Summary
TheEuropa Universalisfranchise by Paradox is a top-rated historical strategy game series where players take the reins of various world countries during the Renaissance and beyond.Europa Universalis 4has seen a slew of different DLCs, each adding various things to the game world in the form of new mechanics and strategies for old countries.
A poorly kept secret is the development ofEuropa Universalis 5,codenamedProject Caesar, as the next-gen successor to the extremely long-livedEuropa Universalis 4.Project Caesaraims to be a big improvement over its predecessors, taking everything Paradox has learned from prior entries and even other franchises by the studio to make the bestEUyet.
1Simple And Effective User Interface
Essential For Both Beginners & Veterans Alike
Europa Universalis 4is a massive, sprawling game withdozens of complex mechanics- and often interactions between those mechanics. The trouble is, the user interface forEU4is creaking under the strain of dozens of patches and alterations to game mechanics forced into a user interface it simply wasn’t designed for.
EU4has a bit of a reputation for being hard to learn, and its user interface is part of the problem. More recent Paradox strategy games such asCrusader Kings 3have implemented a newer, more responsive UI that offers players in-game tips while playing.Project Caesarlooks set to implement a similar thing, along with other changes to UI which should make the games easier and more fun for old and new players alike.
2New Start Date
New Options And A Different Feel
A new start date offers a different playing field for old veterans of theEuropa Universalisfranchise, giving players the chance to try out all-new strategies with countries that often didn’t make it toEuropa Universalis 4’s1444 start date.
The proposed 1337 start date forEU5/Project Caesarpresents players with some very different situations for popular countries such as England or France, giving the game a fresh new feel - and the chance for all new countries to make it big.
3Mechanics To Avoid Blobbing (Or Make It More Fun)
Keep The Challenge Longer
Some of the best fun in any game is theclimb to the top, and that’s true for theEuropa Universalisfranchise as well. But as many players find, it’s all too easy to become too big to fail, and often the fun ends there. With some more (well thought out) mechanics to avoid blobbing, where players can turn into super large countries - or even face super large countries - the fun could continue until the very end.
Although part of the fun is in growing the country, many players find the challenges of running a large nation to be tedious more than fun. Some blobbing is inevitable, but it doesn’t have to be boring.
4Lose The Mana System
No More “Make It Better” Buttons
Although the monarch points system inEuropa Universalis 4gets the job done, many players find it to be annoying or overly abstracted. Although players can simply hit a button to instantly improve many things inEU4,from the progress of rebellions to the stability of the country and even the economy of a province, some players find it unsatisfying.
Project Caesarhas apparently done away with much of this system, replacing it with slower and less abstract systems designed to simulate something a bit closer to how things would really work. This should offer players new strategies when it comes to solving the classic problems facing countries in theEuropa Universalisfranchise, giving a fresh new feel to the gameplay.
5Better Peacetime Mechanics
Something To Do While The Truce Timer Ticks
Although much of the game is about war and conquest - along with managing conquests and cultures - the nextEUgame could benefit massively from a bit more to doduring peacetime. In other words, those times when war isn’t possible - no matter how much players would like it to be.
Although it doesn’t need to copyVictoria’seconomic and governance gameplay in its entirety,Project Caesarcould improve on its predecessors by introducing some elements from theVictoriafranchise such as laws and more fleshed-out government mechanics.
6Better Province/Location Granularity
More To Conquer And More To Manage
Although the map forEuropa Universalis 4has changed considerably since its release, with many new provinces being added by various patches, the overall design philosophy has remained the same. This approach has served the game well, but some players have noticed that the province system can result in weird border shapes or lead to strange situations during wars.
The new approach ofProject Caesar/EU5to include many more locations at a sub-province level, including the ability for armies to move through locations, gives anew layer of tactical thinkingto the problem as well as gives map painters more to work with.
7Better Development System
Simulated Prosperity
The development system added many years post-launch was a godsend to players, allowing them to finally improve provinces economically and militarily. This meant smaller, less prosperous countries in real-world history could improve throughout the game, allowing all sorts of new player-driven stories to happen.
But the development system is just a kind of monarch point sink, and there could be a much better way to simulate the development of a province over time than simply pushing a button to make it better. A new entry to the series should try to improve the development system.
8Addition Of Pops
Literal People Power
The question of population inEuropa Universalis 4is one that’s never really addressed directly, although it’s referenced many times in some of the game’s systems in a rather obtuse way - as a country’s “manpower.” But manpower doesn’t derive from actual populations and it’s an abstract system.
Like the popular economic strategy gameVictoria 3and its predecessors,EU5/Project Caesarwill include “pops,” a representation of populations that live in the game world. The addition of pops to theEUfranchise should offer a whole new kind of gameplay, with the potential for many more interesting stories to be told.
9Dynamic Trade Networks
More Interactive Trade System
Trade inEU4can be a complex system to get to grips with, but at its core, it’s all very abstract. There are trade goods and trade nodes, but they don’t actually do much in the world. People don’t use fish to feed themselves, nor is wood used to build things.
The trade nodes and their directions are fixed, without being able to be changed throughout a game. This means that thethree “end nodes” where all trade flowswill always be where the trade goes, even if a completely unexpected country somewhere totally out of the way becomes a massive economic powerhouse.Project Caesarcould fix that by giving a purpose to trade goods and introducing a more dynamic trade system.
10Better Performance
Late Game Shouldn’t Be A Drag
Most Paradox strategy games suffer with late-game performance thanks to the large number of things simulated and the increasing complexity of the game world over time, but late-game performance issues are still a major drag. From months that take whole minutes to pass by to wars that bring the whole system crawling to a stop, it’s fair to say that performance issues can kill an otherwise fun game.
ForProject Caesarto shine, it has to address performance issues. Paradox has done some good work with performance in games such asStellarisandVictoria 3,both of which feature pops and complex resource interactions, so there’s a good basis forEuropa Universalis 5to be even better.
