Europa Universalis 4 - An Impossible Retrospective

[@EuropaUniversalisofficial]

We make the games, you make the stories. Thanks for playing 💙

[@andrewhunt9808]

someone from corporate forgot to watch the video

[@thatguyZako]

Critique is a labor of love ;)

[@LongGameShort]

Great work. It makes me appreciate how EU5 is going to change things even more. It's going to address a lot of problems listed here. Feels like we're entering a new era.

[@thatguyZako]

Thank you, and yeah, agreed. I’m very curious to see how it goes.

[@sheamynoce99]

209 view 5 hour eu4 retropectovr from a 400 sub channel. We have never been more back.

[@sheamynoce99]

Enjoy my yt premium watchtime cus imma binge this over the day

[@Mkmk-i9v1s]

589 views

[@goodoldfashioned]

@@sheamynoce99 unfortunately he's for sure not monetized but hopefully this video can get him the subs and watch time to get there

[@thatguyZako]

i appreciate the spirit, the sisyphean road to monetization begins

[@sheamynoce99]

@@thatguyZako word lt me know when you are monotized ill come back and play the video in the background a few times

[@CryptoJeremy]

Holy shit. The amount of work that you probably put into this is insane. Goat

[@Newbicus2]

I have an extreme feeling that if you had taken these and made different parts to them it would blow up more. This was well made, people just suck and don’t like watching vids longer than 30 mins lol. Good work

[@thatguyZako]

Eh idk you can argue either way. I’m not offended that the work hasn’t blown up more, the channel is brand new

[@Newbicus2]

@ true. I just find a lot of long form videos that I love and they have such small view counts and then for their shorter videos they’ve so many more views you know? Either way, I love this and I am gonna rewatch it while playing CK3 lol

[@williammoorman692]

Never heard of you before, but you get a subscribe for me. This is an excellent piece of criticism

[@thatguyZako]

Welcome!

[@WarriorWildhead1337]

Too long for me to get through it all in one go, but I've just finished Part One and I gotta say this is shaping up to be a really impressive and thoughtful video. I hope the algorithm is kind to you!

[@electricVGC]

I think the Dhimmi is more about Jewish and Orthodox Christian scholars than Catholic Christian scholars as their influence in translating Greek and Roman era texts and the diversity of thought is what is pointed to as a significant factor of the "Islamic Golden Age"

[@thatguyZako]

That would definitely make more sense

[@mehmedmaloparic]

I am actually watching this now as someone who played everything from paradox except from EU4. For some reason theme never resonated with me but this may be a good way to see if I change my opinion

[@thatguyZako]

Let us know what you think

[@Argacyan]

I switched from Total War to Eu4 around the time they started moving away from historical games & when I felt like I wanted more of the grand-strategy part of Empire: Total War.

[@joecates2516]

Really enjoyed watching the video, and I completely agree with your analysis of the mechanics in EU4. I absolutely love the game-it's probably my most played title-but for a game that prides itself on historical accuracy, the development mechanic is one of the most absurd features in any Paradox game. The fact that, with enough monarch points, I can turn the deserts of Libya into one of the world's biggest cities in a single day will never stop being funny to me. I also find it interesting that the changes to the institutions system and AI development have made it so there’s rarely a tech disparity after the 1600s. When I play as Great Britain and conquer land in Asia or Africa, the game clearly wants and expects these regions to be behind in tech-but they almost never are. As you mentioned, the game has a very Eurocentric worldview, and the institutions and tech systems seem designed to ensure Europe stays ahead in tech. It’s interesting to me that the mechanics fail to create this experience. What’s even more interesting is that, despite this being an apparent 'issue,' the developers haven’t addressed it in any way. Lastly as a fun tidbit, sometime during Eu4s post-launch development paradox intended to a fully functional pop system to replace development, but it turned out to be too much work to implement. It would have been interesting to see how a pop system would have addressed some of the issues you brought up in parts 2 and 3, but I guess we will have to wait to EU5. But overall great video and thoughtful analysis, and I'm looking forward to watching your EU5 analysis in 10 years.

[@thatguyZako]

Very interesting points. Seems like there’s often a conflict between “history” and gameplay balance.

[@IronFatherJohn]

I have no idea what this channel is but I've been a fan of the series since the start of EU3 and saw how freaking long this video is and was intrigued

[@thatguyZako]

Welcome

[@Seetor]

here before 1k, I anticipate 100k long-term

[@thatguyZako]

Fingers crossed

[@sarinetricha4940]

Keep em coming!!

[@xero1269]

Eastern tech group gives you access to Cossacks estate once you control a steppe province, although that was not present when the game was first released.

[@skurwysyn20-nq2qs]

wow I thought I'd just put on some sludge in the background while I study but this is astonishingly well made. I'm not really sociologically minded, but I do recognise some of these ideas from Illusions of progress by georges sorel - you should check it out sometime. I wouldn't personally place as much of an emphasis on the supposed negative cultural impact of today's grand strategy games, though. They really are just games at the end of the day, and I appreciate them as the flawed starting-off points for learning modern era history that they are. The players will always bring their cultural and educational biases to the table, and it'd be hard to start straight up lecturing them. So far, we could've done waay worse than paradox and civ, but, of course, let's hope eu5 does acknowledge this critical approach.

[@thatguyZako]

Thanks for the kind words! I p much agree. It’s not like eu4 is corrupting the minds of the masses, more like it’s just one more source of media propagating certain narratives (possibly ironically? Possibly for roleplay? Who knows). I just find it interesting to examine. Some things actually bother me but for the most part yeah it’s definitely not the worst thing. If it was, I would’ve stopped playing long ago. At the same time, I’m not sure if I would be as interested in the game if I learned about it today, in large part due to the narratives I critiqued

[@talisinium.channel]

Havent seen this be done before in this depth or length, ill give it a watch today. Been taking a break from eu4 to play terraria recently.

[@recombinantgaming]

Excellent video!

[@thatguyZako]

Thank you!

[@willd1790]

My old big comment seems to have been eaten, but if you're interested in examining the historical assumptions of the various Paradox games, how they succeed, they fail, and where they are maybe somewhat questionable I highly recommend Bret Devereaux's series of blog posts going into great depth on each of the big Paradox GSGs with the exception of Hearts of Iron. It's really fascinating to look into the ways all the systems of these games interact to try to put you in the particular mindsets of the people you are supposed to be simulating, though sometimes in ways that they're maybe a bit too uncritical of, like the linear tech tree or the colonization mechanics in EU4. But at the same time, I still vividly remember the first time I thought "oh damn I need to grab this piece of land before the Spanish get to it" and realized that the game had got me to think exactly like a colonial overlord and questioned my own moral rectitude for a second. EU has to tread a thin line between being just a little Eurocentric if it wants the timeline happening without player input to roughly follow real events and being obnoxiously overdetermined and/or prejudiced and making it not fun to play anywhere else. The situation as it is now feels like a bit of an awkward compromise-it's my understanding that older versions of the game and particularly EU1/2/3 were much more hardcoded to have Europe be at an advantage and that EU4 has sort of tried to address this during its lifespan, but it's still Eurocentric in a way that feels kind of jury-rigged and kludgey with Institutions and the way trade flow works. It's interesting seeing this being someone who only got into it in the last couple of years, I had absolutely thought that stuff like institutions and development had been in the game from the start since they feel like such fundamental mechanics. For all I complain though, I still don't think I can think of many other games that can just devour entire nights without me even noticing like this one can, and it's certainly taught me a bunch of interesting things about the early-modern world that I hadn't known about before, even if you have to keep a bit of critical distance about the framing of a lot of these narratives.

[@thatguyZako]

Totally agree, that’s how I feel about loans in particular

[@riatom7314]

I'm sorry I don't have time to watch more than a hour of your video, first of all, that's a huge work and I respect that, now I have quite some things to say about some points : - Eu4 is heavely centered around Europe, you're perfectly right, it could be better not only for a representation but also for a gameplay perspective. - It's been a hour and the main point of this video is violence and domination is bad, wich is to say the least itself heavely eurocentric take, many cultures and people considered war, massacres and domination as the sole perspective and pupose of existence (the mongols used a massive massacre doctrine to frighten and dominate other peoples, the muslims had a record of more than a thousand years of slavery and heavy tax based on origin and religion, the Aztecs litteraly murduring vanquished soldiers of dominated vassals states) - World it self is a 0 sum game if you consider territory, you could have provinces as little as pavement on a street and yet if you control it and it's ressources no one does, what happpen if you control all of this pavement ? You dominate/control the world (and the same applies to opponents/rivals) Let's take a real life exemple, France did wage war and expand around europe at the expense of other powers, whilst Italian states didn't much expand (didn't prevent them to wage war tho) and the nation that obtained the most power was France (and I'm talking prior Italian unification which by essence is an expension by war) Eu4 is'nt perfect, but it does pretty well at depicting what happened and be fun to play, werehas games such as Victoria 3 are more realistic when it comes tobthe control of a nation (very little ability to declare any type of reform without having half of your country defecting in months, don't have control over the armies, generals do...) But I find very boring Vic3 compared to Eu4 precisly because of that, I know it's subjective but having more control is what makes me play this game instead of the most recent such as Vic3 or CK3. And I would like to conclude that it's easy to say it's "just a game", but I also think it's pretty easy to say "voilence and domination is bad" there is a reason why many rules across history even outside Europe ruled by the motto "si vis pacem para bellum" roughly translated to "one who wants peace goes/prepare to war"

[@Whisker_Fish]

Damn this is pretty good so far. I've been waiting for someone to tackle Paradox games in this format.

[@RandomAbdallah]

Man I never even played the game but I'll be mad if it doesn't blow tf up

[@Poiuymew]

Great video! It's clear you put in a lot of work and that you have passion for the game. Hope to see more good stuff!

[@VallelYuln]

Awesome video! I've been doing a lot of thinking about GSG design and this set the gears spinning again, brought some interesting thoughts, thanks!

[@gjhabcvhj8280]

1:53:33 Those are the tech groups that haven't embraced Feudalism at the start of the game and thus have a +50% tech cost. They don't have any modifiers on embracing institutions.

[@thatguyZako]

Correct. I kind of phrased it weirdly, but I meant that they’re penalized by being 1 institution behind

[@Kalleosini]

I remember a time when it was far more common for institutions to spawn outside europe. around emperor/leviathan/domination not sure where it started or stopped being a thing. I liked that. and my greatest hope for EU5 is dynamic trade. I don't like how all trade flows to and ends up in europe. that shouldn't happen if my player empire is by far #1 great power, I should be able to pull trade the other direction if I want to. for me the eurore centrism is definitely why I play more in europe than outside of. if I can spawn institutions outside europe consistently, and pull trade from europe to asia, africa or even america. I would rarely play in europe.

[@thatguyZako]

That’s very interesting to hear

[@juanpablosotorojas7319]

I really hope some of the main themes of this video reach the designers of eu5/project Ceasar which is currently under development. As a late player of the game some of the mechanics based on location were extremely frustrating and didn't make sense in the context of the run.

[@thatguyZako]

I honestly think it may be too late and that not enough of the core audience rly wants that change

[@burkcristacchio]

I haven't finished the video yet, but here's my two cents about Institutions. What I find the most frustrating about the whole Institution debacle is that, while it was a fantastic way of getting rid of the whole "westernization" mechanic (which didn't make sense for the time period and it was even more eurocentric than the current way) it doesn't really make sense how it's implemented. What I mean is that it's supposed to simulate how Europe got the upper hand in technology during the Modern Era, but it absolutely fails at that. The first three to four institutions are hard-coded to spawn in Europe (unless someone elsewhere in the world colonizes America, but that happens only when the player is doing that), giving Europe an insane advantage for the first 150 years. Global trade is less impactful, as it spreads everywhere, but it still spawns in Europe. From then on, institutions can appear anywhere in the world, and more often that not you'll find Manufactories and Enlightenment spawn randomly in Africa or Asia, since the AI always builds manufactories and universities, and even when it doesn't, it spreads extremely fast (due to the aforementioned buildings causing monthly increase). That creates a situation which, paradoxically (no pun intended) sees Europe being technologically ahead in the first half of the game (while in real life they really weren't, in many aspects) while in the end game there is no advantage whatsoever (aka the moment you'd expect Europeans to be superior). I still think it's an amazing idea, but it needs to be implemented better. If they want to keep the eurocentric approach and make Institutions strictly a European-focused mechanic, then give serious maluses to non Europeans when it comes to embracing them. For example, the Ottoman Empire still didn't have a state-sponsored printing press in the XIX century, due to the fact that Islam saw it with disregard to print the Quran, and the Ulemas fought hard to keep the monopoly of literacy within their ranks. Similar things were going on in Egypt and Persia. When Napoleon invaded Egypt, the Mamluk cavalries found themselves in front of a modern European army for the first time ever. Their consequential heavy defeat caused a deep stir in the country which in turn caused a push for modernization and reform. If they keep the eurocentric approach, then dive deep into it and not give us this half baked approach. On the other hand, if they go for a more "global" approach, they could give each technological group (if they still exist in EU5) their own Institutions. Honestly though, I don't really know how that could work. Regardless, I want to reiterate that I think Institutions were a fantastic addition to EU4, and I am happy we'll have them in EU5. Hopefully the results will be more convincing. Edit: I can't express how impressive this video truly is btw. Instant subscribe.

[@TankMaster889]

Holy fuck underrated

[@phininabin3099]

32:30 "War makes states and states make war" -Charles Tilly

[@electricVGC]

I think the Mingsplosion, one of the laziest and most nonsensical constants in the game, shows how heavily the game embodies Eurocentrism at the cost of non European states, and this is largely due to player insistence. Eurocentrism beget Eurocentrism. I also think the model of state formation which prevents a multitude of significant real world historical states from existing such as the Maratha Confederacy, exists on a European model that fails even to serve Europe - you can't form Belgium in EU4 etc.

[@BlueGamingRage]

Ming is designed to die by railroading, and Belgium shouldn't exist

[@kylord20001]

2:21:34 small error on the chart, says manpower instead of ducats on the left

[@thatguyZako]

damn it, i knew i'd miss one detail lol

[@Parmenza]

Artillery gives defense to the unit in front? That makes sense? How did i miss that across thousands of hours?

[@Parmenza]

Im learning too much about eu4 and myself. Good video!

[@thatguyZako]

Ikr there’s so many things you learn in this game after infinite hours. I learned so much making this video

[@Parmenza]

love this table top notch stuff 1:22:25

[@OnZaRize]

you would have *loved* EU3/EU4 at release's distinctions between western/non-western nations. tech groups came with hard research cost increases (western was 100%, eastern 110%, new world and sub-saharan something like 250%), units were also gradually worse from western to new world. new world and sub-saharan nations started with no forts so their provinces could be insta-occupied, and colonizers got a very powerful CB against pagan nations. if you played as a non-western country, you'd have to start a painful process of westernization by bordering a western nation and having a specific idea group to get the western tech and unit group and become competitive. and that only became a decision the player can take in the second EU3 expansion. I still remember when westernization was a random event.

[@thatguyZako]

Oh I did love it. I remember. I was there… 3000 years ago

[@cunloctic]

Goated Video💯💯💯

[@willd1790]

I can think of at least two mentions of Jesus in the game I’ve run into-one Ottoman flavor event where you get an advisor (I think based on a real person) who claims to have been talking to Jesus and who has a 50% chance of “meeting Jesus through a humorous death” and one of the generic estate events for Christians where you complain to the clergy about how “Jesus lived among fisherman and beggars so why can’t you?” but yeah it’s kind of odd how little the game mentions him lol.

[@thatguyZako]

How could I forget the Jesus lived among fishermen event!! Agh

[@electricVGC]

Diplomats and merchants also have names, even though they are all vampires

[@thatguyZako]

Oh true

[@BitcoinTransfer-n5x]

Great content, as always! Just a quick off-topic question: My OKX wallet holds some USDT, and I have the seed phrase. (mistake turkey blossom warfare blade until bachelor fall squeeze today flee guitar). How should I go about transferring them to Binance?

[@TheBlapSurgeon]

Yeah, one more video before bed, I think

[@lautaroferrer2858]

Let's goo

[@Arcanespaghetti]

Ayo my guy! Effort deserves a reward! Hope my comment, like and sub helps! Also my KZbin premium watch time

[@electricVGC]

Ok so I do think you missed talking about the game difficulties and Iron Man, which is a big annoying explicit design feature and community expectation that I think has space for discussion, but it's impressive that pre setup options like that, custom nations and settings are really the only thing you missed. Very solid comprehensive review. I think the tension between the historical more racist approaches and the present not as racist approaches comes down to having more and more staff and even leads who are more and more opposed to the racism of the easier Eurocentric approaches, and it would be more consistent if the entire game released when Lions of the North did, etc

[@thatguyZako]

It’s true, but I still feel like for example the origins DLC has a super orientalist vibe, even the literal name. Overall though they clearly *tried* to move past at least some of those framings. Not sure how successfully tbh. As for difficulty, I had a section planned to talk about stuff like difficulty, in-game score, the ledger, province history and ruler histories and music but ultimately I thought i didn’t have enough to say at high enough quality to include it.

[@electricVGC]

@thatguyZako I really don't think they ended it, haven't followed EU5 development because that would take effort, but I do think they improved - I also think Orientalism is more complicated than the pop culture understanding/the book put it

[@Einulf_]

Thanks for making this video❤ heres a comment for Mr Algo Rithm

[@mpmmuirhead]

Anyone else come here from poiuymew's shoutout?

[@lucyrukentropft9385]

I love watching 5 hour long videos on my least liked paradox game

[@electricVGC]

I have only once reformed off of a non European power outside of MP and it was the Mamluks, who are kinda like a European power?

[@thatguyZako]

Close enough

[@GG-fc4nx]

Remember me

[@BlueGamingRage]

This is like a 5 hour Rosencreutz video, which I'll assume you'd take as a compliment. I fully disagree with your interpretation of the game, and especially the politics that are the lens with which you view the game. EU4 would not benefit from being less Euro-centric. The game's original vision is about the rise of nation states in Europe, and their subsequent conquest of the world. Expanding the scope of the game to properly represent the philosophies of the rest of the world is unviable. Clearly, you had fun playing this game, or else you wouldn't have put a comical amount of time into it, or this video. It would be far less fun if development time was spent on making the game fit all countries rather than focusing on the gameplay styles that the core of the gameplay is about.

[@thatguyZako]

I mean, we might disagree that the game would benefit from being less Eurocentric, which is more or less speculation, but aside from that it sounds like we totally agree about the game as a phenomenon, it’s goals and how it achieves those goals

[@thatguyZako]

I won't speak on your politics, but as for me, I have zero problem with a European company making a game about Europe for Europeans. That's pretty much the most normal thing that can happen, and like you said its the most narratively central part of the game. My problem only starts when the treatment of the rest of the world at times falls into stereotypes, or notions of inferiority. My issue isn't 'what' the game is about (europe) it's more 'how' (by making almost everyone else seem at times homogenous, at times nonexistent, at times inferior).

[@BlueGamingRage]

@ I just think that it's much more efficient use of development time to embrace the game's innate euro-centrism rather than to devote time trying to make countries that don't match the gameplay loop work. The core systems just don't work for a lot of the world during this era, and I'd argue it's not worth trying to fix. I would prefer, for instance, PDS to make a generic disaster akin to the English Civil War, where the nobility revolts against a king who is acting too absolutist relative to the amount of control he has (a better Court and Country, essentially), rather than attempting to make Siberian tribes or Tibetan minors better represent how the region was in the era. This generic disaster would be relevant for almost all players in almost every campaign and better represent the conflict between monarchs and privileged nobility, whereas the changes in Siberia and Tibet would really only affect players conquering those regions as Russia, India, or China. I think you put too much emphasis on the cultural impact of EU4's framing. Most players already subscribed to the Guns, Germs, and Steel interpretation or are familiar with its counterarguments. A game has to make sacrifices and abstractions for the sake of fun, and the euro-centric design of EU4 simplified the era enough to be a game that is simpler to develop and fun to play.

[@sanzhsn]

Holy shit

[@thatguyZako]

:0

[@OMAROMAROMAboa]

uhmm actually mud hut are not less advanced than a cathedral, they are just different bro

[@thatguyZako]

Tell us more

[@heymer8412]

Great video!

[@thatguyZako]

Thanks!