Writing Wraith said:
The Vicky pops system is totally different from anything in EU2, as is the system for politics, technological advance and production (though there are similarities between Vicky's military production and HoI's). HoI 2 has very different system for the modeling of warfare, production and technological advance. CK's character driven system and feudal structure are totally unlike anything in EU2. How are you defining radically different while remaining within the same genre?
What do you see as flaws in the EU3 system? How do they compare with the differences between EU2 and the other EU2 based Paradox games?
Yes there are minor differences between EU2 and its spin offs. The POP system in vicky is a great example. It was still a minor difference however and the core idea of the game is still the same. The furthest from EU2 was CK with its dynastic simulation, but even that was only a medium sized difference.
I loved the HOI2 tech system, although it was a little over encumbered and until Armageddon it was all nation-specific (certain tech teams for certain nations) which made the game less fun. And in all actuality the entire tech system really didn't ADD too much to the game in the long run - it didn't make it SUBSTANTIALLY different than EU2.
A game that would be radically different while remaining still an EU style game would be almost a complete remake of every major system. NOTHING execpt for the engine itself should be brought over. Every concept should be re-designed.
Obviously i'm not expecting Rome to do this - but to call it anything other than small and medium changes to the EU3 format would be a sham - at least from what we've been shown so far. Its good they decided to call it EU:Rome instead of something different. It allows them to label it as a stand-alone expansion and thus keep many of the existing systems in place.
There were some major flaws in both EU2 and EU3 -- EU2 was too historically accurate, was out of date (engine wise) even before it was released (which ended up being a mixed curse- it helped pick up some sales, while hurting its chances with the graphics babies), and lost its appeal VERY quickly.
EU3 has its own flaws. Despite being atrociously buggy (even after all the patching), it picked up a lot of points for allowing history to diverge in many ways. Its easier to mod, yes still requires some deep knowledge to do anything short of making new events. The game needed things like a map editor for modders that was offically designed.
EU3s 2 other major flaw was shared by most Paradox games in some form (including EU2) - The first is Badboy/Reputation/Stability -- While there NEEDS to be a mechanic to keep people from going on conquoring sprees all the time, the system currently employed is so horribly portrayed that it alone almost caused me not to purchase NAx (seeing as they did nothing to fix it).
The other major flaw in the series is the lack of anything substantial to do during peacetime (and just barely more during wartime). - CK didn't suffer from this as much, nor did Vicky, but EU2, EU3, and Hoi2 all suffered from it enough to make up for that..
There needs to be MANY more buildings to build - and they need to be cheap enough that your always shuffling through territories deciding where to spend your money. All your money should go to your bank, and the concept of interest should be dropped- while realistic its a huge detractor from the game- during war time you should be able to assign your units to formations, and (like in HoI2) order your units to "dig in" when defending.
