I'm sure that if Paradox Interactive were Korean we'd have a "White Devil" cultural group with "Arab, European, Russian and Sorb" as sub groups.
Historicity - Culture group "east asian"
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No. Latin is far more common in writing.
Sorry, you have argued yourself into a corner. You argue that Japanese and Chinese are related because they share the han-writing, but that Europeans are not related despite that they share latin-writing. No, on one spoke latin outside church, but no one at all spoke han either (obviously).
Chinese cultures are hard to model, but if we just keep them in their same group despite their differences, we kind-of model the unity the states historical followed. Make Japanese and Korean separate from Chinese. I would suggest they share a group, but I don't really care.
An interesting tidbit: In 1500 2/3 of Stockholms population _was_ German.
But in the game a revolting Japanese province might well join the Chinese by itself...
And as other's have said the African culture group is just embarrassing.
Schnitzel is a very common thing in Sweden atleast. It's served in our schools from time to time. As is hamburgers of course so that doesn't mean anything itself
The point was that there were loads of ties between the Scandinavian cultures and the Germans during most of the game (just look at the names of the noble houses of these countries). The scandinavian languages also share a lot of history, language, etc with the German sphere and for a long time German was mandatory in schools while English wasn't atleast here in Sweden. This doesn't mean that they are in the same group. However do keep in mind that the Chinese and Japanese had less interaction than this...
Hehe that is indeed true as well. I just realized I never finished the sentance you quoted, it was supposed to say that educated people in scandinavia spoke german
From a historical perspective I totally agree, however I'd not want to see the programmers actually spending time on splitting the african group in the next patch, there are way too many things I'd like to see them do before that. As I wrote in the OP, there aren't sufficient in-game reasons to split Africa.
Asia on the other hand is truly embarrassing. Just to make it clear tho, in case any of the devs actually plows thru this thread, this is the best game ever made
Even by Martin Luther's time, writing is done in the local languages of the nations. Yes, the clergy used Latin, but most people are not clergy! (Literacy rates in London can be as high as 10-20% in this time period, clergy rates are much lower)
And of course, Han is simply the written form of Japanese, whereas Latin is not the written form of German. If you want to base it on people sharing spoken languages, india should have at least a couple of hundred cultures groups.
Not even that. Han script is a script of Japan, they have several others (as has been mentioned). And as also has been mentioned, the Japanese use it in a very different way than the Chinese do (and even within the Chinese "dialects" there are big differences in how signs are read).
And while English, German, Albanian are all written in a script based on the Latin one, they do not write the same language, Even though you know the letters it does not mean that you know the language.
Those other scripts were invented after the end of the game time frame, and while they are pronounced differently, they mean the same thing.
If you're claiming that written Japanese and written Chinese were mutually intelligible until 1822, you seriously need to brush up on your knowledge of Japanese.
Hiragana had been used since at least A.D. 471. It may have developed out of Chinese cursive script, but was uniquely Japanese from the start.
Katakana have existed since at least the tenth century.
And Kana (unique Japanese characters) have been used alongside Kanji (Chinese characters) since at least A.D. 759.
The only "modern" "Japanese" script is Romaji.
Hiragana had been used since at least A.D. 471. It may have developed out of Chinese cursive script, but was uniquely Japanese from the start.
Katakana have existed since at least the tenth century.
And Kana (unique Japanese characters) have been used alongside Kanji (Chinese characters) since at least A.D. 759.
The only "modern" "Japanese" script is Romaji.
Kana was also not formalized until 1900, Hiragana existed in both China and Japan. And there is probably as much variation in writing by going from one end of London to the other. (English spelling was very ad hoc for the longest time, remember)
Honestly, purely from a gameplay perspective the East Asian culture group needs to go, Japanese and Chinese provinces should not be revolting to eachother.
However, watching a bunch of eurocentrists defending Europe's two dozen culture groups while insisting that "East Asian" makes perfect sense is pretty ridiculous. Imagine if lee was a Korean insisting that written English and Croatian are the same language. Frankly, if the other groups were as loose as East Asian we would see "European" consisting of Mediterranean, Germanic, French, and Slavic.
However, watching a bunch of eurocentrists defending Europe's two dozen culture groups while insisting that "East Asian" makes perfect sense is pretty ridiculous. Imagine if lee was a Korean insisting that written English and Croatian are the same language. Frankly, if the other groups were as loose as East Asian we would see "European" consisting of Mediterranean, Germanic, French, and Slavic.
Not everyone is as self-absorbed as some europeans .. you'd be surprised at the level of knowledge.
At 1400, that is actually not that bad of a idea. The notion of a United Christendom is still alive and well, while European resistance to rule of outsiders existed here and there, there is no nationalistic struggle that the game tries to simulate in 1400. Language barriers was quite a bit smaller back then, with Latin being a lingua franca amongst everyone. French speaking English kings ruled large tracts of France, which does not seem to have annoyed anyone. In practice, there is simply no point in having the modifiers for non-accepted culture for one European nation ruling another.
I'm rather (not) fond of the North American one myself. Because, obviously, people in California and people in Nunavut? Nearly identical cultures. (Modding is underway).
But yes, I definitely agree
Lee - the modern use of kana was not formalized until recently (when katakana were relegated to foreign words), but kana were in use long before then, for formal documents. And Hiragana used in China is news to me, though I suppose that if it the use was minor or insignificant, my east asian studies profs may have skipped it during my major.
On the general question, are these cultures linked? Obviously, yes. They were all very profoundly influenced by early Imperial China (eg Han). which left a mark.
BUT, contrary to the person earlier who asserted that culture group just implies cultures that influence one another. Much of Europe influenced much of the rest of Europe (Italy early in the EU3 period, France midway through it...); and they all derived a lot of influence from Rome. That doesn't keep the major "cultures" of Europe (eg, French, German, English, etc) from being identified in the game as culture groups, with a wide variety of local sub-groups. I feel Asia should at least have a few culture groups.
(Also, a more varied cultural make-up in Asia MIGHT keep the Ming in check a bit)
Imagine that there is a number that describe how different two cultures are, and that if number is small, we put them in the same in game culture, if it is bigger, we put them in the same culture group, and if it is bigger still, we break it apart all together.
While there is a difference between Chinese culture and Japanese culture, it should score a difference smaller then that of English and Scottish, who are part of the same culture group. Chinese and Japanese shared far more linguistically then Scottish and English. Dress did not differ by that much in the Ming era between the two nations either, certainly not the difference that you see between kilts and British leggings. Southern Chinese Cuisine is damned near identical to its Japanese counterparts for most dishes that does not involve in raw fish. (and even the Japanese did not eat that much raw fish) Social structure can be a bit different at times, but the difference that you see between Lubeck and Brandenburg is far larger.
The point here is that for any given difference between Ming China and Tokugawa Japan, we can find a even bigger difference across two European nations that are part of the same culture group.
English and Scottish are in the same culture group largely for game reasons (so that Great Britain can be a union tag for the two).
And even putting aside the fruitless debate of "Was France closer to Italy than Japan to China" (Putting aside writing: pretty much any scholarly work of note in the era in France AND Italy was written in the same alphabet (latin) and language (latin also)), it's those game reasons that make lumping all four nations into one culture group. Korean or Chinese provinces would never revolt to Japan (and likely not to China either), and the notion that Japan would have an easier time controlling China than France would have controlling Northern Italy is...laughable at best (they would have an incredibly hard time).
And even putting aside the fruitless debate of "Was France closer to Italy than Japan to China" (Putting aside writing: pretty much any scholarly work of note in the era in France AND Italy was written in the same alphabet (latin) and language (latin also)), it's those game reasons that make lumping all four nations into one culture group. Korean or Chinese provinces would never revolt to Japan (and likely not to China either), and the notion that Japan would have an easier time controlling China than France would have controlling Northern Italy is...laughable at best (they would have an incredibly hard time).
Quoted for truth.
East Asia really needs a major rework, cultures being one of them. The territories within the staring Ming range should have at least multiple culture groups because there's multiple incompatible languages within the range, particularly in the south. If they can communicate at all at present is due to present schooling forced to be taught in mandarin.
To be historically accurate there should be factors that cause internal instability within Ming and make outward expansion very risky. For example, the Sui dynasty fell to internal instability shortly after it was inaugurated because of the massive losses caused by the grand canal and the war against Koguryo. There's also the factor of the various bordering countries historically threatening chinese kingdoms but that'd require an AI improvement so it wouldn't be that simple.
Japan being united and the second best naval power at the start of the game is a joke really. Add to that Shinto being the religion across the country.
Korea is also grossly misrepresented as well .. the peninsula is approximately the equivalent area of england, yet england has 2-3 times the number of provinces and on top of that they're dirt poor. Historically Koryo (the predecessor of Choson) was able to field in excess of 100k troops a few years prior in a planned invasion of manchuria .. you'd be lucky to be able to field 10,000 troops let alone 100,000.
Suffice to say that east asia needs major rework, cultures are just one facet
The Japanese would NOT have a hard time in China in the game's time frame. Look the Manchus or the Mongols. (Granted, the Mongols were a bit before the game's time frame, but not by much)
That is no longer true in the 17th and 18th century. By then, the French have mostly moved on to French.
Both the Mongols and the Manchus had to rule by the sword .. it's telling that Sun Yat-sen used "Oppose the Qing (ie. Manchu), Restore the Ming" as a rallying cry in 1911
The only reason the Mongols and Qing were able to stay as long as they did is because they pretty much used "Move Capital to Beijing" then "Adopt Chinese culture" (or large parts of it anyway). And even then people revolted against them eventually.
Japan occupying Korea, China occupying Korea, China occupying Japan, or basically anyone occupying anyone-but-China woudl have had a hard time.
Japan occupying Korea, China occupying Korea, China occupying Japan, or basically anyone occupying anyone-but-China woudl have had a hard time.
I would have to say that japan is not china...
from all my reading it seems like china had a strong and bright culture that at times may seem to out shine other cultures around it.
but the Japaneses changed Chinese ideas to fit their own culture.
Buddhism in china is worshiped differently than Buddhism in japan, because the Japaneses still honor their traditional "kami" Gods. Buddhism was brought is as a means to control the masses not to replace their traditional Gods.
so you see how they changed the idea they got from china
to fit their own culture/way of life...
from all my reading it seems like china had a strong and bright culture that at times may seem to out shine other cultures around it.
but the Japaneses changed Chinese ideas to fit their own culture.
Buddhism in china is worshiped differently than Buddhism in japan, because the Japaneses still honor their traditional "kami" Gods. Buddhism was brought is as a means to control the masses not to replace their traditional Gods.
so you see how they changed the idea they got from china
to fit their own culture/way of life...