Hypothetically, if PDX were to make a game in one era which they hadn't previously, which one would be better?
I:R to CK
or
HOI4 to Stellaris
I:R to CK
or
HOI4 to Stellaris
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IMHO, right now HOI4 to Stellaris would be better because, due to the fact that I:R exists, any game set prior to or after I:R would be (unfairly) judged as just a prequel/sequel to I:R (or, in case of a Dark Ages game, also a prequel to CK3!) even when featuring new bookmarks, mechanics, challenges due to the historical start, etc. On the other hand, a game set between HOI4 to Stellaris, such as a Cold War GSG (which I strongly advocate as you can see in my signature) would allow PDX to do something original for a change, namely a GSG:
- where one must use means other than direct conquest to expand one's sphere of influence,
- which would deal with the consequences of one's country being a part of a rapidly changing world, one which changes dramatically in terms of politics, economy, technology and culture from decade to decade,
- which would give a chance to relieve or alter history, which some of PDX fans (and their families) have experienced firsthand and perhaps, give them a chance to gain a new appreciation of what actually happened, wonder what could have been and perhaps, inspire them to talk to living witnesses of said history while there is still time to do so.
PDX is capable of making a game set post-1945 which will not offend anyone, like PDX did with HOI4 in terms of its depiction of WW2. The question is: does PDX itself believe it can make one?
- where one must use means other than direct conquest to expand one's sphere of influence,
- which would deal with the consequences of one's country being a part of a rapidly changing world, one which changes dramatically in terms of politics, economy, technology and culture from decade to decade,
- which would give a chance to relieve or alter history, which some of PDX fans (and their families) have experienced firsthand and perhaps, give them a chance to gain a new appreciation of what actually happened, wonder what could have been and perhaps, inspire them to talk to living witnesses of said history while there is still time to do so.
PDX is capable of making a game set post-1945 which will not offend anyone, like PDX did with HOI4 in terms of its depiction of WW2. The question is: does PDX itself believe it can make one?
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I would agree with you on the cold war, but the problem is, like the dark ages, it would be a game which starts with one set of mechanics and ends with a very different one. I'm not saying they can't do it, and I'm certainly not saying that they shouldn't, but it sure would be difficult.
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The trick would be to determine which mechanics must be present throughout the entire era (and would have to be in the base game), which should become active some time later in the campaign and which can be safely omitted until further in the development cycle and then added via DLCs or not included at all.
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The Migration Period is one of my favorites of history, so many interesting characters, chaos, betrayals and violence.
I too would like Victoria 3, but the OP clearly stated:
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I:R to CK is a MESS. Badly documented mess of slow decline and ruination with proto-feudal tribes.
HoIIV to Stellaris is a "grand strategy of skirmishes and proxy wars"
Both could be characterized as a "quagmire". They tried East vs West already and cancelled it.
HoIIV to Stellaris is a "grand strategy of skirmishes and proxy wars"
Both could be characterized as a "quagmire". They tried East vs West already and cancelled it.
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I:R to CK3 (say: 395-814) would be a very risk move, since it could fall under a cheap copy of I;R or Ck3, but it also has high potential if done right.
The whole migration period that happened at the fall of the Western Roman Empire could be translated into innovative new mechanics and the fact that this was a time where many different tribes settled in foreign new land, seeing large scale cultural and religion shifts and the forging of new kingdoms would also provide an incredibly replayble empire-building experience.
It's also the period that saw the most "stereotypical" strategy game experince:
-starting as a small tribe
-rising to a global hegemon that dwarves all it's rivals
Example:
-Umayyad Caliphate
-Carolingian Empire.
But it could also provide some entire new experiences such as a Western Roman Empire "survival" playthrough or a Hunnic nomadic playthrough.
However, due to the general lack of precise information on the period and low public knowledge of the era could lead to the game struggling when appealing to a larger audience.
Ultimately i see this game either being a massive flop and failing to represent the period entirely. Or an underrated masterpiece with a loyal and fierce fanbase but struggling to break into a larger audience, and ending up with an untimely ending like I:R did.
The whole migration period that happened at the fall of the Western Roman Empire could be translated into innovative new mechanics and the fact that this was a time where many different tribes settled in foreign new land, seeing large scale cultural and religion shifts and the forging of new kingdoms would also provide an incredibly replayble empire-building experience.
It's also the period that saw the most "stereotypical" strategy game experince:
-starting as a small tribe
-rising to a global hegemon that dwarves all it's rivals
Example:
-Umayyad Caliphate
-Carolingian Empire.
But it could also provide some entire new experiences such as a Western Roman Empire "survival" playthrough or a Hunnic nomadic playthrough.
However, due to the general lack of precise information on the period and low public knowledge of the era could lead to the game struggling when appealing to a larger audience.
Ultimately i see this game either being a massive flop and failing to represent the period entirely. Or an underrated masterpiece with a loyal and fierce fanbase but struggling to break into a larger audience, and ending up with an untimely ending like I:R did.
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I would like to see a pre-CK game that is about the collapse of great empires and you are either trying to keep yours together or creating a new empire to replace the old fallen ones, either as a migrating group or seizing power from within an existing empire. I've only played CK3 but I've found that once you've gotten so big you are basically unstoppable and would like to play with the opposite experience, size is a burden that you can only maintain with a massive effort and, even then, still have a high chance of failure.
Lack of historical documentation or accounts of witnesses never stopped PDX from filling in the blanks with somewhat logical assumptions and extrapolations, even if they had to be revised in subsequent patches/DLCs.
Exactly: this is something NEW offered by a NEW game. I've mentioned it once during a similar discussion that outright military conquest is the equivalent of "been there, done that, got the T-shirt" of PDX games. Fighting one's opponent mainly via skirmishes and proxy wars (since direct military confrontation could lead to catastrophic consequences, WW3 included) would be something original for a change.
I beg to differ: we don't know what a Late Antiquity/Dark Ages GSG gameplay would be like and East VS West was cancelled due to inadequate development progress and issues with the quality of the Beta version, not due to the depicted period, gameplay mechanics or other constituents.
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It would be interesting to implement CK's vassal opinions and interactions system into a Cold War proxy state system.
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The year 100.000 BC to 15.000 BC. You might think that it would just be about stone age tribes trying to survive, but no! There's Atlantis and a bunch of other high tech civilizations, reptilians, Hyperboreans, plenty of entrances into the hollow earth, an ice bridge making it possible to walk to the moon, flying pyramids, etc etc. Pretty much every conspiracy theory you can imagine is represented. Late game you'll be faced with some randomly chosen existential crisis threatening to destroy everything, and your ultimate goal is to not collapse into obscurity (e.g. an alien force erasing any trace of people, one province at a time, with the set goal of only leaving alive one guy and a girl in a weird garden with suspicious fruits).
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I too might like to see Paradox give the second half of the 20th century a try. There's a lot there to work with.
And by the way, at least some of the team that tried to create East vs. West ended up making Terminal Conflict. I like that game quite a bit. If you have any interest in the Cold War, you should give it a look.
And by the way, at least some of the team that tried to create East vs. West ended up making Terminal Conflict. I like that game quite a bit. If you have any interest in the Cold War, you should give it a look.
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I'm going to be straight forward.
The reason these games don't exist is because these time periods all have complicated aspects to them that nearly equally make them hard to develop well imo.
They tried to do the cold war with east vs west and couldn't manage to make it fun.
Having said that I think the cold war is the best option. I just don't know what you can do to make it fun when all war will always be limited small conflicts. Pops and internal management and politics would be interesting but we're coming up on the tail skirts of very recent history. |
I don't imagine a game depicting any of the current conflicts going on in the world coming out well at all.
For older history. It's actually probably regional game play types that'd be more successful than a certain date range.
The fertile crescent and egypt might be interesting but it's a decently niche historical period. Chinese warring states and spring and autumn period games as well as sengoku would be much more popular imo and could be very sellable.
1AD-400AD is kind of hard to depict because it's 'stability'. A defensive type game could be interesting but it'd be pretty ground breaking.
400-CK3 would be very good but paradox is way too skittish to depict muhammed in game and if CK3 can ever depict a non-feudal realm effectively it may as well just be a CK3 DLC.
Paradox could do something super wild and make like a neolithic type game. Probably less about warfare and more about moving your tribe around trying to keep them fed and alive.
The reason these games don't exist is because these time periods all have complicated aspects to them that nearly equally make them hard to develop well imo.
They tried to do the cold war with east vs west and couldn't manage to make it fun.
Having said that I think the cold war is the best option. I just don't know what you can do to make it fun when all war will always be limited small conflicts. Pops and internal management and politics would be interesting but we're coming up on the tail skirts of very recent history. |
I don't imagine a game depicting any of the current conflicts going on in the world coming out well at all.
For older history. It's actually probably regional game play types that'd be more successful than a certain date range.
The fertile crescent and egypt might be interesting but it's a decently niche historical period. Chinese warring states and spring and autumn period games as well as sengoku would be much more popular imo and could be very sellable.
1AD-400AD is kind of hard to depict because it's 'stability'. A defensive type game could be interesting but it'd be pretty ground breaking.
400-CK3 would be very good but paradox is way too skittish to depict muhammed in game and if CK3 can ever depict a non-feudal realm effectively it may as well just be a CK3 DLC.
Paradox could do something super wild and make like a neolithic type game. Probably less about warfare and more about moving your tribe around trying to keep them fed and alive.
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Neither suggested period excites me. Late Roman era would need to be more of an economic and diplomatic game, rather than a map painter, unless you're playing one of the barbarian nations looking to expand into Roman territory. Not a terrible concept, but tricky to portray, and a lot of Rome-lovers will be sorely disappointed.
Post-Roman and Dark Ages would not be well suited for a GSG, as it had regressed to small wars at short distances. Potentially a good time period for a TACTICAL game, but not a GSG. Something like a cross between the CK series and Mount & Blade might be a huge success, where you have tactical-scale battles PLUS a real diplomatic and economic side of the game to deal with. I'm not sure Paradox has the expertise in the tactical side to handle it, however.
Cold War era seems to either involve a series of small brush wars and proxy conflicts, or else devolve into a nuclear exchange in which everyone loses. It has some potential as a non-map-painter game, but may be difficult to properly portray, especially without ruffling the feathers of current regimes.
Modern runs into far more diplomatic, social, economic, and political issues than military ones. Considering how shallow and awkward diplomacy has been in every Paradox game so far, I'm not sure it can be handled in a credible manner.
Personally, I'd be in favor of something set in the late Bronze Age or early Antiquity, with Egypt, Babylon, Sumer, Assyria, and possibly Hatti, Carthage, the early Greek states, and other empires in and around the Middle East in roughly the 2000 BC to 500 BC timeframe.
Post-Roman and Dark Ages would not be well suited for a GSG, as it had regressed to small wars at short distances. Potentially a good time period for a TACTICAL game, but not a GSG. Something like a cross between the CK series and Mount & Blade might be a huge success, where you have tactical-scale battles PLUS a real diplomatic and economic side of the game to deal with. I'm not sure Paradox has the expertise in the tactical side to handle it, however.
Cold War era seems to either involve a series of small brush wars and proxy conflicts, or else devolve into a nuclear exchange in which everyone loses. It has some potential as a non-map-painter game, but may be difficult to properly portray, especially without ruffling the feathers of current regimes.
Modern runs into far more diplomatic, social, economic, and political issues than military ones. Considering how shallow and awkward diplomacy has been in every Paradox game so far, I'm not sure it can be handled in a credible manner.
Personally, I'd be in favor of something set in the late Bronze Age or early Antiquity, with Egypt, Babylon, Sumer, Assyria, and possibly Hatti, Carthage, the early Greek states, and other empires in and around the Middle East in roughly the 2000 BC to 500 BC timeframe.
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EvW campaign would have lasted from 1946 to 1991. 1991 was exactly 30 years ago, so it is already hard to consider it "very recent history" and it gets harder to do so with each passing year.
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I hardly think the map painter crowd would be happy with it. Just see the first threads: Stupid game, I can't do WC.
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IR to CK. That way we can finally do a proper megacampaign. More to the point though the Migration Period is an underlooked era even though it immensely shaped a lot of our world's current cultures. I disagree that there isn't enough info out there to make a semi-decent map for the period either. Just take a look here. That covers most of the CK3 map already. I also do not think it will be difficult to model game mechanics for the time. The central game mechanics could be Authority and Prestige. Authority is linked to martial control of lands while Presitge is linked to whether people will acculturate to the player's culture. Here's how the gameplay loop could function -
This was something I came up in 30 minutes and I'm just one person. If PDX put a team together I'm sure they'll come up with something. Any of us would quite frankly.
- If you are an empire, then your goal will be to maintain your empire's internal stability, political unity, and development and trade - the sum of which will be Authority and Prestige.
- If you're a non-empire, non-neighboring tribe, then your goal will be like the Huns to push around the other tribes around you and even deploy warbands to conduct incursions/raids into established empires to weaken them. If successful, the empires will lose Authority and Prestige as doing so will impact their internal stability, political unity, development and trade. The tradeoff of course is that you yourself will have a significantly smaller army and way to boost your numbers but enough so that you could stake out some territory through a thousand cuts approach and wait until an empire falls into freefall. Prestige will then play a factor as even if you do conquer parts of an empire, if the empire has high prestige, the local population will refuse to pay fealty to you and you will have to keep quelling local rebellions while slowly increasing your populations in new territories with each generation via expeditionary warbands before you actually control your new territory (think the Anglo-Saxon migration to Britain and the conflicts between the Romanized Britons and Anglo-Saxons) and before you finally establish enough Authority to work on your Prestige and develop your territory to turn into a proper kingdom.
- Finally, if you're a foederati or foderati-equivalent tribe for non-Roman empires, then your goal will be to pursue a middle approach to the above two and develop territories and provide replacement services yourself against raiding tribes and boost your Prestige and hence Authority among the locals (think the Franks) enough to a level enough that helps you usurp a kingdom away from your parent/allied/patron empire.
This was something I came up in 30 minutes and I'm just one person. If PDX put a team together I'm sure they'll come up with something. Any of us would quite frankly.
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