Mass influx of Imperator: Rome feedback at Steam

[Nuclear Elvis]

Paradox Leadership, Project Managers, and Game Developers should all pay attention to what's just started in Steam in the past few days, as Steam's Autumn Sale event just kicked in and Imperator: Rome price point dropped to $9.99 (USA price) for a purchase through Steam (and even lower prices at Steam key-selling vendors outside Steam).

This has resulted in a massive amount of new players, "new eyes" put toward Imperator, and if you scan through the hundreds upon hundreds (soon to be Thousands) of new reviews, most say the same thing:
- Why has Paradox abandoned this game?
- The game looks improved but not finished, and Paradox should give more attention to it.

I say this without owning the game (yet), because I went into the purchase totally Objective to see where the game is at in the eyes of the (gamer) beholder, and a very high percentage now enjoy the game but find it unfinished, as if they know it was intended to have multi-DLC packages developed in the future years.

Other negatives that trend a lot in the reviews:
- Players do not like the "Shattered Retreat" (EU term) type of retreat that makes a defeated army immune to damage as it crawls through the player's other armies and then finally ends its march and becomes eligible to fight again but the AI tends to immediately take on rear-defense lesser armies of the player, so it comes off as if a free infiltration of the player's army front. Paradox should think seriously about this system, because we EU players don't like Shattered Retreat nonsense either. Clearly a fix/update to make (if Paradox gives this game some love).
- "Loyalty Simulator" - several reviews say essentially this same thing, that the task to manage loyalty of Generals and Politicians becomes monotonous/tedious and crosses a line where the game is no longer "fun" but more of a task. Clearly, some AI functionality to help the player set up automated management is in order, among other potential changes.
- Some players say the game feels "Empty" due to lack of build-out of content.
- Some players are not happy that the game ends so early, that the game's total timeline should double from what it is now.
- Some are very angry that Paradox pulled Developers away from Imperator to help fix EU4>Leviathan, and that the going opinion of players was that the Imperator game was just crossing over to become a much better game at the time that resources were diverted elsewhere.

I'm merely a conduit of information on this one - it's a bit stunning if you see what it amounts to, as Paradox has what could be a very brilliant comeback in the making for Imperator, with a quickly growing customer base, but--- what will Paradox now do with the game that is Imperator: Rome in the end?

 

[zorkman]

Are you looking at the same site, as it seems as dead as a Dodo to me. As for these massive amounts of new players, they are still consistantly trailing the ancient V2, which is nearly a decade older, but still has a far more dedicated fanbase.

 

[Revshawn]

Please do not bother us with nonsense. 500 players right now on the game with Victoria 2 having 900 players and EUIV having 14,000 players.

Imperator has been abandoned and it will never get touched by Paradox Devs again. Never ever. Why would they? There's no money on it. Paradox had a shot at recapturing the old Rome days and they blew it. Maybe they'll try again some point in the future? But the fact of the matter is that Imperator, by and large, is not a fun game. There's some lessons to be learned from the way the launch was handled and what needs to be done in the future. But it is clearly a failed project. Clearly. This mockup post faking sudden increased interest in a very, very dead game is irksome. Please do not bring up the subject again as it is still a sour point for many Paradox fans.

All of the focus is on Victoria 3 now. Which, by and large, looks primed to be one of the most interesting games that Paradox has ever released. Let the ghosts lay where they are.

 

[Tullaris]

Sometimes in game development, a game just doesn't click and it doesn't work out. That's ok. You should risk shaking up things and try new stuff once in a while.

To me, Imperator ultimately failed because the time period it is set in it, we know too little about apart from Rome, Greece, Carthage and a few of the Alexandrian succesor states. Any tribe in Gaul or Britannia, meant absolutely nothing to me. Let alone somewhere in eastern Europe or India. So the replayability was ultimately too small.

 

[TinWiz]

Please do not bother us with nonsense. 500 players right now on the game with Victoria 2 having 900 players and EUIV having 14,000 players.

Imperator has been abandoned and it will never get touched by Paradox Devs again. Never ever. Why would they? There's no money on it. Paradox had a shot at recapturing the old Rome days and they blew it. Maybe they'll try again some point in the future? But the fact of the matter is that Imperator, by and large, is not a fun game. There's some lessons to be learned from the way the launch was handled and what needs to be done in the future. But it is clearly a failed project. Clearly. This mockup post faking sudden increased interest in a very, very dead game is irksome. Please do not bring up the subject again as it is still a sour point for many Paradox fans.

All of the focus is on Victoria 3 now. Which, by and large, looks primed to be one of the most interesting games that Paradox has ever released. Let the ghosts lay where they are.

Back in 2012, CK2 had 10X as many players as Victoria 2, and the last expansion for Victoria 2 was released in 2013. Comparing these games against each other for player numbers to determine whether they're worth working on is not consistent with what PDS has done in the past. There is certainly an argument to be made that further development of I:R is a good investment not just for the bottom line dollar return, but other market intangibles that affect the company's brand value and reputation.

 

[Revshawn]

CK2 was a new game that had just come out and was one of Paradox’s best games of all time. Of course it’s gonna have more players. I’m sorry what are you trying to prove here?

The game has less active players than Getting Over It with Bennette Foddy. And that’s exactly what you should be doing. Getting over it

 

[Nuclear Elvis]

An update for clarity - in Steam Reviews area, you must manually adjust your settings to see the total data pool. If you go into Steam's reviews or other metrics, the default view is only in the language you registered for Steam for your account. You have to manually select "All Languages" to see the total player data pool.

Current Stats? 80% positive reviews in the last 30 days for the All Language (i.e. grand total) of reviews in the system.
Why? A theory: Steam's sale event included a cut rate for the packaged deal (Centurion Bundle) of all DLCs/add-on content beyond the base game. Fact is, after a purchase of all available game content, >90% of Steam player base that does review games -- only reviews the Base Game, not the DLCs, and as result the Base Game review = Base Game + DLC/Content in place during the gaming experience.

So, the total I:R game (total released content) is bringing in an 80% positive review pool. That's actually impressive considering the rocky start to this game upon release.

I ended up buying the Deluxe version of the base game (admittedly, only available at a key vendor outside Steam), and then bought the Centurion Bundle inside Steam to round it out. After doing some research about the Deluxe edition/complaints on that specifically, the price point was still fair and not much higher than non-Deluxe game at the key vendors. If someone earned an extra $2 on my Deluxe buy, have at it.

I've enjoyed the game so far, now active over in the I:R forum area. I posted this here in sincerity - and it is accurate, there was a bunch of new reviews posted, and new players in the game (you'll see same in I:R forum, where more new players are posting as result of the sale event). I'm not here to prop up I:R, but I think there is a good debate to be had as to the future of this game. Would be a shame if shelved permanently, as there's potential here.

 

[zorkman]

Just had a look at all those new players & see currently there are 364 playing on Steam. I know this is a low time of the day for people playing, but in comparison the ancient Victoria has 511.

 

[elektrizikekswerk]

Back in 2012, CK2 had 10X as many players as Victoria 2, and the last expansion for Victoria 2 was released in 2013.

Vic2 was mainly distributed on physical data mediums (i.e. CD/DVD) and didn't require Steam. As such the "real" number of player was probably much higher than whatever Steam was telling.

I'd guess that today's numbers are much closer to reality due to said physical mediums not being compatible with modern OS.
Or modern computers... (I don't even have an optical drive anymore).

 

[Nuclear Elvis]

Just had a look at all those new players & see currently there are 364 playing on Steam. I know this is a low time of the day for people playing, but in comparison the ancient Victoria has 511.

The online-connected player total could fluctuate significantly with US/Europe day/early evening time frame contributing the most numbers, there's 770 in-game right now, as example.
However/Reminder, that's in-game with online connectivity. One can play the game offline and that is more the norm in some countries outside US/Europe.

 

[wthomas]

I think IR failed to generate enough interest because it was not as bold a departure from the original EU Rome. As a franchise, it lacked a defining mechanic. CK, EU, HoI, Vic all play have defining mechanics that the other games lack. IR just borrowed from the other franchises without adding something to the greater portfolio of games.

I can’t tell you what that defining mechanic would be for a Rome game, but I suspect it would start with the bold move narrowing the scope to just a few playable nations (at least intitially) - and a heavy focus on domestic politics. Like maybe you don’t control the nation unless one of your party or someone who falls under your patronage is in a position of power. But you could instead control a legate or two, or some sentators, a governor, etc, based on your influence.

anyway probably 15 years out until the next IR game at least so they have time to puzzle it out!

 

[Nuclear Elvis]

I think IR failed to generate enough interest because it was not as bold a departure from the original EU Rome. As a franchise, it lacked a defining mechanic. CK, EU, HoI, Vic all play have defining mechanics that the other games lack. IR just borrowed from the other franchises without adding something to the greater portfolio of games.

I can’t tell you what that defining mechanic would be for a Rome game, but I suspect it would start with the bold move narrowing the scope to just a few playable nations (at least intitially) - and a heavy focus on domestic politics. Like maybe you don’t control the nation unless one of your party or someone who falls under your patronage is in a position of power. But you could instead control a legate or two, or some sentators, a governor, etc, based on your influence.

anyway probably 15 years out until the next IR game at least so they have time to puzzle it out!

I really like that theme you laid out, in contrast to many of PDX's games drifting toward a "must have World Conquest" option baked in (blob painter sim). Instead that would be a "Rome Conquest" at top end, to move up ranks/political power, and perhaps one could choose to start in the military path to try and climb the ladder via military prowess, or there could be an internal political/senate path, or an external political/diplomatic path, or even just the "Hard Mode" start as a peasant, but then I admit I'd probably be bringing in my Mount & Blade: Warband bias into this too much. It is also a good point to be made, whether one plays a 3rd party/external view of things at macro level as if always acting as King/Emperor, or if you're down in the 1st person view and the game only lasts for a generation. Honestly, those are probably 2 different games (either of which I would play).

I've said this in another thread - the Game Dev's at least have to get Rome right, if no other nation. In other words, the game's balance, sense of challenge/competition, the events in sheer numbers/variety have to favor a Rome play through and make that "as fun as possible" for a gamer, even if you screw up an Armenia play through (a kingdom that I love to play in this series when I want an out-of-Rome experience). I played quite a bit of the EU:Rome - Gold Edition game that is the true predecessor for I:R, and enjoyed it at the time.

 

[Jernau_]

I can’t tell you what that defining mechanic would be for a Rome game, but I suspect it would start with the bold move narrowing the scope to just a few playable nations (at least intitially) - and a heavy focus on domestic politics.

Imo thats what have hurt IR and to some extent CK3. IR is a good game if you play the nations that have been more fleshed out.