Victoria 3 Review – My God, It’s Full of Numbers

I am a degenerate that likes weird strategy games and things no one else likes. I like Paradox games. But I am awful even by Paradox-liker standards. The toe to toe slugfest of Hearts of Iron? BORING! The intrigue and drama over centuries in Crusader Kings? YAWN! The globe-sweeping ambitions of Europa Universalis? PASS! No, I play a man’s game. A game with hair on its chest and a deep voice. A game for true alphas that are scared to eat a soybean or drive into a city and constantly tell everyone they are alphas (the mark, of course, of a true alpha male) and eat only meat until they get scurvy. I play…economics.

Victoria 3
Developer: Paradox Development Studio
Price: $50 USD
Platform: PC
MonsterVine was supplied with Steam code for review

The Victoria series isn’t quite the unloved child of the Paradox games (those are Sengoku and March of the Eagles, the children hidden in the basement) ((I enjoyed them)), but the Victoria series is more “What if we made a massive simulation of the 1800s economy so you could corner the market on grain and machine tools?” than the usual world conquest ambitions of Paradox games.

The usual Victoria introduction is reading a Let’s Play–I suggest Texas for Victoria and this How To for Victoria II–and instead of the mind rejecting it, as most sane people would, the mind goes “This sounds like the most amazing thing I’ve ever played.” THRILL to figuring out how to educate your dirty peasants to make them…more literate dirty peasants! GASP as your landowners try to coup you! SWEAR as the church turns against you just because you’re shoving them out of government! MARVEL as Britain gets mad and steam rolls you like a…terrifying steamroller, Britain is pretty powerful given this is Peak British Empire. EXCITEMENT!

It’s a weird itch to scratch, mind, and you are probably like me if you have it (a twice-divorced weirdo who will definitely be eaten by his cats) but if you do, then Victoria 3 is the best the series has ever been.

For one thing, they are actually trying to teach you how to play this instead of leaving you to cobble together an understanding based on lots of fiddling around, reading Let’s Play, and watching Youtube videos. There is a tutorial (yes!) that does a decent job of explaining things. After some basic orientation, it basically takes the form of…almost a “quest log” from an RPG, where it will task you with improving a building, then have “Tell Me How” and “Tell Me Why” buttons that walk you both through the reasoning for doing it and the “okay but actually which of the menus is that buried in” part of the process. There are still opaque stats and a lot of numbers to grapple with, but at least you have an idea for which part of the game to poke to make number go in the desired direction.

That is actually the key to the Victoria experience. It’s really about seeing how you can get all your numbers to go in a desired direction. And that’s also the downside, as such: This is a self-directed game, by and large. You can take the helm of the British Empire and run it into the ground if you like. You can start with a smaller country and figure out how to manage an economy. Or you can follow the tutorials and Youtube guides and eventually experience the joy of your trade routes finally making a surplus.

If you like to tinker and see what happens, the Victoria series is pretty fun and satisfying. I will say the feedback comes pretty quick in Victoria 3. There’s less of the “Oh, I made a mistake 20 years ago,” from previous installments. Start building factories and your industrialists and petite bourgeoisie might like you but the church may be mad you’re not pushing nationalism instead. Or you get a war declaration just because you declared another country’s capital was your territory and expelled their diplomats. Invade a nation ONCE and they hate you. Typical.

There is also a “current situation” button at the top of the screen that offers some pretty solid advice like “It would be helpful if you had access to literally any market” or “Your economy kinda sucks, brah.” There are usually some buttons and explanations that may not lead to an instant fix, but give you an idea of what to do. Or, worst case, an idea of what to punch into Youtube.

Even if you make classic “Paradox game mistakes” like neglecting your research, innovations do eventually diffuse through the world, so you’re usually not throwing sticks and rocks at “steamships” or “choo choo trains.” You figure it out eventually. It’s hard to reach a completely unsalvageable situation, though whether it’s worth salvaging is an entirely different question.

I think the real appeal of Victoria 3 and the series overall is it’s very self-directed. Picking one game can result in a completely different experience. Managing the diplomacy and economy of the British Empire at its peak is absolutely insane, then during the next run, you are trying to do things like “figure out how to even have diplomatic relations” and “wtf how do i economy???” in some backwater nation you are gracing with your benevolent rulership.

There is some combat, if you like that kind of thing, but it’s very abstract and you really just kind of wind up your military and point it at things and hope it works out. This isn’t a game for the conquerors and fighters…but if you’ve ever sat in front of a spreadsheet and felt a tear forming because my god, it’s so beautiful…welcome to the Victorian Era, chum!

The Final Word
It’s not for everyone…but if it’s for you, it’s really really really good.

– MonsterVine Rating: 4.5 out of 5 – Great