In the last few years it's been pretty clear that paradox has been moving away from it's older more robust ledgers in its games, and out right never included graphs in most of them. Meanwhile every new game or dlc the dev's management, etc keep talking about making the games more accessible.
These two things are entirely at odds with each other and I don't understand why this trend keeps continuing.
I think everyone here can think of some classic strategy games that include graphs and ledgers, especially RTS games. I understand why often it's hard to justify sinking dev time into something that you're likely only opening up when a part of the game is obfuscated, to meta game, modding, or to just give yourself a quick pat on the back. Of course ledgers and graphs will never be the same importance as new shiny gameplay features but for the amount of work invested into them they're literally have the best return on clarifying the intricacies of the game.
I understand that part of accessibility is hiding information that is not generally necessary to play the game as to not overload newcomers. By not including graphs or ledgers though you're not just hiding that information away one or two layers deep (like the wonderful tool tip system) you're just outright removing a lot of that information without looking into save games, game code, and doing your own maths.
I know for a fact that even as a veteran I've had many scenarios in paradox games where I made some mistake and for the life of me could not figure out the reason for it or how a system is 'supposed' to look when you're playing it right. In older paradox titles my go to was to check the ledger which usually only tells me about the exact present events of the games and often that enough was enough to help save my playthrough or understand how i'm using a system wrong. In other games and a few paradox games like hoi4 graphs have enabled me to understand the mistakes i made in my past actions and often let me correct them before they lead my game to a frustrating failures. In many other, newer paradox titles, like stellaris and imperator for example I've literally found myself having to rage quit under similar circumstances knowing full well that the issue is some mistake in my handling of the games economy systems with absolutely no way to diagnose the issue at that point in time because the information, the graphs, the ledgers are just outright missing. (The new imperator ledger is definitely a small step int he right direction).
I'm not going to sit here and pretend that graphs and ledgers are the number one thing to bring the most accessibility to paradox games but I have a growing feeling that the dev teams and possibly the larger attitude at paradox is that graphs and ledgers are among the least prioritized form of accessibility and heavily undervalued.
They might not be sexy, or new, and they might not excite everyone or make a particularly exciting addition but they're tried and true and have been with us since the early years of gaming and in our own real lives for a very good reason. Sometimes the best most efficient way to deliver key information if with a list (ledger) and for trends a graph.
As a modder I know there are many many variables these games outright track anyways that are just straight up never going to see the day of light in an informative context otherwise. (imagine searching for that unlanded independent religious head in ck2 without the ledger)
So please for the sake of accessibility, for the sake of clarity, and for the sake of our sanities as we trouble shoot our in game mistakes, put a little more priority into the ledgers and graphs of all relevant paradox games across the board. Make that information accessible, if not readily at least one or two clicks away!
These two things are entirely at odds with each other and I don't understand why this trend keeps continuing.
I think everyone here can think of some classic strategy games that include graphs and ledgers, especially RTS games. I understand why often it's hard to justify sinking dev time into something that you're likely only opening up when a part of the game is obfuscated, to meta game, modding, or to just give yourself a quick pat on the back. Of course ledgers and graphs will never be the same importance as new shiny gameplay features but for the amount of work invested into them they're literally have the best return on clarifying the intricacies of the game.
I understand that part of accessibility is hiding information that is not generally necessary to play the game as to not overload newcomers. By not including graphs or ledgers though you're not just hiding that information away one or two layers deep (like the wonderful tool tip system) you're just outright removing a lot of that information without looking into save games, game code, and doing your own maths.
I know for a fact that even as a veteran I've had many scenarios in paradox games where I made some mistake and for the life of me could not figure out the reason for it or how a system is 'supposed' to look when you're playing it right. In older paradox titles my go to was to check the ledger which usually only tells me about the exact present events of the games and often that enough was enough to help save my playthrough or understand how i'm using a system wrong. In other games and a few paradox games like hoi4 graphs have enabled me to understand the mistakes i made in my past actions and often let me correct them before they lead my game to a frustrating failures. In many other, newer paradox titles, like stellaris and imperator for example I've literally found myself having to rage quit under similar circumstances knowing full well that the issue is some mistake in my handling of the games economy systems with absolutely no way to diagnose the issue at that point in time because the information, the graphs, the ledgers are just outright missing. (The new imperator ledger is definitely a small step int he right direction).
I'm not going to sit here and pretend that graphs and ledgers are the number one thing to bring the most accessibility to paradox games but I have a growing feeling that the dev teams and possibly the larger attitude at paradox is that graphs and ledgers are among the least prioritized form of accessibility and heavily undervalued.
They might not be sexy, or new, and they might not excite everyone or make a particularly exciting addition but they're tried and true and have been with us since the early years of gaming and in our own real lives for a very good reason. Sometimes the best most efficient way to deliver key information if with a list (ledger) and for trends a graph.
As a modder I know there are many many variables these games outright track anyways that are just straight up never going to see the day of light in an informative context otherwise. (imagine searching for that unlanded independent religious head in ck2 without the ledger)
So please for the sake of accessibility, for the sake of clarity, and for the sake of our sanities as we trouble shoot our in game mistakes, put a little more priority into the ledgers and graphs of all relevant paradox games across the board. Make that information accessible, if not readily at least one or two clicks away!
