Crusader Kings Complete

At the first sight Crusader Kings seems as small poor brother of Paradox series like Hearts of Iron, Europa Universalis or Victoria. But deep inside are hiding many features which are superior. The main fun comes from feudal system made from royal houses, vassals and claims. Another strong thing is church which you need on your side. Game is also great introduction to Paradox strategies. Its much more intuitive without deep micromanagment of economy, technologies or units. In contrast of its brothers it has also much bigger replayabality because its very dynamic and every game is different even without your influence. One crippled king should ruin empire which his precedessors had built over centuries:) Some may ask why not buy CK 2 instead or why play CK 1 when you have already 2 with all its DLCs. CK 2 is not better in all aspects but its not worse game either. I like CK 1 slightly more, partly because nostalgia, partly because graphics and partly because more simple and more polished game mechanics.

Curiously, despite its far larger budget, it's successor lacks some of the atmosphere and ambience of this earlier Paradox title. Smaller in scope, it still brims with the nefarious and mendacious comings and goings of the medieval court. Excellent stuff.

See my full, detailed, review here: http://www.rindis.com/blog/1859 Strategy games journalist Troy Goodfellow once said that Crusader Kings wasn’t Paradox’s best game, but it was his favorite from them (this was in 2011, before CK II came out), and while I’m not sure what my favorite Paradox game would be, I can well understand his sentiment. Once again, Paradox showed that they could take the same basic game structure, and deliver a very different feel. From the grand sweep of empires across the globe in Europa Universalis, to the very detailed study of society and internal politics of Victoria, this time the game has a very personal feel. It isn’t a role-playing game, and cannot be mistaken for one, as there are no real characters here, and no dialog, no spark of life behind the actors on the stage. But the actors are there, and they are people, and not countries. The common failure of most grand strategy games is to ignore the centrifugal forces that act against larger structures, while preserving most of their advantages. In CK, keeping a large kingdom together for any length of time can a harder accomplishment than conquering the world in a game like EU. It isn’t a detail-oriented simulation like Victoria, but it is much more successful at delivering the feel of the era.

Its just as good as its successor except it costs about 200 dollars less once factoring in DLC. So if one is interested I suggest you get this steal of a game.