Recording *alternate* History. In detail.

[Miragu]

Just finished watching the start of Daniel's new play as Japan. Great video describing the details of the UI and how to play.

The thought just came across my head since this game runs through a timeline during which so much happens and in so many places it's impossible to savor it all unless you're playing at Speed 1, and checking every corner of the map as you play.

Nothing would be more satisfying after winning a great fight than sitting back and reliving it, watching how the world unraveled during your playthrough, at least in my opinion. It'd be cool to know how in your alternate timeline the battle that decided fates wasn't Midway/Stalingrad but Honolulu/London, for example.

I have a feeling this would be impractical to make since we'd have to track every unit move, etc. Obviously one way to record things is to record your game on video or something, but that won't cover the whole map, no? I'm not aware of other methods one could use to record games. Thoughts anyone?

 

[wiguy]

I like it. Civilization (4 I think) had something similar. You could watch cities being founded, border growth and border changed. Very crude, but I always liked the nice short playthrough afterwards. It probably wouldnt be that hard to implement something that crude. Every province that changes hands, and maybe mark large battles? Tracking army movement is another can of tuna though...
The idea is cool, but it's too late in the development progress to get it now. And to be frank, I'd rather have them focus on actual gameplay. Maybe as part of an expansion at best, but I doubt it. I don't think any other paradox games has it.

 

[Mac Lazer]

Like what wiguy said, the Civilization series had something like this. It was like a replay, where it showed the borders of the cities and civilizations changing and growing throughout the game. Now, EU4 has a province history system, so I assume one for HOI4 could be added easily. The game can then compile the information from all the province histories into a replay. It may take a long time, though, since there's like 10,000 provinces.

 

[Daddl]

They are adding this exact feature with the next EU4 expansion, where you at any time can watch how the borders in the world changed from your start date until present. You don't see the armies running around however I think, so its just the border changes, you are not able to rewatch particular battles or so.

 

[Axe99]

If you had the border changes, and then kept track of the battles (so knew which battles were large, for example), that might go some way? It's still likely to miss some things, but it could definitely be cool. Not a priority (I'd prefer time spent on the game proper than on this kind of thing, at least early on), but I'd pay for it .

 

[ssb]

If you had the border changes, and then kept track of the battles (so knew which battles were large, for example), that might go some way? It's still likely to miss some things, but it could definitely be cool. Not a priority (I'd prefer time spent on the game proper than on this kind of thing, at least early on), but I'd pay for it .

Same here. No need to track and show a flashpoint for every battle, just the top x% of battles that were won/lost based on forces involved/destroyed, key objectives captured/defended or battle plans completed, crucial victories where outgunned, and turning points in key metrics. Some of those would trigger events in Black Ice, so it doesn't seem like a complete stretch. Could be cool to have the replay also note non-combat highlights, like major national focuseses or when one of your most important pieces of equipment first rolled off the assembly line / slipway.

I'd also definitely be willing to pay for a more manipulable ledger. Ideally with options to choose the columns and filter results (figuring out which provinces to give to estates after every war in my EUIV WC run is becoming a major annoyance without that capability.) While we're wishing, custom charts too - just integrate tableau and excel into the game and I'll be perfectly content . (There isn't already a simple way to export paradox save games into a structured dataset, correct?)

 

[ssb]

I like it. Civilization (4 I think) had something similar. You could watch cities being founded, border growth and border changed. Very crude, but I always liked the nice short playthrough afterwards. It probably wouldnt be that hard to implement something that crude. Every province that changes hands, and maybe mark large battles? Tracking army movement is another can of tuna though...

I think I recall Civ I having this (though the entire game ran off a single floppy disk)

 

[Axe99]

I think I recall Civ I having this (though the entire game ran off a single floppy disk)

It's going back a ways, but IIRC correctly there was a replay even back in Civ I. Of course, I don't always recall correctly..... While it was a single floppy, from memory it was a single 3.5" floppy, woot .

 

[ssb]

It's going back a ways, but IIRC correctly there was a replay even back in Civ I. Of course, I don't always recall correctly..... While it was a single floppy, from memory it was a single 3.5" floppy, woot .

Yep, hard to grasp now how games like Civ I and Mechwarrior were so much fun without even using a hard drive. (This from a guy who just went overboard on a new M.2 SSD, at least partly motivated by a curiosity to see whether that and a new CPU might bring some stability to a Black Ice game where I invaded the Soviets through the Black Sea... as Japan )

 

[Axe99]

Yep, hard to grasp now how games like Civ I and Mechwarrior were so much fun without even using a hard drive. (This from a guy who just went overboard on a new M.2 SSD, at least partly motivated by a curiosity to see whether that and a new CPU might bring some stability to a Black Ice game where I invaded the Soviets through the Black Sea... as Japan )

Aye, it's just amazing how things have changed. I think Clash of Steel (a European-theatre WW2 hex-based, corps level strategy game I was fond of back in the early 1990s) was similar - it probably took up as much space as some individual assets will in HoI4! That Japan game sounds like fun, did the inproved CPU help?