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UberFelix

First Lieutenant
6 Badges
Dec 9, 2005
259
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  • Europa Universalis III Complete
  • Hearts of Iron III
  • Europa Universalis III Complete
  • Europa Universalis III Complete
  • Europa Universalis: Rome
  • 500k Club
I discovered HOI2 and loved it. I love the ability to mod the game.
Just recently I bought Rome, Victoria, EU III.

Let me say I use to work at a s/w company called Micrografx so I know a little about the s/w business.

There needs to be some marketing changes at paradox because you are shooting yourselves in the foot. It is as if you want to keep Paradox an unknown game company. There is an old American saying "Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door". It would be nice if this was true but the fact is good marketing trumps a better mousetrap. Look at the Japanese when their superior DAT tapes lost to CD-Roms. Or DVD players beating the beta players.

1. Why does paradox make so many variances of the same game?
Rome, Rome-Gold, Vae Victis, and perhaps more?
Europa III Universalis: Complete (and there are other versions I'm told)
I'm sure it is easy for you to keep these straight but as a casual customer I'm shocked at your marketing. I don't know which versions contains expansion kits and which do not. At Micrografx we seemed to fight continuous battles with marketing not to create 20 different versions of the same game. At Paradox, it is clear your Marketing dept wins those battles. You need to make buying decisions easy for your customers...

I've heard Vae Victis is good but I don't know if I need to buy Rome-Gold first or if I can go straight to Vae Victis. If you tell me I need, Rome-Gold then I've completely wasted my money on Rome (the basic game).

2. The names of the games are clever if your a student of history but for the layman it is overly confusing and it simply does NOT sell the game.
e.g.
Europa III Universalis: Complete (and I've notice there is another EU III version out there as well). The title tells me NOTHING of the time period.
eg. Deus Velt? (I don't feel like looking up the correct title)

This relates to #1 as well.

3. Part of the strength of any successful franchise is using your brand name to create additional success when you come out with new games.
When I compare the box art of the different paradox games, the games look like different companies wrote the games. This takes any leverage you have from your more successful games and it wastes that goodwill. I should be able to put paradox game boxes on a book shelf and SEE that these games all come from the same company. Look at the company Webroot. When you see the lime-green Webroot boxes, you know your buying s/w from the same company.

I'd put a 360 degree colored band (just choose any color that stands out) on all box cover art with the words "Paradox Interactive presents:" This way when a consumer sees this colored band they know it is a paradox product. If they like other paradox games, then they'll be more likely to pick up that box to see if this a game genre that they might like to buy. I should be able to put all Paradox games on a book shelf and see the SAME colored band on all the products. This way you are leveraging your success of one game to another game.

Just as GM created 6 different sub companies to compete in the car market (Chevrolet, Pontiac, Buick, Oldsmoble, LaSalle (discontinued), Cadilac) the same could be done for Paradox.

e.g.
Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Ancient World: Alexander, 700bc-300bc
Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Ancient World: Rome, 300bc-400ad
Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Ancient World: Dark Ages, 400ad-1000ad
Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Medieval World: Medieval Warfare, 1000ad-1500ad
Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Renaisance: Renaisance(sp?) Warfare, 1500ad-1600ad
Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Empires: Napoleonic Warfare, 1600ad-1850ad
Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Empires: Rifleman Warfare, 1850ad-1900ad
Paradox Interactive Presents: World War I, 1900-1920
Paradox Interactive Presents: World War II, 1930-1950
Paradox Interactive Presents: Cold War I, 1950-2000
Paradox Interactive Presents: Star Empire, 2000-3000
*Obviously more thought needs to be put into the game names and genres than I've chosen but you get the idea.

So can anyone tell me do I need Rome-Gold before I get Vae Victus?
If this is the case, screw Vae Victus...it is too much trouble to figure all this out.
 
EU: Rome Gold includes Vae Victis and states so very clearly on the box and online information. "Gold" and similar additions to game titles are quite commonly known to refer to an edition of the game that includes atleast one or more of the expansion packs as well.

As for the box art, well, their retail sales are starting to (or may already) be overshadowed by digital download sales. The logo on the spine indicates pretty clearly to me who published the game and as far as I know, the boxed versions of EU3 Complete, Hearts of Iron 3 and Victoria 2 also have Paradox Interactive with the logo displayed in a black band on the front of the box.

That may not be consistent with their old boxes but for obvious reasons. They've redesigned the layout as well as going to the slimmer cases over the years and it would be a little unreasonable for me to expect them to go back and change boxes from 10 years ago. And a little silly for them to reissue retail boxes of older games.
 
I agree some titles are not obvious concerning the content. But a title like "Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Empires: Rifleman Warfare, 1850ad-1900ad" just makes me shudder. :p
 
1. Well it's expansion packs, not different versions, some bundled, some separated. I fail to see the issue here, reading 2 lines of description aint that hard if one is confused about what the product is...

2. Id say Deus Vult is a better name than Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Ancient World: Dark Ages, 400ad-1000ad, yes, really ;)
And consider it's an expansion pack for a game called Crusader Kings I'd say it's not that hard to at least get a bit of an idea of what it's about.

3. As previously mentioned the paradox logo is on all the games, and if I see that mark on a game im sure to at least check it out. (the nice lil platypus skeleton is rather unique after all ;))
And imho a big banner saying "paradox interactive presents:" on all boxes seems a tad silly, if not pretentious. Can't remember seeing any other game publisher putting much more than the logo on the games...

4. Sure, having the band with the paradox logo in a colour wouldn't hurt, as long as it's fairly sublte whilst still unique, some overly bright and "in your face" sort of colour really wouldn't fit with the feeling of the games themselves.
And your name examples, even though they sure put a smile on my face, are 1 too long and 2 over the top on being obvious, they sound like a series of documentaries or something.
 
Oh come on... I made that up on the fly. I made no claims that these names were optimum. Only that the present system is deeply flawed and did not leverage good will from one game to another.

At my local 1/2 price bookstore there are Paradox games out the wazoo but...I never realized these games were part of the Paradox family until I looked at the Rome game just out of curiousity. If I had known it was a Paradox game, I would have bought it sooner just based on my like for the HOI2 game. All I'm saying is Paradox makes a lot of marketing snafus and they should make thigs easier for their customers.
 
EU: Rome Gold includes Vae Victis and states so very clearly on the box and online information. "Gold" and similar additions to game titles are quite commonly known to refer to an edition of the game that includes atleast one or more of the expansion packs as well.

As for the box art, well, their retail sales are starting to (or may already) be overshadowed by digital download sales. The logo on the spine indicates pretty clearly to me who published the game and as far as I know, the boxed versions of EU3 Complete, Hearts of Iron 3 and Victoria 2 also have Paradox Interactive with the logo displayed in a black band on the front of the box.

That may not be consistent with their old boxes but for obvious reasons. They've redesigned the layout as well as going to the slimmer cases over the years and it would be a little unreasonable for me to expect them to go back and change boxes from 10 years ago. And a little silly for them to reissue retail boxes of older games.

1. I've never seen the Rome-Gold box. So how I would I know it includes Vae Victus?
From what I've read I've wasted $6 on the vanilla Rome when I should have gotten the Gold.
A $6 mistake is not the end-of-the-world but I do resent the byzantine paradox marketing which caused me to make such a mistake.

2. The person that eats the soup is a better judge of the soup than the person that cooks it.
I've seen the Rome game at my local bookstore for MONTHS without realizing it was part of the Paradox family.
The tiny paradox logo on the box just didn't cut it. Like I said, the company Webroot knows how to market their product visually with their lime-green boxes...
 
Oh come on... I made that up on the fly. I made no claims that these names were optimum. Only that the present system is deeply flawed and did not leverage good will from one game to another.

At my local 1/2 price bookstore there are Paradox games out the wazoo but...I never realized these games were part of the Paradox family until I looked at the Rome game just out of curiousity. If I had known it was a Paradox game, I would have bought it sooner just based on my like for the HOI2 game. All I'm saying is Paradox makes a lot of marketing snafus and they should make thigs easier for their customers.

I completely agree with you, but your proposed names still suck donkey balls.
 
1. Why does paradox make so many variances of the same game?
Rome, Rome-Gold, Vae Victis, and perhaps more?
Europa III Universalis: Complete (and there are other versions I'm told)
I'm sure it is easy for you to keep these straight but as a casual customer I'm shocked at your marketing. I don't know which versions contains expansion kits and which do not.
First of all, I completely agree with the OP that Paradox's expansions are a baffling maze to newcomers. Its almost as though they haven't considered that some people haven't been following one of their games since it first came out. Take EU3, for example: a newcomer would have no idea if you need the base version to get IN or NA, and which do they need then? Which comes first NA or IN? Do you need NA first or can IN be installed without it? And what is up with launching a "Complete" version and then releasing another 2 expansions? If you do somehow find out that HttT is the latest expansion, does that include all the previous ones? And now Paradox is working on another EU3 expansion, just to add more headaches to the whole mess. All I can say is they better release some sort of "Gold Edition" that includes everything or people are just going to look at that mess of expansions and stare in confusion before moving on.

Gamersgate: "Oh, you want to buy EU3? Well we have several different versions here for you to choose from, would you like: EU3, EU3: Complete, EU3: Divine Wind, EU3: Heir to the Throne, EU3: In Nomine, or EU3: Napoleon's Ambition?"
Customer: " ... Huh???"

2. The names of the games are clever if your a student of history but for the layman it is overly confusing and it simply does NOT sell the game.
As strange as it sounds, I don't think Paradox is really aiming for the casual layman gamers. If that were its focus, it would have to directly compete with the likes of Civilization, Age of Empires, and Total War. As it is, it occupies its own market niche of historical simulators, where its pretty much all alone.

As far as naming goes, who says the name has to tell you what you're going to be doing? Off the top of my head, I can name some of the most popular games of all time and their titles give you very little information: Halo(something to do with religion???), Call of Duty(probably involves warfare of some sort), Civilization(so open-ended as to be meaningless, a game with this title could be about anything), Warcraft(again, this game will probably involve combat), Starcraft(the art of constructing stars???). Luckily, there's the back of the box for clearing up such things as what type of game you're holding and when it will be set.

Personally, it seems like the only thing the title has to do is sound cool, which Hearts of Iron seriously succeeds at, Europa Universalis... not so much.
 
I would hope that they release an EU3: Platinum (i.e. EU3 + NA + IN + HttT + DV) for newcomers. If they release yet another expansion pack, then they will need an EU3: Diamond, I suppose.

As for GamersGate, I suppose they could do a better job labeling base game, expansion pack, and bundle. Hopefully, if they release an EU3: Platinum, they will pull EU3: Complete from online distribution.

I do not think Paradox is out of line with naming conventions, though. Is Europa Universalis III: In Nomine so different from Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword (Latin aside)?
 
1. I've never seen the Rome-Gold box. So how I would I know it includes Vae Victus?
From what I've read I've wasted $6 on the vanilla Rome when I should have gotten the Gold.
A $6 mistake is not the end-of-the-world but I do resent the byzantine paradox marketing which caused me to make such a mistake.
You have not wasted 6$. Just buy Vae Victis and you have two (!) nice and shiny icons after registering your game. I would pay all the time for more icons. ;)
 
Dear UberFelix,

Thank you for your lessons in marketing. I believe there's always room to improve, no matter how good you are, and some of the issues you mention above are things we have discussed internally. Since you're familiar with our products you've probably noticed already that Rome was a bit of an anomaly when it comes to the box (on purpose mind you) and the company branding is stronger on other products, particularly over the past couple of years. In general I think we have a pretty good grasp of the sales and marketing end in our company where talk is cheap and action/results is everything. We have gone from being a pretty niched strategy developer to a a leading Publisher of PC strategy games worldwide in less than 6 years with a turn-over increase of 30-40% each year. Hence, while we're not perfect in all areas, we've obviously managed to focus on the things that have created results. Can we make things even clearer for the consumer? Always. Are we in the habit of doing things at random at Paradox? Not really.

All the best
Susana Meza
 
Have to agree with steveh11.:D

And I have to say, "Paradox Interactive Presents: Battles of the Ancient World: Alexander, 700bc-300bc" makes me want to snore. And I am a history student.:p
 
Like I said, the company Webroot knows how to market their product visually with their lime-green boxes...
OK, I'll bite - who are they and what do they do?
 
There is so much I want to say, but I'll limit it to just this for now:

Paradox does not need to, nor should they dumb down their games/titles to appeal to joe blow or the A.D.D. teenager accustomed to playing Modern Warfare online.

First, neither one of those target customers would be interested in playing a game that doesn't require a $3,000 alienware computer to run. Second, the only "history" they know is that Iraq was invaded a few years ago.

In other words, these games appeal to a certain segment of consumers and Paradox does the most intelligent thing in that regard: They play up to our demand and knowledge of historical accuracy while combining it with engaging gameplay and in-depth strategy.

An example of another succesful company with that same forumla is SI Games. Since the 90s they have produced the Championship Manager/Football Manager line of games. Those are true Football simulators which bypasses the photo-realistic graphics that EA goes for with their FIFA series and instead favors the realism and accuracy of the sport.

The result is that the Joe Blows and kids with ADD buy the FIFA series made by EA while the hardcore football fans buy Football Manager. Never have SI ever considered dumbing down what is a very complicated game just to appeal to a mass market. Same for Paradox with their line of games which provide millions of people with endless hours of entertainment.
 
The only suggestion I am going to make is that when the title of a game contains the word "complete" in its title, please be sure that it is in fact complete. My Europa Universalis III Complete hasn't been "complete" since Europa Universalis III: Heir to the Throne was released.

Consider these definitions of "complete" at Merriam-Webster Online:
  • 2 : brought to an end : CONCLUDED
  • 4 a : fully carried out : THOROUGH
 
The only suggestion I am going to make is that when the title of a game contains the word "complete" in its title, please be sure that it is in fact complete. My Europa Universalis III Complete hasn't been "complete" since Europa Universalis III: Heir to the Throne was released.
I'm pretty sure they'll never again name a compilation "XXX Complete". Johan (I think) stated that they should have never called it that as well. Well, you know, 20/20 hindsight and all that...
 
I'm pretty sure they'll never again name a compilation "XXX Complete". Johan (I think) stated that they should have never called it that as well. Well, you know, 20/20 hindsight and all that...
aye for sure, the smart thing now would probably to update the complete version that is on gamersgate so people don't get fooled about it (but then I guess those who bought it will complain about not having the updated version grins) or name if "EU 3 Complete: The return (twice)" ;)
 
I'm pretty sure they'll never again name a compilation "XXX Complete". Johan (I think) stated that they should have never called it that as well. Well, you know, 20/20 hindsight and all that...
I like the convention of using silver for one expansion pack, gold for two, and platinum for three. Perhaps diamond for four (using major anniversary conventions)?