Europa Universalis IV Subscription Now Available on Steam and Microsoft Windows

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I got out at the right time.

Step 1: Hey, the subscription's totally optional!
Step 2: Hey, there's some cool new stuff that the subscribers get first!
Step 3: Hey, there's some cool new stuff that only subscribers get!
Step 4: Hey, you can only play the game with a subscription!

If Microsoft can charge a subscription for a word processor, PDX will charge you a required subscription for a non-continuous, single-player game.
 
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My question seems to have gotten lost in transit, so I will ask it again: does anyone know how this affects us financially?
 
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My question seems to have gotten lost in transit, so I will ask it again: does anyone know how this affects us financially?
If you have already bought all the DLCs you want then I would say "Not at all". Otherwise, the answer would be "Not at all unless you want to rent the DLCs you don't have for $5/£4/€5 a month, in which case it will cost you $5/£4/€5 each month that you choose to keep it up"...
 
If you have already bought all the DLCs you want then I would say "Not at all". Otherwise, the answer would be "Not at all unless you want to rent the DLCs you don't have for $5/£4/€5 a month, in which case it will cost you $5/£4/€5 each month that you choose to keep it up"...

I have all the DLCs except the unit packs and stuff like that. My concern is: what about future DLCs? I would like to know how it will affect any future DLCs.
 
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Nobody knows. But personally, I wouldn't expect price drops or deep discounts.
Welp. So you pay 5 euros for a subsscription that does not make fuure DLCs cheaper, and you can't get future DLCs without it? Guess this is where I stop updating EU IV then. Thanks you for your replies.
 
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Welp. So you pay 5 euros for a subsscription that does not make fuure DLCs cheaper, and you can't get future DLCs without it? Guess this is where I stop updating EU IV then. Thanks you for your replies.
As long as you are subscribed, you will automatically get all future DLCs without paying for them. And if you don't have the subscription, you can buy them the normal way(and pay a price which will likely be similar to the price of previous expansions(e.g. the next expansion Leviathan will cost 19.99 $/€ which is the same as the last few big expansions))
 
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As long as you are subscribed, you will automatically get all future DLCs without paying for them. And if you don't have the subscription, you can buy them the normal way(and pay a price which will likely be similar to the price of previous expansions(e.g. the next expansion Leviathan will cost 19.99 $/€ which is the same as the last few big expansions))

Thank you for clearing that up for me. Much appreciated.
 
I have all the DLCs except the unit packs and stuff like that. My concern is: what about future DLCs? I would like to know how it will affect any future DLCs.
I don't expect it necessarily to affect future DLC direct purchases at all, but things in the future are always subject to change and uncertainty. This applies whether or not any subscription scheme is running at the present time.
 
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I have a different kind of question. I have a Mac and a Surface, with Steam and EUIV installed on both. The subscription is only for Windows, I know. However, if I subscribe on my Surface, would everything show up on my Mac version, since they share the same account?
 
I have a different kind of question. I have a Mac and a Surface, with Steam and EUIV installed on both. The subscription is only for Windows, I know. However, if I subscribe on my Surface, would everything show up on my Mac version, since they share the same account?
The original experimental subscription programme was Windows ,only, but so far as I know this one is all OSs.
 
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Ah, oops, I did ask that question internally but got no answer - I should have paid more attention here :D
 
It's all about demand... it makes 0 difference if you guys complain about pricing as long as you keep buying/paying.
From a marketing perspective, there is actually an impact on sales from complaining. Easiest example is review bombing on steam, which this post isn't an endorsement of, but there's a direct and correlative effect between people complaining loudly and on multiple marketing channels, and lost sales. Its actually bad enough for companies that sites like Steam and Metacritic both take measures to either hide, remove, or deprioritize user review bombing. Not the opposite, because earned media sales from shallow user hype-reviews only works to improve sales. But review bombing or other complaining-adjacent actions from the user base will impact sales.

Just wanted to correct that because marketing is an interest for me, especially in gaming.
 
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From a marketing perspective, there is actually an impact on sales from complaining. Easiest example is review bombing on steam, which this post isn't an endorsement of, but there's a direct and correlative effect between people complaining loudly and on multiple marketing channels, and lost sales. Its actually bad enough for companies that sites like Steam and Metacritic both take measures to either hide, remove, or deprioritize user review bombing. Not the opposite, because earned media sales from shallow user hype-reviews only works to improve sales. But review bombing or other complaining-adjacent actions from the user base will impact sales.

Just wanted to correct that because marketing is an interest for me, especially in gaming.

The problem is, the game appeals to a quite niche market. They can't really rely on going for a wide audience for their income. So they milk existing audience. Complaining will deter some new people, but those who really like this type of game (the niche), will buy it anyway.
 
The problem is, the game appeals to a quite niche market. They can't really rely on going for a wide audience for their income. So they milk existing audience. Complaining will deter some new people, but those who really like this type of game (the niche), will buy it anyway.
Niche's are really vulnerable for a game with backlash, since they need to appeal to a larger percentage of their audience. GTA 5 is more insulated against fan backlash than EU4, but GTA 5 was the first example of steam hiding a spike in negative reviews.

Easiest way to visualize this is how someone buys a new game on steam. If you go to a store page, and you see the reviews are Mixed, it will give you pause to at least go scrolling through the reviews to see why. Now bear in mind, there's a percentage of people that won't even do that, and will skip a game entirely if its Mixed on steam reviews.

Same applies for review scores, people will skip a game with a 7 or less.

Also paradox game's aren't small anymore. EU4 and the others are some of the most popular strategy games on steam.
 
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