Europa universalis IV impressions

Nameless one

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I didn't really have time to play it as much as I wanted so this are my very early impressions.
First thing that is noticeable right away is much improved graphic and interface.You can see all needed information easily, diplomatic options are sorted by groups.One thing that I like a lot is that diplomats and merchants are now persistent not just one use resource.AI has been improved especially diplomatic part, and during the war they finally don't spam peace offers under ridiculous terms.So far I haven't encountered a single bug but game does slow down a bit on 2 highest speed settings

Things that I didn't like, well lack of sliders, in EU III you could really "customize" your nation with policy and technology sliders, now that is gone and number of technologies and been reduced to 3.

I have mixed feelings about new resource system, it works well enough in game but it doesn't make much sense.

So far very good game, because of interface and hints easier to get into for those that haven't played EU game before.Is it better than EU III or CK II?I haven't played enough to make conclusion.


So what are your impressions so far?
 
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I've been trying to finish Eador before I dive deep into EU4, but that campaign is way too long to keep me from playing EU4, so I played it yesterday. So far I'm liking it. I definitely like that expansion seems to be much slower now. Whenever you conquer new territory, unless it's reclaiming your cores, it raises 'overextension'. If it's too high, bad things happen (sort of like infamy before, but you have direct control now), so you have to core them ASAP.

As far as the sliders thing, I don't miss them. Ideas take their place in a better way I believe, and they are much more strategic (as in, do I take this or that). In EU3 there were some sliders that you almost always wanted to move a certain way, so it wasn't really as customizable imho. But I'm still too early in my game to say for sure.

My first game I'm playing as France, because they're all powah and I know I'll be making mistakes, so better have a strong military to back my stupidities. Needed two wars with England to finish the 100 year war and erradicate those prunes from the glorious french lands. Was struggling with manpower, specially when Castille and Portugal (plus Aragon) allied with Burgundy which is my natural expansion way. Each war left me army-less, but I managed to grab all my core provinces from them and a couple more. I'm worried about Spain though, at this moment they digested Navarra and almost all Aragon, and they're allied with Portugal so it's a scary neighbor. England has been busy taking all the lands to form Great Britain so I haven't seen them since I kicked them out of continental Europe, but maybe they'll come back when they're done. On the east side I started munching into HRE territory but since I'm in a Personal Union with Austria, I'm not too worried about them. Here's how my France is doing so far in 1515 …

2P4Kq7j.jpg
 
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My first game I'm playing as France, because they're all powah and I know I'll be making mistakes, so better have a strong military to back my stupidities. Needed two wars with England to finish the 100 year war and erradicate those prunes from the glorious french lands.....Great Britain so I haven't seen them since I kicked them out of continental Europe...
Wooo the game seems very cool and more and more tempting. :)

More seriously I don't have a good remembering of a past game in the series, it failed stick me in and failed appeal me to try it again. But I wonder if I don't make a confusion, perhaps some Victoria game which was really really not for me, not at all. :)
 
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Loving it so far, It took me a bit getting used to but I think I like the way they handle "ideas/technologies" better than in the past.
 
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Has anyone tried the "import from Crusader Kings" thing?
 
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I've done the Import from CK2 and it surprisingly is not obvious how to use. It will export a mod to the CK2\eu4_export folder which you then need to manually copy to your EU4\mod folder. I suppose it works ok in that regard (got it for free and not really worth $10, IMNSHO). I was able to import my Francia empire and it kept my queen and her heir. It seems to not have the richness of information on lot of rival empires where I had royal connections. Also you start off at ground zero in all things except land area. There were a lot of countries with out a proper heir on startup though not clear how big a deal that was. I suppose easier to swoop in and get a claim through royal marriage.

As far as CK2 vs EU4, they are 2 different games and while they superficially look the same they are have very different mechanics. I've not completed anything close to a full game of EU4 and for that matter CK2. My own preference is CK2 over EU4 at this point because of the succession planning and strategy and a host of other things but its not like its really bad or anything.

It is definitely an improvement on the EU franchise and the user interface is reasonably easy to navigate though some things like Diplomacy could be improved with things like easier ways to recall diplomats.
 
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Wooo the game seems very cool and more and more tempting. :)

More seriously I don't have a good remembering of a past game in the series, it failed stick me in and failed appeal me to try it again. But I wonder if I don't make a confusion, perhaps some Victoria game which was really really not for me, not at all. :)

it's possible. I've tried most of their games. From the 'big 4', I like Europa Universalis and Crusader Kings, I didn't care much for Victoria but I'm thinking of some day giving it another try. Hearts of Iron was just too much, definitely not for me, even though all those games use the same core engine.

Another thing that makes this different from EU3. In EU3 my only consideration to start a war was "can I beat them?" if yes, war. Now it's more complicated, when I consider a war, even if I can win, is it worth it? will it leave my army depleted? will it leave me unprotected? is my country rebellious so rebels start popping up when my armies are away? will neighbor countries that I want to be friendly with get too angry? Have I expanded too much recently?
 
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I personally am waiting on a sale and a few patches to grab this.
Still way too into CK2 atm. :)
 
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After putting few more hours I have to say I was wrong about about nation being less customizable than in EU 3.Since ideas now works similar to tech branch so there is actually more options than in EU 3.Diplomacy and colonization also work much better.
One thing that I find annoying is that some events repeat too much.During around 70 years I got sighting of comet 3 times(-1 stability) and I got that event when you have to chose between losing money or incising inflation by 3 4 times, I also got "naive cousin" event 3 times.
 
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it's possible. I've tried most of their games. From the 'big 4', I like Europa Universalis and Crusader Kings, I didn't care much for Victoria but I'm thinking of some day giving it another try. Hearts of Iron was just too much, definitely not for me, even though all those games use the same core engine…

I'm 100% sure I have Hearts of Iron 3 and couldn't get into it. I'm almost sure I tried one of the Crusader Kings, most probably the 1, and also couldn't get into it. I'm less sure for Victoria or EU but I have the feeling I tried one and couldn't get into it.

So I have the general feeling of games that fail to appeal me, not even that I really played them, and I'm not even sure I even tried some of them, but that general feeling is rather strong, failure to appeal me. I'll try the demo of EU4 and/or CK2 but it's on PC only, so a day if I remember it. :)
 
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I'm 100% sure I have Hearts of Iron 3 and couldn't get into it. I'm almost sure I tried one of the Crusader Kings, most probably the 1, and also couldn't get into it. I'm less sure for Victoria or EU but I have the feeling I tried one and couldn't get into it.

So I have the general feeling of games that fail to appeal me, not even that I really played them, and I'm not even sure I even tried some of them, but that general feeling is rather strong, failure to appeal me. I'll try the demo of EU4 and/or CK2 but it's on PC only, so a day if I remember it. :)

Oh, if you tried CK1 then it's understandable. I also tried it years ago and couldn't get into it, just didn't understand the interface at all. If you haven't played the newer generation of Paradox games, you should. Just open your mind though, this is not Civilization... 'factions' are not balanced in any way. France is more powerful than Morocco, England is more powerful than Scottland, etc.
Also try and watch a "let's play" video in youtube, so you can see how the game works before you open it.
 
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I'm 100% sure I have Hearts of Iron 3 and couldn't get into it. I'm almost sure I tried one of the Crusader Kings, most probably the 1, and also couldn't get into it. I'm less sure for Victoria or EU but I have the feeling I tried one and couldn't get into it.

So I have the general feeling of games that fail to appeal me, not even that I really played them, and I'm not even sure I even tried some of them, but that general feeling is rather strong, failure to appeal me. I'll try the demo of EU4 and/or CK2 but it's on PC only, so a day if I remember it. :)

Try demo of EU IV because it has better interface and better hint system it's easiest EU game to get into.Hearts of iron I can only recommend to someone who has good number of hours into rest of the series.
 
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The interface includes an annoying lag at the moment.

My first game I'm playing as France, because they're all powah and I know I'll be making mistakes, so better have a strong military to back my stupidities.

The big blue blob is the past. The new big blob in the game is the yellow blob. Spain.
 
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At least that's more like history. Actually france and to a little extent ottomans seemed to get nerfed in divine wind and that at least made me happy. There's really no reason to put france down as an amazing power when brittany was almost as strong until just recently. Not to mention it's been on the losing side of about 9/10 greatest military disasters in history.
 
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At least that's more like history. Actually france and to a little extent ottomans seemed to get nerfed in divine wind and that at least made me happy. There's really no reason to put france down as an amazing power when brittany was almost as strong until just recently. Not to mention it's been on the losing side of about 9/10 greatest military disasters in history.

The game is not a history simulation. But apparently, a lot of players enjoy thinking that way.
 
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I never said it should be, but it used to be ridiculously unbalanced IN ORDER TO MAKE RESULTS MORE LIKE HISTORY. When a lot of that history was just fluke in the first place.
 
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The blue blob never had a historic origin, only game mechanics origin. Same for Spain.

The thing is that a lot of players on the US market relate with UK or Germany first and that the big blue blob hindered their efforts.

The yellow blob is less harmful to them so there is no whining about that.

Same thing went for the muslims and the nerfing sequence they went through in CK2.
In current version, in a typical game, AI muslims end close to losing the Mecca.

Historical verisimilute never been a concern. Pleasing the customer always has been.
 
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The interface includes an annoying lag at the moment.
I saw some yelling in the chat about NVIDIA drivers that the latest ones have really slowed down both EU4 and CK2. Could that be it?
 
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I saw some yelling in the chat about NVIDIA drivers that the latest ones have really slowed down both EU4 and CK2. Could that be it?
I only played the demo on my GTX460 OC and noticed the game was slower than EU3 but nothing abnormal here as it's much more graphics heavy. Never noticed unusual lags with CK2 (same 3D engine, Clausewitz).
 
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