Customer Reviews

Europa Universalis III

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

I have had the game less than a week and have already spent WAY too much time playing. It's great! The AI is very good. Lots of decision making in the form of alliances, builing up your country, manpower, diplomancy, war, merchants and more. Yet, you don't get bogged down "micromanaging" everything. Planning for the long term is necessary and acheiving "victory" is what you make of it. Just surviving for 300 years could be considered a great victory for the likes of Barvaria or Serbia. You have control to make and create history.
The game has been visually redesigned as well. It looks great. It's not World of Warcraft, but compared to EU2 it's leaps ahead of it. An upgrade is already available (for free) from the publishers on thier website. The game comes on one CD and is quick to load. A great game for lovers of history and gaming.

I have purchased each release upgrade in this game series and, in my opinion, EU III is by far the best in the series. Unlike other reviewers I really like the new look of the game and the ease and access to more information you get from the other views of the map - terrain, political, religious, etc. - really an enhancement. As to the divergence from historical events, I rather like the play of this edition better than the slavish approach of EU II to history which caused things to happen that, in the context of the game being played, made no sense at all.

The big plus to me is that I have not encountered any bugs in EU III after many hours of play. EU II was very buggy, even after downloading patches. III has been solid.

Another thing I really enjoy is that the economic logic really makes sense - you don't have to experience hyper-inflation as was inevitable in II. The national development options also make better sense. I enjoy the military improvements - vastly superior to previous releases; the whole game is just better in every way.

I absolutely love these games and am deeply addicted to playing them at virtually every opportunity. If you enjoy thinking about what you're doing and really planning things and then watching your vision take shape, this game is a winner hands down!!

You need a somewhat modern system with a video card that supports Pixel Shader 2.0 to play this game. If you don't you will be disappointed.

The game itself is incredible and blows away it's predecessor EU2. The new 3d graphics are nice and the interface is quite easy to grasp. Of course this being a Paradox game there are bugs, but with their user feedback forum and participation of the dev staff in said forum, patches have been released fixing many of the issues.

If you liked EU2, Victoria, or HOI...you will LOVE this game

The game is not visually appealing compare to Medieval 2 but overall the computer opponent's AI or gameplay is far superior in Europa. You actually have to think twice before you declare war on your neighbour because allies will actually send troops to help your neighbour and your allies will actually send troop to help you. This will never happen in Medieval 2. If you get attack by your neighbour. You are on your own because your allies will just watch and do nothing. This game has endless posibility as to what route you want to pursue such as exploration + colonization of new world or world domination where as Medieval 2 you only have one choice: conquer or be conquered.Europa has more replay value and more options. You want a game that makes you think or one that looks beautiful?

I own almost all of Paradox's games from EU1 to Victoria: Revolutions and I've enjoyed every single one of them. As someone who values historical accuracy, good gameplay, replayability and in-depth strategy, I would highly recommend this game to all like-minded individuals. A previous reviewer used World of Warcraft as some sort of industry bar with which to compare all computer games, even ones of so different a genre. If you value looks over quality of gaming experience, I suggest console gaming. To the more discerning individual however, the intricacies of dynastic politics, the trials of leading a nation through 350 years of history and the excitement of altering the course of human events offered by this game are sure to please. Otherwise there is really no point in purchasing this game. I would suggest a stroll down Broadway if all you want is a pretty light show, it would be much less taxing on your obviously overtaxed mind. EU3 is a bit of a system hog compared to its predecessors, but I can run it on my midrange laptop so, if you cannot run this game I suggest upgrading your hardware.

This is not a game for the casual game-playing public. If you think Civ4 is complex and challenging, EU3 is not for you. On the other hand, if you are a serious armchair general/dictator looking for a grand strategy platform, this is the best and latest from the studio that also produced the excellent Heart of Iron series.

As can be expected for a game of this genre, the learning curve is steep and the time required is long. The gameplay, however, is deep, broad and long-lasting, so to each his own.

This game in my opinion is the best earth strategy game that I have encountered since Civilization IV. Game play is very addictive due to the long period of time it takes to accomplish your goals, i.e. colonization, expansion and construction.

In agreement with some of the other comments, I do wish the tech tree moved faster but if you are any good with programming, that is easily changed.

As far as all the other comments about bugs and crashes, I don't have anything to say except that it has run to my surprise flawlessly on my system. I don't know if the problem is perhaps that those who have problems, simply have older systems or operating systems that are inhibiting gameplay. So I'd say be cautious, but if it works for you I hope you enjoy it as I did. I would've given this 5 stars for fun if the gameplay went a little bit faster.

Also I wish the AI's were a little bit more intelligent and could mount a truly good military offensive across multiple fronts. But this has been a problem with almost every strategy game.

All things considered, I would recommend this game.

What can I say about this game that has not already been said? Strategy lovers should get this game hands-down (though, if you do not have a version, get the Europa Universalis III Complete, so that you get the two expansions and the patches that are included in them).

The game does have a learning curve, but nothing that cannot be cured by playing the game, and referring to the manual or the online forums if you do not understand how something works. A couple of points that I found that helped me is to watch your inflation (though it cannot be helped raising it in the beginning), and have the advisor window open when time passes so that you can pause it and snatch the advisor you want whenever he comes along. Unless I missed it in the game, one pop-up option they could have included is notification of when a certain kind of advisor or certain class of advisor is available for hire, so that you did not have to babysit that window. That is a minor gripe really, and a matter of preference.

Refer to the other reviews on this site for the game mechanics and details, as I feel mentioning them will just be redundant. Bottom line, if you are a strategy gamer, and enjoy involving strategy and planning things out, and a strategy game where war is not the end-all of the game, this is a game for you, and you will get tons of replay value for your dollar.

Paradox Interactive makes Grand Strategy games. Emphasis on Grand. If you plan on playing a PI game, you'll be playing for days, if not weeks. And EUIII is definitely built from the same mold. If you're familiar with Civilization, then EUIII is a lot like that, only even more unforgiving and complicated. There's about a thousand things happening at once, except very very slowly. It may take you a game or two before you start understand enough of it. It did for me, and I read the manual through first. That said, it's incredibly engaging and allows the player to take a myriad of actions in response to any single action. Even if they have no idea what the outcomes of those actions will be.

Bugs caused most of the negative commentary and I almost didn't buy this game due to that. They must have fixed the bugs in the 1.3 patch. I haven't had any issues at all on XP.

Other posts describe the game well, so all I will say is that for strategy folks: This game is so good I am currently obsessed with it. Haven't had a strategy game do that to me since Civilization 1.