Europa Universalis: Crown of the North

Crown of the North itself is a very simplistic version of EU set on a map of northern Europe. The AI is not terribly sophisticated and frequently fails to develop its territory in a way that would allow it to continue into the late game. Territory resources don't play as strong a factor as in other EU titles so that the winning strategy ends up as annexing the most territory rather than the most important territory. As an intro into some of the more basic mechanics of Europa Universalis, this game succeeds, but even the novice strategy gamer will find little replay value after a couple crushing wins.

Fortunately, the purchase price for Crown of the North includes one of the greatest computer strategy games of all time. The Europa Universalis II install on the CD is a complete version of the game with the latest patch (1.07). Technically it's not supported by Paradox (the publisher) but by Strategy First alone. However, access to the Paradox forums is available to all players and one can get help on issues or exchange stories of their latest conquests in a very active community of players. EU also has one of the most dynamic and accessible engines for modifications to the original program and the forums contain countless scenarios for unlimited hours of play.

If you are looking for a simple and fun strategy game or an intro to EU, then Crown of the North is for you. Play COTN until you are bored and then install EU2 and start playing one of the best and most complex diplomacy and conquest games to date.

If you already play EU2, find another fun mod and save your money.

In the game, you can choose to start as one of six factions focused within the three northern kingdoms of Sweden, Denmark and Norway. Somehow, almost from the start, the game lacks any sense of feeling that you are within the northern realms of these countries, or that there are even countries here interacting with one another. Unless your painfully familiar with the setting you'll probably find that the amusing graphics and layout of the game lend little to place you into the time or situation. It could be a fantasy setting for all one knows, if we weren't already told otherwise. At first glance, the graphics appear wonderfully pleasing but rapidly turn into some sort of comic like representation that causes a sinking in the stomach. The combination of these leads one to feel little for the setting or the events at hand.

Still, it's not even this lack of immersion that detracts from the game, but the actual gameplay itself. Unlike previous Strategy First/Paradox games in the genre, this one lacks any true sense of the necessity of tactic or grand strategy. It also lacks fun.

Developing your land is a crude and cartoon like activity accomplished by clicking on one of a handful of buildings and selecting the upgrade button. Each building upgrades by level, from one to ten, and the graphic that accompanies it improves three times during the ten clicks that you'll possibly manage for each. There is nothing related to technology or "advancing" outside of these shallow clicks you place inside each building and there is no sense of accomplishment with having done so with any of them. Perhaps this is because wealth is so easy to come by that upgrading as needed is done at will. All the same, this process of upgrading buildings is required for any province you want to produce troops from within and it quickly become tedious at best.

Within each building are an additional two options that enable you to endear or offend one of the classes such as the merchants, peasants, clergy or nobility. Because you don't actually interact with these groups you might please or insult with your rule, they all seem more an aside than an actual influence on the game. For the majority of my first game I kept the clergy well into a fully insulted state even going so far as to purposely do things to offend them just to see what would happen. I'm still unclear if anything negative occured as a result and I can't say that any other faction made much difference to my game whether they were happy or not. The only real loss or benefit I'm aware of was a hit or bonus to my taxes and even that mattered little since cash was easy to come by.

Combat is a rather uneventful affair as well. The main and perhaps only real strategy is to have a larger army to attack with. Outside of that, there is not much else to consider or ponder regarding your coming success or failure. Once you have defeated a defending army, conquering or sieging a province is done by simply watching a gold looking catapult make an annoying and unnervingly repetitive noise while doing little else.

Winning is accomplished by repeating the same thing over and over, province by province, building by building. I admit I was utterly shocked that the box this was delivered in mentioned anything about Europa Universalis at all. Well, that is perhaps its only saving grace.

While you'll probably find Crown of the North to be dull and drab, particularly after the first three minutes of admiring the updated map and graphics, you'll start to recall that Europa Universalis 2 was included on the same disc. Thankfully so, but only for those who don't already own it. In truth, it would be better to save yourself ten dollars and just buy Europa Universalis 2 which is a fantastic strategy game that just oozes with history and depth. Crown of the North is hardly nobility let alone a contender for the crown that is actually EU1/2.