5 its gonnnnnna be realllllly bad for Paradox.
pls dont screw up EU5
I've always had a pretty on and off relationship with EU4, I'd always rank it as one of my least favourite Paradox games, but I think I was really just looking at it the wrong way. I always saw it as a shallower version of CK2 with much more gamified and abstract systems that just appealed to those who like to map paint with less options for roleplay allowing you to get immersed in your nations history. This video, however, has made me think of the game in a different light. Cohesive nation states play a much bigger part in this period in history than in the early and high medieval time, so playing as a state instead of a character makes a lot more sense now I think of it. I've played the game for a couple hundred hours already but I haven't played it at all in the past few years, I think I'm gonna give it another go though. I was already really hyped for EU5 and this has made me even more excited.
that's awesome, my friend :) Hope you enjoy it this time around!
I find HOI4 Very good in multiplayer , you can dedicate an afternoon and an evening and playing it with friends at home and finish the game.
Hard to do with EU4.
But in Solo I prefer EU4
Victoria: Revolutions was my first Paradox game and EU4 was my second. Have played basically all of them, but EU4 is just so balanced and stays grounded. Nothing really out of the ordinary or weird. Balanced on diplo, economy, and warfare while ck or victoria or hoi seem to concentrate only on a one of those each. EU4 is for sure their best game overall.
2:24 according to wikipedia, that twitter poster is actually right about Leningrad. The German army was ordered not to storm the city when encircled for pretty evil reasons.
Imperator is the Roman Empire Fanboy ( we all love the roman empire )
Eu4 is the only paradox game where i prefer vanilla over like wacky modded stuff. With other games like hoi4 theres always stuff like road to 56 or the 17 million alt history scenarios.
With EU4, I only use visual mods and one which massively expands the dynamic province name list for alot of cultures and renames every country to their local endonym for themselves.
It says alot how good the base game is and honestly how much more there is to do here than in hoi4. Theres like 50x the amount of time and 10x the amount of playable nations.
Won't lie I think Eu5's map is kinda ugly rn but there'll definitely be mods for that so I'm ok with it
@@b0redom782 same I dont want something as saturated as vicky 3 but I dont like how gray and simple it looks tbh
I wholeheartedly agree with everything that's been mentioned in the video. CK2 brought me in as well and, due to nostalgia and personal reasons, it will always be my favourite game, but one cannot deny that EU4 is their best game so far.
And to add two more reasons;
-mission trees (their absence is felt in CK2 and Stellaris)
-not too complicated (100 different buildings and ship components in Stellaris)
I have bought alot of other PDX games just based off my good will generated by EU4.
It will take years after release for eu5 to even come close to eu4
this might be true, but thing is, EU5 is a paradigm shift from EU5. In reality it won't compete head to head, I think it will be so different that it's going to feel like a different product altogether rather than a pure comparison, like CK2 and CK3
did you know that you can play as japan, change to christian, become hre emperor and have mandate of heaven at the same time?
worth doing.. its pretty op, i just did it.. dunno if anyone else has done this before?
how did you manage to become HRE emperor as Japan then? sounds sick af
@@AndysParadox well.. conquer japan as fast as possible... take exploration & expansion ideas first.. take out some of the tribes near japan.. i released mongolia from some nation who had alreayd conquered it.. and i fed mongolia TONS of provinces.. cos im not interested in anything other than trade and coastal stuff myself.. made them a march... made them huge... kept giving them half of china.. warred ming non stop... first declaring on ming, then, one tributary after another.. mongolia gets really big so they do all the carpet sieging for you... every so often i invaded all the small indonesia areas.. whilst trying to colonise closer & closer to africa.. then invaded kilwa etc the islands around africa, by the time i got to west africa, castile was already there... warred castile & portugal... tooka ll their colonies plus one province near barcelona... then warred burgundy and took province of holland.. by now i was already mandate of heaven.. originally was gonna move my capital to holland for england trade node but realised i cant move my capital inside hre province so did a war with genoa and took that one province.. i allied all the electors waited took all the open events and converted to catholic while all that stuff was happening.. possibly based on luck and hoping all the events come up quickly unfortunately in the meantime the stupid league war happened and the protestants won, so i had to change religion, un ally all the old electors, ally all the new protestant electors, improve relations and wait for the new emperor to die and got voted in... got it roughly by 1600.. im sure someone whos really good at the game could get it earlier than that.. dunno if there is a record speed for doing it? but basically you become super op once you have all the hre bonuses and all the mandate bonuses
@AndysParadox just shift your capital to europe and improve relations with the electors.
@@sasi5841 its a bit more complicated than that as japan.. you have to keep taking all the open choices in events and eventually become catholic.. you need to get exploration & expansion and spread to africa and towards castile & portugal asap.. then take a province in europe, improve with electors, move capital etc. i want to know what is the quickest time someone could do this to become hre emperor.. is it quicker to conquest thru russia region to europe? rather than colonising? you are not a horde so not that easy, unless you vassalise a horde and feed them most of the land?
@@sasi5841 so you no-CBd a European nation basically?
I agree completely. I still remember when I was in high school amazed at Rome: Total War and a friend said to me: "nah, this game is easy, there is only a handful of nations and you can conquer the whole map. I play a game where you can pick any nation that existed on the planet at any point in time and it is just impossible to conquer them all". I thought such a game was just some myth, computationally unfeasable, something I was seeking for years. The game was EU2. It was frustrating at first, a game where things were slow and indirect... No internet guides back then, only a short and incomplete manual. But once I started getting the hang of it.... man, so rewarding! I've seen many Paradox releases, some good, some bad, but always EU has been the firm Paradox spine that never let down. I was fully against mana and thought I would hate EU IV, but man even with mana the game was just so good... To this date EU IV has the best diplomacy I've ever seen in any game.
I have now played Ck3 and Vic3 and I would like to get into eu4 but the barrier to entry is just so high like you can't play the base game because it misses just some really essential features and the whole games cost more than €300
There's a $6/month subscription that gives you access to every dlc out
Brother, do the subscription! You can test out everything for like 6 dollars a month, and if you like it, it's still a massively cheaper option than to put out for every single sold DLC. You won't regret it!
@@AndysParadox That sounds like a good deal for when I have vacation in a couple of weeks
Wat nation do you recommend to play?
@@meindert16 My favorite nation is probably France due to all the possibilities, it's stong all-around but you can still mess up if you don't act correctly or are unlucky with Burgundian succession. France, Portugal, Austria, Ottomans, England, probably those as your first to get your bearings. Portugal will probably offer you the most peace and easy transition out of these ones
@@meindert16byzantium, theodoro, trebizond, perm, granada, gotland, hisn kayfa. Those are my recommendations.
I like EU4 because there is no gimmick. It's just a good game, 100% of the time, no matter what mood I'm in. That being said. I love all the games!
This is kinda what I mean yeah. CK3's gimmick is the character drama which you may or may not like as you're trying to build your realm. HOI4 is the super-complex military building and some crazy political shifts. EU4 is kinda just grand strategy, simple as
Vic 2 is also something else
Best mapgame ever no doubt about it
by far the grand strategy i played the most
same
Funny, I was first introduced to paradox with Victoria… no numbers. It was an incredible complex game, nothing since has seemed to complex and complicated. I probably have 3k hours in it. Crusaders kings two ruined EU3 & 4.
Victoria, damn. How was THAT game?
tbh, I tried to get into it a couple of times, but when colonizing the New World arrives, I always end up dropping it 😣
Hmmm I felt it was never as replayable as ck for me as the characters will always be unique and the situations different,But it been a long time since I played eu so maybe it’s not to bad.
the replayability of EU4 lies in the different states and their different gov and religious mechanics, plus in the different idea groups which make for completely different playthroughs! :)
EU IV is absolutely the heart of Paradox, and it's a strategy game of incredible depth, it deserves plenty of praise for its achievements.
At the same time, I absolutely hate EU IV, as good of a strategy game as it might be, it's a terrible simulation of the era, and I completely disagree on how immerssive it feels. Most challenges of the era historically were fights between the 'estates' to really forge a state in the modern sense, that internal politics should be the foundation of the gameplay and struggle, and in EU IV it simply isnt. M&T tried to fix this, but while it did plenty of impressive stuff, it's also, in my opinion, way too clumsy to be enjoyable.
Yet EU V has absolutely impressed me with how aware they seem to be about this, and how much better the game seems to be on fulfilling the simulation/immersion aspect that I felt its predecessor failed at, and that has me very excited. Remember that EU was originally just a boardgame for people who thought history was neat. But its come a long way since then, and so has Paradox, im sure they were just as bugged as me.
Yeah, the biggest issue with EU4 is just how much happens within those 400 years.
How EU IV works is actually not too bad at capturing say, the Napoleon Era, but how things worked at that point does NOT apply in 1444. And the game had to figure out how to build a game which can consistently reach that point, with all the mechanics pushing it towards that direction.
I think EU V will be taking the opposite approach, where everything will be built with 1337 (and the Late Middle-Early Modern Ages) in mind. I think it'll struggle with representing later periods as a result, but that'll make it a super unique experience from EU IV.
The Wehrmacht's drug of choice was Amphetamines, not coke.
fair, I was too coked up to check
No mana points in eu5 :( no more 5 dev clicks in my dutch campaigns where i turn the swamps of of the lowlands to the highest skyscrapers known to man
*sad mana noises*
No Imperator mentioned 😢
YES Imperator mentioned! You missed it??
@@AndysParadox nvm I missed it
Stellaris seems like it would be cool but spending 100s of dollars on dlc just to make the game playable is a pretty high barrier to entry
Eu4….
@@_jame7928 the DLCs are often on sale but yeah it's still a problem in eu4 too
because mana. at the end of the day, eu4 is all about mana
dip, adm, mil, splendour, pope points, legitimacy, prestige, reform progress, military profes
eu4 wouldnt be as enjoyable without mana
I do love my EU4 mana
Ck2 is annoying cause I started as the kingdom of walachia and I couldn't just conquer hungary easily
I don’t understand EU4. The games to old that RUclips play throughs don’t show you how to play. They just play.
Which is fine, but I have no idea what’s going on
"Not overly genocidal to your neighbors" --> working on fast trade companies of castillian culture and catholik religion.
Trans atlantik slave trade is about to lavk goods in 20 years.
You surley have to tryhard to get this gebocidal in stellaris
I'm still waiting for eu4 to be free
Trivia: what's the difference between EU4 and a clicker game?
Eu4 requires thought.
EU4 is the best
Absolutely!
Age of Wonders is good but ... CIV 7!
EU 1 and CK1 was where it was at?
man I had problems reading that sentence
field of gloty kingdoms does it better just came out no mana
Agree, and you dont need 100 dlc's for the systems to work
0:55 So you're saying EU4 is the one with common sense? 😉
Nice
Or and hear me out just learn to play all games and mega campaign
By the time this video released, you should know that EU5 will add personalities to the game. Which I'm not fond of either.
I know. I'm not against it inherently, but I hope they don't become a major deal. I don't particularly like Paradox's 3D models as I find it makes everything feel less realistic, but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt for now.
lol ! why did you end the 100 years war so late, what have you done for 3 decades ?!
hundred... years... war?
@@AndysParadox
In your playthrough of France
Ck2 better than ck3
Mission trees ruined a lot of what made eu4 fun. I think it will kill the longevity of the game by making countries repetitive and samey (You always do the thing to click the button to give you free stuff, never deviating from the railroad). It's still a great game, but I feel a lot less addicted to it when I boot up the game and hover over a country on the map. Instead of imagining a dynamic adventure with that country, I'm given a chore chart of things to conquer. Usually I just close the game after thinking about it for a few minutes.
For me it's pretty crazy that people complained about too much railroading in EU2 - which to be fair was more forced. EU3 moved away from it and eventually EU4 came back but via slightly different route.
Well, no one is forcing anybody to use those mission trees at least.
@@andrzejnadgirl2029 They are quite literally forcing you to use them in some cases, some event chains and formables that used to be in the normal game are tied to completing missions.
Your point about ck3 being wacky is totally unjustified. Paradox has stripped vanilla ck3 from all fantasy elements which are now possible only with mods, not even dlcs
that doesn't mean it's not wacky, you still find yourself in sometimes weird and personal situations that come across as wacky like incest, like breeding dynasties behind the scenes, just wacky stuff altogether. Add the 3D models that look theatrically animated and it gets quite wacky. Not saying it's bad, just saying it makes it feel very different from a game like EU4.
I think the addition of mission trees kinda ruined the game. The game feels way to railroady, and you don't feel like you have any interesting choices to make, since your mission tree dictates everything you should be doing and hands out rewards for it, that you can't replicate without the missions. At first it wasn't that bad, but after the Emperor/Leviathan DLC, Paradox seemingly realised, that they don't to design any new mechanics and systems, and started to only design highly scripted mission trees.
Instead they should have continued to develop systems, that make the game more dynamic and more replayable. Why not expand on the personal union system, to make it so you don't largely depend on your mission tree for them? Why not add an interesting disease system? Why not rework trade a bit to make it more dynamic? Why not make diplomacy a bit more interesting, by adding defensive leagues, or more peace deals like dismantling forts? Why not add some systems that actually keep nations from snowballing to insane degrees?
Eu4 is a really good game, it's a pity they stopped actually developing it, and instead tag on mission trees that add nothing of value.
Absolutely not, it improved the game alot. You dont have to complete the missions at all, and each mission tree gives what most players will generaly seek for their nation.
@@TamanskayaDivision The missions simplify what you want. Even if we assume, that most players always want the same thing, now that thing is robbed of its strategical depth, and reduced to "do what the mission says".
Hoi is better
I found eu4(and in turn Paradox) in late 2017 through those "old" 57second eu4 meme videos and I was like "yo what game is this, looks good", ended up buying it for my self in 2018 just around the "Rule Britannia" expansion pack and immediately got addicted, I didn't have a good pc at the time so it'd be one of the few games that I'd play and I sank hours in it . And that's all with the base game too cause I'd be a year since I started getting the dlcs (back when you couldn't even change occupation or even develop your provinces🥲) flash forward to 6 years later, 2K hours on it+ I own all the big paradox titles hoi4,ck2,ck3,vic2,vic3 and imperator, but still eu4 remains the best one for me: the grand scope of 4 centuries, the way the exploration of the world is handled, the mechanics, the simplicity of the economy, the satisfactory way conquest is handled, the visuals and most importantly the thing that separates eu4 from the other paradox titles the flavour. Be it the mission trees, the event lines, the ideas, the modifiers or even something as simple as geography makes every nation feel a bit different.All of this plus my personal nitpick that I don't care about individual characters (rulers like in ck or imperator) or about population management (like in vicky or....again imperator (which is actually a very enjoyable game)) makes eu4 (imo) Paradox's greatest game and that makes me anxious about eu5, that it won't be able to live up to it's predecessor..... But we'll wait and see about that
EU4 is quite literally the most bastardized and warped PDX title imaginable, even the most diehard redditors will agree that for the most part the game has suffered from totally unnecessary bloat and confused game direction for the last 6 years. It's totally and completely fucked, no PDX title has suffered this much as EU4. I don't know how you could even remotely say that this is their magnum opus. In many, many ways it has gotten objectively worse from where it was in 2016.
Institutions are a mess, the entire world is at the same technological development throughout the entire game. Natives are extremely half-assed in their implementation, and the AI is totally unable to handle their improper presentation as modern nation states. The removal of native CBs means that you always end up with wildly ahistorical situations like Mesoamerica thriving into the 18th century, colonial nations will uniformly all openly embrace and accept natives resulting in very little cultural change. By the end of the 15th century, practically the entire world is colonized including Alaska and Australia and even Africa. On the other hand, Europeans are also totally and hopelessly incapable of expanding abroad beyond areas that can be directly colonized, failing to even make a serous foothold in Indonesia or India. It didn't used to be like this, but I feel that the last 6 years of development have been so confused and directionless, they're forced to do Project Caesar because it's impossible to unfuck EU4.