Great start. Needs a ton of polish and bug fixes, but I guess it was to be expected considering the scale. I wasn't hopeful considering the last new game (Vic3) was simply dire (and remains dire), but this one feels like it's had a lot of love pushed into it. Hard to explain in mechanical terms, but it's like a nice chicken broth your mum would make when you were feeling poorly: hearty.

In practice, this is more like a child of Imperator and Victoria 2, than a sequel to EU4. You gently nudge your country & population in different directions with a fairly large toolbox at your disposal. Some mechanics are straightforward, others remain completely opaque at the time of writing, but I would say 9 out of 10 times you can generally figure out what the problem is and have some idea of how to solve it, which is a fairly engaging loop.

We've gotten some great game stories in the last decade or so, but what continues to set Torment apart is that: in spite of the word count and weirdness, the writing somehow manages to remain easy to digest. You'd think an older game would struggle to get its message across, but the simple vocabulary and universal theme holds up.

What can change the nature of a man? I hope you'll give this one a shot and find out.

Play a mage and crank up wisdom if you only plan to play once and want to get the most out of it

I offer this game my absolute highest of praises. It is a masterful example of game design: simple, yet meaningful.

It is rare to find a game that weaves narrative and mechanics so well. It's kind-of typical to expect to need some kind of dissonance / suspension of belief when playing any game, but not within Four divine Abidings. It is a genuinely meditative experience, both in text and in gameplay

If you're into idle games in general, this is one of those games we'll speak fondly of for many years to come

One of the more unique "Survivor"-likes, with actual build and character variety. My only criticism is that runs can sometimes take a bit long, especially with characters that are held back by crappy movesets... but your progress is saved after each 'phase' (which is often), so you don't need to finish a run in one sitting.

Several free updates so far that would usually be gated behind paid DLC, including new characters, mechanics and game modes

Relatively low price-to-entertainment value is a big plus too

(post-bug fixes) Astoundingly good crpg, on basically every front:

- Coherently and entertainingly written, without being overly wordy.
- Picking party members is painful because they're all appealing. Nothing necessarily unique, or groundbreaking, but the characterisation is consistent and refined to a point of mastery.
- Riveting combat, on both ground and in space. I can't get enough of it. It's horrifically unbalanced and some combinations and party members are obviously much better than others, but destroying the entire enemy team in a single turn still makes me feel like some kind of tactical genius
- Gosh the soundtrack. Again nothing groundbreaking but it sets the mood precisely: gets you pumped when it's time to be pumped and makes you anxious when it's time to be.

Very important note: you need some familiarity with the 40k franchise going into this to enjoy it from the get go. Rogue Trader is not about the meaty tough men that 40k games typically deal with, but is instead closer to high adventure in an extremely hostile universe. The game tries to introduce some concepts to you slowly and its an admirable effort, but 40k is dense to the point of absurdity, so try to read up a bit about it beforehand.

Derivative and not worth it at the price point. There's much better idle games out there for much less.

Visual style is ok, but makes it seems like there's more to it than there actually is

Surprising amount of (enjoyable and varied) content for the price tag

Initially, I think the tactical card gameplay might look shallow, but some persistence and patience with it really pays off once the true depth behind it reveals itself

One thing to note is that the translation isn't perfect, but you can easily figure out what they're trying to say and I've come to find it kind of endearing

A consumer-friendly live service game - which isn't saying much in the sea of absolute trash that is the live service space, but one hopes it will set a precedent.

It's not groundbreaking in terms of gameplay and it's jam-packed with bugs ranging from amusing to game-breaking. However, despite it's flaws, I think the player count speaks for itself. It's an extremely enjoyable game that keeps you coming back, especially if you have a coordinated group to play it with.

A terrifically boring, poorly optimised and disjointed world mashed together and undercooked inside a 20 year old oven

There's some sparks of great quality ingredients like the zero gravity combat and the ship designer, but they're buried under a mountain of mediocrity

I'd really like to celebrate Bethesda's attempt to build a new IP, seeing how very risky it's become, but Starfield feels like it could have used some fresh eyes and hands.

I'm mostly neutral on Vicky 3, but currently leaning towards 'no'.

Vicky 2 is one of my favourite games and at the barest of minimums I expected Vicky 3 to be an improvement. In some regards, it is... maybe. In many others, it feels like a different game with the name "Victoria" slapped onto it because of some narrative similarities, but mechanically and thematically (in the romantic sense), it is so very different! Listening to the Victoria 2 soundtrack while playing Victoria 3 gave me a degree of cognitive dissonance because my brain expects something entirely different when hearing the music.

The most fundamental difference between the 2 games, I believe, is population and how you interact with it. In V2, throughout the entire game, you'd directly interact with your population through focusing them towards something (e.g. getting them to become clergymen so their literacy would go up). The game had been out so long that the best strategies were already 'known' (get clergymen to precisely 4% of population for max literacy gains, any more is a waste), but applying that strategy to different countries is where things got interesting.

For me personally (perhaps other will feel differently), economy was always secondary in Victoria 2 to your population. Your main primary objective, always necessary for success, was your population's well-being and growth. You conquer or colonize land to get more room for them, or access to goods they otherwise wouldn't have. You build factories to fuel your population's needs, or that of your army (to conquer more land for your pops..).

In Victoria 3, I feel the main objective has inverted: from population, economy is now everything. The main objective is meeting supply & demand... or rather, trying to generate so much supply that everyone can afford everything. Population views are buried under a sea of menus. Their value to you is simply as another numerical resource on the factory build screen to make sure you have enough people to staff them.

I don't like this. Victoria 3 feels cold and cynical, where it should be hopeful. Advancing your population's well-being (both tech-wise and socially) was a huge draw of Victoria 2. it made countries and people feel real. V3 turns precious people into numbers and resources and frankly I think we're all exposed to way too much dehumanizing media already.

I don't think it would have been an impossible feat to recapture Victoria 2. CK3 managed to do this following CK2 (crappy DLC & post-launch development aside). I'm disappointed, so for now, we'll have to wait-and-see to see how it develops... unless they pull another Imperator (after finally making it decent too - seriously it's on the cusp of greatness).