Will this be another I:R situation?

[Manbearpig]

IR is just so terribly flavorless. Even Rome itself feels absent of attention. I would expect near the attention that Rome got on every faction of significance. I wanted to like IR but it really feels like a barebones game where you are supposed to have fun with in-game events and role play things a bit, but that aspect is totally absent and there is nothing to role play.

 

[Hiiri]

Im still mad at all these youtubers that lied to us selling Imperator as the best game about Rome ever created, i learned to never trust someone who gets a free game to get more views on their channel

I hope they dont do the same this time.

They will. There's very little incentive for them to criticize these products. We, the consumers, just need to be aware that they're most likely deceiving us by not giving the full picture.

 

[Akbar The Great]

Two reasons to think it is not:

• The game have been in development before development of imperator: Rome started and is still in development right now.
• The price tag of the base game is 49.99$ which indicate more effort spent on the game and that paradox is willing to take a PR risk with the higher price tag as the bakslash of a poor release would probably hurt them more than it did with Imperator: Rome.

The price tag is virtually the same as IR was, so your 2nd point makes no sense.

 

[Father of Nations]

I:R had a rough start, but it got much better with the current version. I do wonder though if CK3 will have the same issues with Mac support as I:R does? Right now, it’s literally broken on Macs. And I haven’t reached that point yet where I‘d get a Windows copy just to play a game (other than EU4 or Stellaris, luckily both work fine on Mac).

 

[Ezumiyr]

Just my opinion, but I think it's difficult to have more than just personal opinions on that matter:
I could see that Imperator was going to be bland, disappointing game from the dev diaries. It didn't look well thought. I wasn't very surprised that it also had a bad launch.
CK3 has been in development for much longer, and there are a lot of indications that it's much more polished and well thought. It helps that the lead game designer is someone who seems more prudent and prone to doubts than Imperator's.

I believe that there will surely be some oversights here and there, but at this point CK3 just looks too big to fail. There are always people complaing about the lack of China or certain game mechanics, but the base mechanics seem robust enough, and we had multiple confirmations that they worked very hard on user experience.

I also think that it's not fair to consider that Imperator was a good game with a bad launch. It was a bad game, and it's still not a very good game because it was built as a map painter based on EU4 and not designed as its own game supposed to show the world of the antiquity.

 

[Volodio]

The price tag is virtually the same as IR was, so your 2nd point makes no sense.

No, it's not. The price for the base game only was 40€ for Imperator. Same for HoI4. The raised price was only for some special edition, similar to CK3 royal edition. While CK3 base game is sold 50€, so they did raise the price.

 

[collins3]

So, running into some kind of filter. Removing the URL to the Vice article (why am I reading this garbage, but I am stuck at home and filled with dread).

I quote:

" Crusader Kings has become one of those games that's synonymous with being hard and esoteric, similar to Dwarf Fortress. This game leans about as far away from that image as one possibly can. It's recognizably Crusader Kings, but I don't think most people will need to be obsessively checking a wiki to make sure they know what all the UI elements do, as I still have to do with Crusader Kings II. In speaking to Fåhraeus, it's clear that Crusader Kings developers Paradox Development Studio is hoping to reach a wider audience with this installment. Fåhraeus mentioned Sims players during the presentation Paradox streamed for the press. He said that he'd be happy if more women played, as well.


"We're not quite targeting the casual Sims players," Fåhraeus said. But when I described to him the basic aspect of creating a character in The Sims 4, where you select traits, roleplay their personality, and place them in a world already in progress, Fåhraeus smiled appreciatively.

---------------------------

So... who thought CK2 was too esoteric and hard? Are these changes to make it less difficult scalable in the rules customization? If I wanted to have a game of pool parties and getting drunk at bars and chasing skirts/pants/whatever you feel comfortable wearing I would play the Sims *random integer.

But yeah just give a thumbs down. Ignore a player that's been with Paradox since OG EU and EU Crown of the North.

 

[RhoDaZZ]

IR is just so terribly flavorless. Even Rome itself feels absent of attention. I would expect near the attention that Rome got on every faction of significance. I wanted to like IR but it really feels like a barebones game where you are supposed to have fun with in-game events and role play things a bit, but that aspect is totally absent and there is nothing to role play.

IR currently is Rome, Carthage and Greek states having a small amount of content to play with. The rest of the map is filler, the only purpose is to sit around for 150 years and wait till you can become a Greek ("who?") wannabe (you will never get anywhere close to as good bonuses as them anyway).

With CK3 it seems more of the playable areas will be fleshed out (just on the merits of how the character and RP system works), but tribals might be more hollow compared to feudals.

 

[Fediuld76]

But not that long. The problems started to appear with the first gameplay videos. We only have one yet and it's six minutes long.

In English language. In German language we have a pretty long video, and we discuss it on another thread how stupid the vassal AI seems to be.

 

[geckoman1011]

I loved EU III but was completely disappointed with EU IV, so I completely sympathize with the OP. However, when it comes to both the CK team and the CK III dev diaries, I feel fairly confident that at the very least we will get a solid game at start. Would I love a great game at launch? Yes. But I also feel like these games are so complex that its impossible to really be refined until its been let out into the wild and brutally tested by the sadists.

 

[EU3NOOB]

The price tag is virtually the same as IR was, so your 2nd point makes no sense.

No it's not I:R is $39.99USD and CKIII is $49.99.

That's not even remotely close to "virtually the same".

 

[pengoyo]

So, running into some kind of filter. Removing the URL to the Vice article (why am I reading this garbage, but I am stuck at home and filled with dread).

I quote:

" Crusader Kings has become one of those games that's synonymous with being hard and esoteric, similar to Dwarf Fortress. This game leans about as far away from that image as one possibly can. It's recognizably Crusader Kings, but I don't think most people will need to be obsessively checking a wiki to make sure they know what all the UI elements do, as I still have to do with Crusader Kings II. In speaking to Fåhraeus, it's clear that Crusader Kings developers Paradox Development Studio is hoping to reach a wider audience with this installment. Fåhraeus mentioned Sims players during the presentation Paradox streamed for the press. He said that he'd be happy if more women played, as well.


"We're not quite targeting the casual Sims players," Fåhraeus said. But when I described to him the basic aspect of creating a character in The Sims 4, where you select traits, roleplay their personality, and place them in a world already in progress, Fåhraeus smiled appreciatively.

---------------------------

So... who thought CK2 was too esoteric and hard? Are these changes to make it less difficult scalable in the rules customization? If I wanted to have a game of pool parties and getting drunk at bars and chasing skirts/pants/whatever you feel comfortable wearing I would play the Sims *random integer.

But yeah just give a thumbs down. Ignore a player that's been with Paradox since OG EU and EU Crown of the North.

They haven't made the game easier by adding pool parties. They've made the game easier by having the game do a better job at presenting information. The thing about not needing to go to the wiki anymore is because the wiki is essentially in the game, through their tool tip inside tool tip system (note, this might even mean the dev's will feel free to make the actual gameplay more challenging, now that the UI isn't as challenging).

And honestly, I'm glad they've done it. While I find CK2 easy and have memorized most of the obscure systems, I could only get one of my gamer friends to play CK2 (even the hardcore ones who play other grand strategy games didn't want to play it). None of them want to watch multiple hours of tutorials on YouTube in order to have a basic understanding of the game. The only friend I could get to play it was one who enjoys the masochism of esoteric systems.

 

[Akbar The Great]

No it's not I:R is $39.99USD and CKIII is $49.99.

That's not even remotely close to "virtually the same".

Who is talking about USD?

 

[Nyrael]

It should be kept in mind that Imperator is a sequel to an extremely flawed, unfinished, and confused game called EU: Rome. Though it was much better at release than its sequel, Imperator still had to figure what it actually wanted to be. It's biggest mistake was trying to be a Board Game like EU4, and started to improve greatly after it changed its vision and approach.

CK3 knows what it wants to be and is a sequel to a successful game. It may have issues at release, but they won't be the same kind as in I:R.

 

[BrytonJSwan]

It'll be like I:R in that I think a year after launch it'll feel like it has quite a bit more content than it does in september. However, unlike I:R I really hope it doesn't disappoint so many right when it comes out. I've mentioned this in other threads but I don't think my game senses are quite as sophisticated as some of the other people on this forum so when imperator came out I felt a little bad seeing everyone unhappy while I was content. I want you guys to be happy too! That's right forum user, I want you specifically to be happy.

I don't think it'll be like that tho hopefully. The game looks really promising and people seem to be like, I guess I would say critically enthusiastic? Like people have a lot of suggestions but most of the ones I've seen have been more like "oh this culture should have a different name" and less like "this foundational gameplay mechanic looks infuriating" which y'know, is a good sign.

 

[DaPacemDomine]

I don't think it will be at all like I:R in terms of what a bad place that game was in at launch. For one, it can't be. CK is now Paradox's most profitable franchise. They can't afford to have a dud with the next iteration. But also, unlike I:R we know a lot of details about how the game actually PLAYS with CK3 ahead of release. We have detailed articles and video footage of what has changed and how, and still have plenty to learn in the more than three months left before release. If I have total confidence in any Paradox franchise, it's Crusader Kings. Confidence enough to pre-order which I almost never do with games anymore.

 

[LordofLight]

I don't think it'll be like I:R.

I:R has an extremely flawed foundation and a scattered vision with no real focus as far as I can tell. Even now.

CK3 on the other hand has CK2 to fall back on for a vision and hindsight of what to do better, it looks good so far. Features don't seem to be flawed at the most basic level (So not Archmage: Rome, a simulation of being the worlds most powerful mage with your mana).

 

[the_atm]

Well, as CK3 looks now - it's CK2 in current state minus some plus some in brand new dress and with bright future. So, only two thing PDX can fuck up on start - is that CK3 will be buggy as hell or unbalanced in some aspects.

I feel like to a degree, games like this will always be unbalanced and buggy. Having a team of 25 or even 50 play testers is nothing compared to 10,000 plus players playing, and min maxing, playing in ways that some dev's might not even thought possible.

I guess it depends on the severity of unbalance and bugs. I've just come to expect that with GS games in general.

 

[Marijn]

I'm confident that CK3 is streamlining and upgrading CK2 for a new decade. Everything they added as dlc to CK2, is now designed from the core in CK3. So I'm expecting CK3 on day one to be on the level of CK2 in it's current form.

 

[IntoTheStars]

I'm confident that CK3 is streamlining and upgrading CK2 for a new decade. Everything they added as dlc to CK2, is now designed from the core in CK3. So I'm expecting CK3 on day one to be on the level of CK2 in it's current form.

This isn't true (no playable Republics, unique nomad mechanics, artifacts etc.), but I am pretty confident that almost everything being removed is something that PDS didn't like the implementation of in CK2 and will give another crack at in CK3 at some point. These games have a lot of stuff added to them over time, and not all of it is good, so I don't even think we should want everything ported from the last game. Keep the good stuff, cut and later iterate on the bad stuff, come up with some (hopefully) good new stuff.