Why developing I:R 2 when you can come back to I:R

[IsaacCAT]

The recent news about PDS interactive renewed focus on GSG and the tweet from Arheo has made me think that they might be considering I:R 2. I'd say, why developing a new game when there is still so much you can do with I:R ? For example, building upon the work by Invictus and improving the vanilla game could be done by a group of engaged devs ( probably modders ?)

https://twitter.com/x/status/1847729315540324416

“We want to get back to what we’re really good at and make sure that it stays that way: that we are best in class in GSGs [Grand Strategy Games], best in class in large games, and that we talk to our players as much as we can, because I think we lost a little bit of that,” Fåhraeus says. “What we’re doing now is getting back to quality, to a relentless focus on what the players want, making sure to talk to them, not getting lost in hubris. It’s very important to always have this communication line open with our players.”

Paradox wants to “go back to what we’re good at” after being “overconfident”

We speak to CCO Henrik Fåhraeus and Deputy CEO Mattias Lilja of Paradox about the company's recent setbacks and the way forward.

www.si.com

 

[Morboth]

The recent news about PDS interactive renewed focus on GSG and the tweet from Arheo has made me think that they might be considering I:R 2. I'd say, why developing a new game when there is still so much you can do with I:R ? For example, building upon the work by Invictus and improving the vanilla game could be done by a group of engaged devs ( probably modders ?)


View attachment 1205434

https://twitter.com/x/status/1847729315540324416

“We want to get back to what we’re really good at and make sure that it stays that way: that we are best in class in GSGs [Grand Strategy Games], best in class in large games, and that we talk to our players as much as we can, because I think we lost a little bit of that,” Fåhraeus says. “What we’re doing now is getting back to quality, to a relentless focus on what the players want, making sure to talk to them, not getting lost in hubris. It’s very important to always have this communication line open with our players.”

Paradox wants to “go back to what we’re good at” after being “overconfident”

We speak to CCO Henrik Fåhraeus and Deputy CEO Mattias Lilja of Paradox about the company's recent setbacks and the way forward.

www.si.com

I will literally support anything that will see I:R or a sequel get non-ironman achievements. I literally refuse to play any Paradox game that does not suscribe to this logic and it is one of the sad reasons because of which I must stay away from the beauty that I:R is.

So, bar for an update removing ironman-only achievements from I:R, an I:R 2 is something I can very much hope fo! Knowing that their new business model did away with that most horrible of features, I can conly hope for an I:R 2 that will allow me to experience that time period afresh.

 

[Gurkhal]

Going back to Imperator would be good. But I feel like that might be considered damage goods in many peoples' eyes and thus creating something new from scratch with the lessons learned from Imperator might make it more viable for commercial success. And thus continued support from Pdx.

 

[IsaacCAT]

Sure, damaged goods is a powerful concept.

However, my romanticism is not bound by rational concepts.

Romanticism - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[Dagda]

Imperator was already the successor to EU: Rome. Both games sold poorly and ironically made similar mistakes.

Any third attempt at a Roman themed GSG doubtfully would be called I:R2. And I:R's current playerbase is just too small for PDX to go back considering its actually lower than Vicky 2's as I type this post.

 

[SVKblitz]

Making sequel to the game that had recently failed sounds ridiculous to me. We got our ancient game and people didnt want to play it so thats it. I think we wont see any new ancient game next ten years.

 

[IsaacCAT]

Classicism - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Classicism has come and gone many times, e.g., the 15th, 16th, 17th, 19th and 20th centuries revivals. I agree that we might take ten or even more years to have a new game in antiquity. That's why keeping I:R updated will give PDX an advantage when the time comes to develop a new game because the classic period is fashionable once more.

The advantage is not being a repository of ancient history in a game database but having a reputation for being a quality content company in that area.

PS: do you think Mercedes or BMW stop making cars because one model does not sell well? They keep introducing new models and people keep buying them because they are recognized as high quality car manufacturers.

 

[darkyodada]

Making sequel to the game that had recently failed sounds ridiculous to me. We got our ancient game and people didnt want to play it so thats it. I think we wont see any new ancient game next ten years.

If Imperator didn't work when it was released, it's only the fault of Paradox and not the players. When it was released, the game was empty and uninteresting. The DLCs that followed were just as uninteresting. No new important mechanics, only missions. No big updates for modding, for a game that was supposed to be the most moddable (CK2 is more moddable than Imperator and it's over 10 years old). Of course, 2.0 was good for the game, but would we have been given it if the players hadn't yelled when we were told about the DLC on Wonders? The answer is no. This company has lost its way, look at one of the last interviews made by the managers on Cities Skylines, it's lunar and the communication on the abandonment of Life by You, which is also lunar, so much so that everything seems to be done on sight without hindsight. So to think that they will learn from their mistakes and bring us a better quality imperator game, I don't believe it at all. Especially since we are still waiting for an official announcement of the end of the game (but if you remember when we said in 2021 that the game was dead and we were told at the time that no because when a game was stopped it was officially announced. We are still waiting)

 

[SVKblitz]

People didnt come back when 2.0 released and thats what matters to paradox, it didnt make easy money like hordes of DLCs for other series did and they still do, so thats why i dont see any hope for IR revival or new ancient game.

I came to paradox because of HoI2 long time Ago. I bought IR at launch, knowing nothing about ancient era, but the game was so Bad i almost refunded it. After years of frustration with hoi4 i gave IR one more chance just about time when 2.0 was in development and I really loved it! It Made me love ancient era. However after canceling the game I dont support paradox anymore and i dont buy any new content.

 

[Rabid]

I do agree with you, but I think that unfortunately economic reasons are going to forestall further development on Imperator even if it clearly makes more sense to improve on an existing (but flawed) game than push out an entirely new one. Alas, a lot of people base their purchasing decisions on hype and feelings rather than researching the product, and in that context it's almost impossible to get away from the stench of a bad release.

Rather than an I:R sequel, if Paradox are actually considering a new game I'd expect it to be a spiritual sequel of sorts. For example, a Bronze Age or Migration Period game would have some clear similarities in theme and gameplay, but give them enough space for the game to be unique in its own right rather than just a rework of a recent failure. And it would be able to market itself as something totally new and exciting.

It would be a real shame if all of the things Imperator does well are either left by the wayside or thrown into the big pot of ideas for EU5 (as much as I have enjoyed the EU series through the years, the Early Modern period is really not the one I find the most exciting, historically speaking!)

 

[Chaostrian]

I:R is the best game Paradox has released (in my opinion), I already have 2k hours of playtime in it and I'm willing to invest another 2k into it.

But I wouldn't support I:R 2. I:R already has everything a good game needs, what's missing is a little more in the mechanics and not in the missions.

One thing that puts me off about I:R is the fact that you have a map on which there are only a few states out of hundreds that have something to say historically...

You shouldn't have brought so many tribes or nations into the game just because one culture existed. It would have been better to simply remove the tribes that historically had little or nothing to produce in any way and instead bring in a very developed colony system.

Of course, except for tribes where famous characters like Vercingetroix or something like that come from or tribes that have something to offer historically.

Rome not only conquered Gaul but also colonized it a lot, and that's what I'm missing in I:R, the colony aspect.

Yes, you have 3 different variations of territories (settlement, city, metropolis) and you can also build buildings there... but I think that just doesn't do enough. You would have had to bring in something like a character that you assign a territory to and under certain conditions he builds a city out of the settlement that is also well developed and contains a few Roman pops and then at some point when he has achieved his goal you give him another one territory, and so on and so forth.

That would also be fair to the tribes because they wouldn't have to wait 50 years until they had enough sesterces to build a building, but they would also have the opportunity to build cities and be able to build up a little competition with the republics and monarchies.

At the moment it's like this: you give a character, a territory and after a certain while he just builds a building and that's it...

And to underline the argument about the number of nations again:

I played I:R with a friend back then and he had no idea about the ancient times. He probably didn't even know that people had existed for so long. What happened: he played a tribe in the north of Scotland... and didn't enjoy the game because it simply had no content...

He played Macedonia in a later round and had fun, but only after I told him that.

And now imagine how many players bought and played the game but had no idea about the time and then played some content-empty nation somewhere on the map and never touched the game again from then on...

And a quick conclusion before I write in such a rage and forget what the actual reason for this thread is: The game is good... I support further development of I:R more than a successor. But I wouldn't say no to a successor either. Unfortunately, everything is still up in the air and I don't think that one or the other will really happen. I:R had a predecessor and it wasn't particularly popular, now I:R came out in 2019 and the game wasn't really popular either. So what tells us that a third part will be popular?

It came out in 2019... in 2021 development was "stopped" and we now have 1.5 months before the end of 2024... the game has now been out of post-development longer than it was in it.

I don't think anything big is coming. If something happens, of course, I'll happily dance here in front of my PC and enjoy my life.

I'm sorry for any grammatical errors, but I had to use Google Translate to write the text. My English is not good enough for such large texts. xD

 

[Calardaras]

Maybe it would be easier to rebuild the basic mechanisms rather than just decorate them.
2.0 did many wonderful things, but it also did the most damage to the game's future. The content that IR lacks is definitely not the narrative; it's an added bonus, but it should not be the core of a GSG (CK3 is an exception).

Mission trees are essentially just a series of flags ,triggers and effects; and while they can achieve certain narrative, event chains can do the same and are even more flexible.

 

[TinWiz]

A Migration Era game would be great. Something that starts in the late 5th century after the Fall of Rome and ends in the late 8th or early 9th century with the Viking Age. The popularity of CK3 mods in that time period shows there’s a demand for it.

Migration period | Dark Ages | Migration, Barbarian Invasions, Decline | Britannica

Migration period, the early medieval period of western European history—specifically, the time (476–800 ce) when there was no Roman (or Holy Roman) emperor in the West or, more generally, the period between about 500 and 1000, which was marked by frequent warfare and a virtual disappearance of

www.britannica.com

 

[IsaacCAT]

I have always stated that I:R 2 should start where I:R finished, that is 27 BC When Octavian assumed sole rule of the Roman Empire.

This will be a completely different game of I:R and a true successor.

PS: the real challenge for PDX would be to make a Grand Strategy Game being fun to play with a huge empire not crumbling, very different from a map painter starting point.

Roman Empire - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[IsaacCAT]

Can we have more good news for I:R alongside a commercial success for Gladiator II?

Gladiator II - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[SVKblitz]

Imperial era is indeed very popular but it doesnt fit into paradox grand strategy formula so I dont see this happening ever. Starting world needs to be diverse and fragmented. IR already suffers by lack of diversity compared to EU4, So the era itself is a drawback front the beggining. While its not games fault, it definitely took off some players.

I would rather set starting date a few years earlier before conclusion of samnite and diadochy wars. Paradox clearly picked up 303BC to guarantee Roman rise to power.

 

[Vohen]

A Migration Era game would be great. Something that starts in the late 5th century after the Fall of Rome and ends in the late 8th or early 9th century with the Viking Age. The popularity of CK3 mods in that time period shows there’s a demand for it.

Migration period | Dark Ages | Migration, Barbarian Invasions, Decline | Britannica

Migration period, the early medieval period of western European history—specifically, the time (476–800 ce) when there was no Roman (or Holy Roman) emperor in the West or, more generally, the period between about 500 and 1000, which was marked by frequent warfare and a virtual disappearance of

www.britannica.com

I have my doubts, this seems like the most forgotten period of European history in popular media.
That said, how well did TW: Attila sell compared to other TW titles?
This might be a good clue for what we're dealing with (as well as the idea of marketing the game around Attila would make things much easier)

I have always stated that I:R 2 should start where I:R finished, that is 27 BC When Octavian assumed sole rule of the Roman Empire.

This will be a completely different game of I:R and a true successor.

PS: the real challenge for PDX would be to make a Grand Strategy Game being fun to play with a huge empire not crumbling, very different from a map painter starting point.

Roman Empire - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It'd be very different from PDX's usual formula for sure, at least if one's playing as Rome.
I imagine it'd work more like a tower defense game, but it could work.

Can we have more good news for I:R alongside a commercial success for Gladiator II?

Gladiator II - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Hoping for a Roman revival in pop culture, this alongside Anno 117 could spark interest in the period again.
And then, who knows...

 

[yezhanquan]

Personally, I've started playing Fields of Glory: Empires, and that game held my attention better than Imperator.

 

[Calardaras]

After spending hundreds of hours in FoG:E, I find that I'm increasingly missing IR. Of course, if I were to start playing IR again, I'm sure I would also increasingly miss FoG:E.

The rise and fall of FoG:E was initially very fresh, but over time I found it as annoying as the missions in I:R. I really hate when the system provides me with a goal that I have to conquer, most of which are unreasonable most of the time.

Overall, I think that FoG:E's trade, products, buildings, and military development, basically all the economic-related systems, completely outshine IR. In the remaining aspects, IR should win.

 

[yezhanquan]

Oh, I never bother with the objectives set by the game unless they are along the way.