Victoria has always been a geo-political grand strategy game about colonial powers in the Victorian era, usually culminating in a world-shattering conflict like WW1. The appeal of the series was that you could pick any nation, from great powers down to minor states or colonial territories, and carve out your own peculiar empire. I spent countless hours in previous titles doing exactly that, with mods adding endless replayability. Victoria 3, however, shifted direction. Instead of a balance between politics, military, and economics, it focuses almost entirely on economics and trade. That would be fine if the core gameplay loop still felt like Victoria, but it doesn’t. The military system has been gutted. Instead of maneuvering armies, managing attrition, and playing out grand campaigns, you simply assign a general to a front and watch RNG determine the outcome. Skill barely matters, just numbers. Worse, the map system creates fractured fronts that the AI instantly exploits, while y...

Since december game maxes out people's CPU and GPU randomly then crashes your whole PC. No patch to fix it, until then it'd be wise to stay away.

AVOID IT if you like strategy and diplomacy-based games. You WILL get addicted. (half the time you'll spend studying the game lol)

I assure you, the massive export subventions on automobiles are necessary for the security of our economy, billions must purchase automobiles.

The game is continuously broken with bugs, the liberate subject war goals has been an issue for nearly a month at this point without a solution being implemented. I bought $48 of DLC recently without knowing this was an issue. Fix the game Paradox

There are many many many issues with this game that are frustrating to encounter. Here is just a simple one that does not belong in just about any game: When you are preparing for a war in this game there is a time window where you and the person your declaring war on can call in allies or attempt to sway other countries into joining the war with you. Obligations are one way you can sway the AI to join its basically an I owe you bro thank you for helping me diplomatic action. The AI will even ask for an obligation on their own to join your wars but they have the ability to accept the obligation from you and then a week later just decide you know what I dont want to join your war BUT YOU STILL OWE ME THO BRO. Your obligation is still valid with that AI even tho they did not join you in the war and blatantly backstabbed your country. This should not be a thing and the developers should be ashamed of themselves for leaving this in the game for so damn long. Obligations can be used to forc...

Victoria 2 is way better. This game seems to get stuck in places and railroad you to the end. Let me give some examples. My populace had free healthcare, education, transportation, and welfare, but 50% of the population said they didn't have high enough standard of living. By the end of the game, over half of my population were still peasants. Even though 80% of the jobs in my country were manufacturing, my voters still considered themselves yeoman farmers. Even with 800% more political momentum, opposition parties would not win elections. I could go on. Your choices do not matter in this game, because the game does not register that you made them. Hard pass this buggy game.

First of all, everyone dogs on the military so [insert complaint about front lines] Victoria fills a really niche area for a map game. It is not an epic-like legend-based game like Crusader Kings. It is not a war strategy game like Hearts of Iron. Victoria is [u]the[/u] spreadsheet simulator where you turn demographics into statistics and politics into buildings and laws. Victoria 3 however is (from what I heard) a different experience than Victoria 2. Victoria 3 shifts further towards internal politics and economy. After 500 hours of Victoria 3, I'm seriously mixed. This game is fun. With good rng and enough imagination, I've had very enjoyable playthroughs. I just have one gripe with Victoria 3. I stopped playing after 1.8.6 (maybe I'll play later), so I can't speak for how this game plays after 1.9, but even still: there is really only one correct way to play Victoria 3. It goes like this. -max taxes -Construction economy -depeasant -topple landowner majority -privatize building...

Bug Edition 1.9 Victoria suffers from the same core issue that plagues nearly all Paradox games: promising mechanics at launch slowly crumble under the weight of misguided updates and an avalanche of bugs. Patch 1.9 severely disrupted gameplay balance, introducing game-breaking bugs that render entire playthroughs unplayable. For instance, war goals can randomly fail to trigger—especially when it comes to transferring subjects—which makes it impossible to play. Previously, the trade system was functional and intuitive. Now, it's been overcomplicated to the point where national development grinds to a halt. Falling into a debt spiral has become even easier, and building up an industrial base barely helps. Naval invasions are also broken, often failing for no apparent reason. The game now runs slower, feels clunkier, and is riddled with bugs—many of which make playing it outright impossible. It’s suffering the same fate as Stellaris, but at an accelerated pace. For ma...

I have really tried to enjoy this game, but I can't get over the feeling there is nothing to do but click build, then wait around for them to complete and a few numbers to change. If I get lucky there may be a law I want to change, but that's about as exciting as it gets.