Impressions from an Early beta-Preview

[King]

I am reviewing Victoria II, and I have written some stuff about my impressions so far on the message boards over at Blue's News (in a news topic about Patrician IV, of all things). Enjoy, or not (I am JaguarUSF, aka James Allen, of Out of Eight fame/infamy).

Here is your problem, you say this "POLITICS: nope, no reforms to do. Political party seems OK to me." and then say this "PRODUCTION: nope, all of the factories are started automatically by capitalists". if you want to build your own factories then your ruling party is most definately OK. Get rid of those weak willed Conservatives of Metternich's Faction and get the reactionary Neo-absolutists in. Then start building your factories.

 

[King]

If someone wishes to review Vic2, they should at least bother to play the game for the first 50 years of the time-frame, that's a bare minimum. Personally, I'd advise playing a GC or three with different countries, but I get reviewers don't have enough time for that.

This isn't a straight-to-the-action high-paced RTS like Company of Heroes. I love CoH, but the beauty of that game lies in a completely different corner than Vic2. Vic2 is a long-term game, with long-term goals on a global scale. The reviewer here claims you have nothing to do at first. I beg to differ. Your actions in the first ten minutes of the game, can still have consequences hours later. This is because a lot is automated and you can't reverse decisions at a whim. You aren't the grand puppetmaster, but the clockmaker, adjusting the wheels.

Enough of that, first off I know this review site and your man there is a serious reviewer. Secondly this is not a full review but only some early impressions.

 

[King]

I'm surprised. Like movies critics, video game critics usually don't publish critical comments on the game before the release date.

For the second time, stop this. Everyone is entitled to their opinion. Not every game we make appeals to everyone, if at the end of the day a reviewer gives his/her honest opinion that they did not like this game, what can you do?

 

[King]

Wait, there are no missions? Well, I don't remember having seen them mentioned in any DD, but...


From the Vic2 homepage among other places. I remember being surprised by this when I read it, but it seems it's not true? Or does it refer to another feature I'm missing?

I am currently asking people why it is still in the feature list when it was cut very early in development process.

 

[Darkrenown]

None of the things you describe are present at the beginning of the game, which is the situation I had in my example. It's hard to pass any reforms or have a revolution before you've started the game timer.

Austria can pick their ruling party from day1, so pop a state capitalist party in power and get building your economy if you want to

 

[Darkrenown]

You don't have to automate trade.

Although you really should. It works quite well.

 

[Darkrenown]

By this more honest first impression. Probably saving some gamers some money and dissappointment with that.

Without evidence for either side, how can you claim it's "honest"?