Europa Universalis 3 Review
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Review by Ian Morris
Europa Universalis III is more than a little tricky to review. Hardcore strategists and history fans will lap up the attention to detail, the old-school presentation, the incredible amount of depth, and the slow gameplay; however, fans of what we now consider to be RTS games (Command & Conquer and the like) may quickly be put off by those very same features. It's because of this that EU III seems to be aiming for an entirely different target market, so much so that it may as well come with a warning sticker on the box: "Do not play unless you're very enthusiastic about history." Accessible it certainly isn't, especially if you're coming to the game thinking it has any real relation to the likes of Rome: Total War.
Putting you in the role of a nameless leader of a country of your choosing (you can play as any one from the known world at that time, which leaves plenty of unexplored continents for you to discover), EU III sets you the task of doing... well, whatever you want. An open-ended strategy game in the extreme, the choices you make really are entirely up to you; there's nothing in the way of a story to follow, and no objectives to complete. It's this level of freedom that can make Europa Universalis III quite daunting at times and also means that anyone who doesn't have the patience of a Greek philosopher will face an uphill battle getting involved.
Played from a top-down perspective, as if surveying a map, your land is divided into different provinces, with large red borders separating your nation from its neighbours. This is the only view you can have of the game - the entire game plays out like a glorified, real-time version of Risk. Just a lot, lot slower. Anything you attempt to do will take months to complete; things such as recruiting an army or moving units between provinces can take upwards of 70 days, so whilst it may sound impressive that the game spans over 300 years in history, you'll still find yourself getting little accomplished. This also means that the game requires some incredibly complex forward planning, as, if you ever happen to get invaded, and you don't have the necessary amount of troops ready, there's no way you can put together a counter attack in time. Although you can hire local mercenaries, these are, understandably, nowhere near as talented as properly trained soldiers, meaning you'd probably be better off spending your time and money waiting to recruit more soldiers, whilst praying that your province's keep doesn't fall before you manage to get anything done.
Despite an overly clunky interface and a disappointing lack of appropriate tutorials, you can't help but be impressed with the way EU III lets you adapt your nation to your liking.
Whilst you can speed up the game, choosing from one of around five different speed settings (depending on the speed of your computer), all this does is make it even easier to lose control of your nation, as problems will begin cropping up far too quickly, even if your armies are being built faster. This effectively forces you to play it one of the lower three speeds, where things take a very long time. It's this unforgiving double-edged sword that Europa Universalis wields that makes it appeal to grand strategy veterans, while at the same time making it incredibly inaccessible for anyone who's new to the genre.
Despite an overly clunky interface and a disappointing lack of appropriate tutorials, you can't help but be impressed with the way EU III lets you adapt your nation to your liking. You're able to change everything from your Government's level of investment in certain things, to choosing advisers to your leaders, or even setting ideas for your nation to follow. All this has to be done while trying to keep your citizens happy and thereby prevent them from rebelling, as well as maintaining your country's good name and reputation around the world. This can be a genuine challenge to accomplish, especially for a relative newcomer to the genre such as myself - keeping everyone happy is never easy, and you'll likely find yourself with a few rebellions that need squashing in the first few years of play. This is by far the most interesting and most enjoyable part of the game, and could well have made the game a must buy, if it weren't for the fact that the menu system seems to be constantly working against you. Simply put, there are far too many menu screens, each with too many buttons and nowhere near enough explanation. As you can imagine, this leads to a horrendously steep learning curve for any newcomers to the game. Finding the appropriate menu to do a certain thing takes forever, and with numerous sub-menus to navigate, and a disappointing lack of shortcuts, many will find themselves in a war of their own as they attempt to do the simplest of tasks.
... but everyone else will find a game that's hard to get into.
Combat is another area where Europa Universalis falls disappointingly short. For the sake of this example, let's presume we're playing as sleepy old England. As a country which begins the game at war with France, you're going to want to amass a decently sized army to defend yourself against any possible attack, as well as reinforce your province in Calais. However, as each of your provinces can only build one army at a time (taking at least 70 days a piece), you'll find yourself having an incredibly long wait before you get a chance to defend anything. To make matters worse, there's also every chance that whilst you're sitting around waiting for your units to be built, the French will march in with a 10,000 strong army and take Calais from right under your nose, before you've even had a chance to react. This is just one example of the incredibly tough situations that Europa Universalis III throws at the player, and newcomers are likely to feel completely overwhelmed.
If you eventually do find yourself in a brief spell of peace time, you may find yourself wanting to invade another country, to garner better taxes, and provide a second base for your armies. To get your troops to another you country, you must first load them onto a boat, before setting sail for enemy territory. However, for some strange reason, you can't load your armies onto a boat when the boat is docked at one of your ports - the boat must first set sail and position itself in the middle of the ocean before your troops can climb on-board. It's a bizarre design decision and is downright confusing for a game which prides itself on realism.
After you land your troops in enemy territory, presuming that you don't come across any enemies defending the province, you're then in for a long wait, as you just sit and watch a still image of the enemy province's keep, waiting until you see it catch fire or the walls collapse. At this point you can choose to assault the keep or wait for them to surrender due to starvation - it's up to you. Again, this can take weeks or months, just as it would in real life. It's just that reality doesn't always make for an enjoyable game. Unfortunately, combat with two armies feels just as slow and uninspired; when you and an enemy enter the same province, a battle between your two forces will automatically occur, and you then sit and watch as the numbers go down, and the enemy team trounce yours. You can't arrange your armies and you have no command over the battle at all, a feature which proves to be very limiting, and makes you feel far too detached from any battles which occur - the ability to change the formation of your soldiers, or even issue some sort of orders would have been nice, and made the game feel much more involved at the same time.
At the end of the day, if you're a relative newcomer to the grand strategy genre who's interested in sampling what the genre have to offer, this really isn't the game you'll want to get started with. The incredible scope, combined with the awkward menu system and lack of tutorials just serves to make this game completely inaccessible to the grand strategy novice. If you're a fan of EU II, you're sure to love this and will probably see many of the issues highlighted as problems for newcomers as reasons why you love the series. However, without anything there to hold your hand through the first few years, EU III is a game that will be completely inaccessible to the average gamer, and because of this it's hard to recommend.
Editor's comment: The review text has been altered slightly from the original which was published on 29.01.2007. These changes were made to more accurately represent the views of the reviewer.
Turn to page 2 for a second opinion on Europa Universalis III
User Comments
ibalkid
The second review seems to be done by a competent strategy gamer and is fair and subjective. Good to see.
Smav
Anonymous
Timofmars
It's not that this game genre only appeals to a few people. It's that people who enjoy this genre would not even consider this game based on this review. I don't even want it now :-)
schmutz@ Calanor
Calanor
However, Nxs, you seem to feel that what upset everyone is the score - I don't think that's the case, although some certainly was upset by that bit too. It's not about agreeing with all the "fanboys", it's a matter of not being the right man to evaluate this particular type of game. As has been said by others, I wouldn't mind a 5/10 if the review brought forth genuine problems with the game compared to others from its genre. The reviewer complained about stuff that's quite fundamental in the genre, and as a result the credibility of the entire review went out the window. That's the actual problem with the review. I honestly don't care much about ratings in general, as they obviously just reflect a certain person's opinion. God knows that throughout the years I've found myself enjoying several games that've received mediocre scores while being bored to death by some getting top ones.
As for myself, I'm hardly a "fanboy" or in any way someone who would be fanatically protective about any game in general. Actually, this is the first game in the EU series that I've actually gotten into, though I've played some other Paradox games as well as a lot of strategy games in general. The reason why I reacted was because I felt that the review didn't really describe the cons and pros of the game well at all, due to what seems to be the reviewer's lack of interest and/or inexperience of the genre. And yeah, I _think_ there are several things that could have been implemented better in the game, but none of those things are mentioned by the reviewer. In fact, some important aspects of the game, such as diplomacy and trading, aren't mentioned at all. For all the reader knows, the game could be completely without such features.
As for the dilemma of posting a second opinion, I can certainly see your point. While some (very few) magazines actually use two different reviewers (hopefully with different tastes) to rate a game - usually a high-profile one of course - that's a different matter. In this case we'd be dealing with something published as an afterthought. I certainly can see the problem here - while I feel that the review Ian wrote is very flawed and rather much useless to people genuinely interested in the genre, a second review might at the same time prove to be a Pandora's box, as you say. :|
Anonymous
Uh, I'd like to direct you to the LINE BY LINE breakdown of what is fundamentally wrong with this review in post 32. The Anon poster fully explored where and why the review went wrong, yet you'll notice the times Ian has responded he has only fielded the softball questions of other posters.
The continued posting of concerns is because Ian has not addressed any of our legitimate gripes. I think a response to 32 would satisfy the confused readers here.
Nxs
As has been said, the review is the opinion of the reviewer and that cannot be right or wrong. I also understand that because the reviewer said that he can't understand the game that this shows vulnerability to criticism and all die hard fans of the series deem this as a reason to go ballistic.
I do not think this is a good thing! Why? I'll tell ya! Reviewers are the bane of the game industry. We are! We get a game and like it or not, our personal feelings interfere on occasion. Reviewers are supposed to be objective but, that does not always happen as frustration and the 'what the hell is this crap' sets in here and there. We are only human. There is never, ever going to be a review that everyone will agree with and in this case, it is a lot more so as not a lot of people have played this game let alone heard of it.
Let's be honest here, it is not a mainstream game and the only ones defending it are people that play it and that brings me to my main point. Having a rereview is not a good idea! You can't have fanboys come in here and say that they demand someone else review it cause they don't like the way it turned out! If they do redo it, it will open a pandoras box cause every damn review that someone does not agree with will have to be redone! Insane!
My closing thoughts are this: If you don't like the review, give reasons why so the reviewer can make adjustments for the next time. Having the site make a second opinion review is just retarded as that will open the door for anyone else who disagrees with something to have them redo it. There is just no time for this crap. Really people, I get pissed off at stupid crap too but, nine pages of crap cause people want a new review is ridiculous! :D
Rogue_Soul
I can't wait to see this 'second opinion' review.
Timofmars
The Total War games (MTW,RTW) are extremely easy to many gamers. The game campaign portion of the game is is no way as in-depth as EU3. Ability to win in MTW/RTW is not an issue for most people. It's an issue of how long it will take. For many, 20 turns is enough time to become strong enough where the rest of the game is spent rolling over the unintellegent opponents. Simply spend your time constantly attacking everything around you as soon as you've created the units to do so.
The only single thing that can slow a player down is the high cost of maintaining a large army. And that is why attacking as soon you have a sufficient army is the best strategy. Only people who don't look at their finances to see the share of the costs that come from the army maintainence are the ones who might have trouble with the game. Though it is not longer an issue by the time you defeat one faction.
Don't get me wrong, MTW was fun for a little while during the time that I thought I that that it was going to remain difficult throughout the game. But after 25 turns and the game had become a game of clean-up duty (walk over all of the weak opponents) and micromanagement (building all those troops and moving them to the front line, among other things)... Well, its shallowness became apparent. The only thing that remains is the tactical combat, particularly multiplayer tactical combat, despite intrusive control bugs and imbalances.
In addition in MTW, the tactical combat that the game centralizes around allows most gamers to constantly overpower their opponents, and in many cases, exploit the AI through certain tactics due to the sometimes weak AI. My point here is that there is no way that MTW/RTW games are more in-depth than EU3. The fact that the reviewer did not understand the game because it was too in-depth refutes that claim. And I'm trying to show also that in comparison, it is a mistake to say MTW has greater depth. In fact, what depth is has doesn't matter if there are so few choices that will actually have a detrimental effect to your success, so much so that you start to ignore the in-depth details because of their irrelevance.
Look at each "choice" you have to make. There is very little trade-off between different choices. Recruit priests to increase your faith. Very little cost to do so, and it's all just useless micromanaging after as you have to move them around to the proper provinces. Same with spies, merchants, any agent really. There's no choices to be made. There's no harm in attempting to make alliances with everyone except your current enemy. The same with getting trading rights. You'll should always attempt to move a spy into an enemy city before attacking to attempt to open the doors from the inside. Merchants? Pure micromanagement, no negative effects to consider or alternatives to consider (you can have it all!).
Drawing a comparison to EU3, maintaining a small army also can save some money. But it is in no way the game-winning strategy it is in MTW. There are so many more variables in EU3. There is no singular game-winning strategy like in MTW. Too much of one thing can backfire in some cases, and in other cases it involves penalties in other areas. For example, you can expand through war, but you'll hurt relations, your ability to trade competitively will decline due to your bad reputation, your stability costs will rise. The things that help you militarily can have a detrimental effect on other aspects of your country. On top of that, the AI is much more challenging. Becoming stronger means it's more difficult to maintain stability, and tech costs will also scale along with the size or your country so extra income doesn't mean you can become a technological superpower. And becoming larger through force can make cause you to face more enemies at once than you can handle.
Some of the things in MTW are automatically handled in EU3 to eliminate the vast amount of micromanagement found in MTW. Taxe rates in EU3 are already considered to be maximized based on the assumption that you would want to tax as much as is reasonable possible. Combat in EU3 is actually detailed and complex, and involves the AI automatically maximizing it's chances to win, for example by targeting the biggest threat first, or the target that is the weakest against attacks. Looking closely at the combat, you'll see the cavalry naturally go to the flanks and to the rear because of their range. And cavalry stay out of assaults during seiges except as a last resort because of their ineffectiveness at it. All these things exist to make the game detailed, but are out of your control to prevent the need to micromanage so you can think about the many other things you need to balance.
And I think that's what the reviewer is missing. He's looking for the immediate flashy explosions that he's used to seeing in games, but he's missing the intricacies that make this game so challenging. The fact that he's losing his battles and thus feeling that it is out of his control shows that he doesn't understand what factors are affecting the combat. I can understand that the battles might seem boring if you don't understand them. But after you understand them, you'll be excited even just manuevering troops during war just because you know the advantages and disadvantages involved like troop composition, morale, prestige, manpower, terrain bonuses, generals, tradition, technology, shock and fire, war score, attrition... Everything is so inter-connected that after learning the game, you can think back to every decision you made and how it is affecting where you are now.
But to review a game without taking the time to understand at least the basics, there's no way you can tell someone about how good the gameplay is. You don't know if it's flawed and a certain strategy is overpowered. You just think it's flawed because didn't take the time to understand it.
Regardless of the fact that your opinion is based on a lack of understanding of the game, there are some items in the review that are just factually false and should be edited. A major complaint is about the game speed being both too fast and too slow!!! But the speed is absolutely adjustable!!! You did not mention this. It can even be paused! Now everyone reading this review things that this is a boring game because you are stuck waiting for "70 day" to create and move an army.
Also, I imagine the reasoning behind having to move a ship into the sea square to load men onto them is because you cannot move your ships into an enemy controlled port. This means you have to load and unload out at sea in order to to attack from the sea. This allow enemy ships to prevent you from doing this by attacking you. Otherwise, maintaining naval superiority to protect from sea invasions wouldn't work as well. And a naval blockade of your own ports wouldn't stop you from loading up troops and just "fleeing" your way to the enemy lands.
So learn how to play the game, and do the review again. The replay value alone should bump up the score a few points!
DTN
As a sidenote, reviewing niche gaming has always resulted in diehard fan retaliation when it does not go their way. This I believe is was not unexpected when they were reviewing EU3. Lets stay away from the personal comments.
Estonianzulu
Ian's review begins in the correct way:
"Europa Universalis III is more than a little tricky to review." This is without a doubt true, and I commend him for taking on the task nonetheless. He is correct in his assumption that large numbers of fans of the Starcraft era-RTS games will not easily translate into this system.
The reason so many people have had such a vehement reaction to this review is not because many of the things you say are untrue. The game is, compared to most, unduly complicated and difficult to grasp quickly. It can have a slow pace, especially for people used to FPS's and RPG's.
I believe that most fans of the game have felt that your review did not do the game justice, and will convice people to avoid the game. Those of us over at Paradox tend to be a niche group of gamers. Many do not consider ourselves RTS gamers (though many do play traditional RTS games). EU, Hearts of Iron, Victoria, Crusader Kings and the like are games of their own genre, which really do not neatly fall into a category.
The fallacy in this review is not so much what you said (in my mind) but how it was said. Concerns over complexity and speed are legitimate. However, qualities such as slow build time, and long-time grand strategy are the corp elemants of the game. Saying that this is a poor quality to have in a game is saying that this type of game is not one you enjoy.
I do not like games that overly simplify the progress of time and civilization, thus I would not review a game such as Civilization, or Sim City. In this case, you do just that. The main qualities of EU are not what you enjoy, thus the game appears to be of low quality.
Your criticisms about the clunky interface and huge number of menus and sub-menus is likely legitimate, I cannot comment to that regard. Although I can say much of this developed from experiences in previous games, a quality that I applaud Paradox for. The long and detailed list of information and statistics has become necessary for those gamers who really love to become deeply involved in the game. Likewise, the inability to control troops and armies, similar to the fighting style of games such as Civilization, is a staple of this genre of games, thus neither can really be a target of criticism.
The parallel to flight sims vs. aircraft fighting games has been drawn, and it is appropriate. Microsoft Flight Simulator X really cant be reviewed in the same vein as Over G Fighters. While both descending from the same video game lineage, they are completely different genres of game.
So while I agree your criticisms can be made of the genre itself, targeting this single game is unfair (thus this, and all the other posts). You cannot blame Starcraft for the fallacies of RTS games, likewise you cannot blame EU3 for fallacies inherent in all games of its genre. I think the above attacks on you and this site were out of line, but I must agree that your review does not do the game justice. However, by prefacing your review with your first line, you do absolve yourself of much blame. This game is terribly difficult to review, because there is very little like it. Parallels to Civ 4 and MTW are the closest that can be drawn, but even those really deny the levels of depth that EUIII is formed to cover.
So, thanks for the review, it is an interesting take on the game; and hopefully you will get to experience a better take on the game in the future. If not, thats ok, this genre of games is most specifically not universal, not even among strategy gamers.
Thomas
TomO
Strategy Gamer
Anonymous