Today is the day we’ve all been waiting for, ladies and gentlemen! There is a colossal sale of Paradox Interactive games on Steam, with almost their entire catalogue of grand strategy games for sale at very, very good prices.
If you’ve been waiting for Europa Universalis IV or Crusader Kings II to go on sale, now is the time to pick them up. I can speak from past experience when I say these prices are better than what you can expect during the Christmas Steam Sale, and I haven’t seen a Paradox sale like this in a long time.
Recommended Buys!
Well, there’s certainly a lot of Paradox games for sale, but not all of them will appeal to everyone. Grand strategy games, like EU4, can be considered to be a cousin of the 4X genre, but there are certainly quite a few differences between the different franchises.
Crusader Kings is all about the medieval dynasty, Europa Universalis about the age of Exploration, Victoria 2 is about the Industrial revolution and Hearts of Iron 3 is World War II. While they’re all made by the same developers, and even look the same, they all play differently, though skills learned in one game could reasonably be applied to another.
All of these games are good, though they have increasingly steep learning curves that can make them hard to get into, though they do have tutorials and a strong online community on the official forums to answer questions. They’ve also got a lot of DLC, and you could easily find yourself short on money if you were to buy every single piece of DLC.
So, here are my recommended purchases for Crusader Kings 2 and Europa Universalis IV.
Crusader Kings 2 – Review, Steam Store. Cost £7.49/€9.99/$9.99
- The Old Gods should be your first purchase, assuming you have the game. It adds centuries on to the game time and adds an absolute fudge ton of content. You can now play Viking raiders and pillage a bloody trail across Europe in the name of the All Father with expanded religious mechanics for pagans. A lot of mods also benefit from this DLC, such as the Game of Thrones mod, since this is pretty much mandatory if you want to play the Ironborn. Cost is £2.49/€3.74/$3.74.
- Legacy of Rome is your second stop. While most of the features are focused heavily on those who want to play Byzantium, there is certainly one thing that benefits everyone. Retinues, which allow you to build a peacetime standing army. It also adds a number of new ambitions and I think it’s necessary to get general traits, though it’s been a long time since I played the game without the DLC so I could be wrong. It’s also needed if you want to play the excellent Lux Invicta mod, since that’s heavily dependent on retinues. Cost is £0.99/€1.24/$1.24
- The Republic is third. It gives you an entirely new way to play the game, not as a feudal lord but as a patrician of a merchant republic of common birth. Instead of fighting over provinces with armies, you feud over trade posts with coin and intrigues, using your vast wealth to fund your own personal election campaign to become Doge…and from there, who knows? This mod is also important for the Game of Thrones mod, without it you cannot play as any of the Free Cities. Cost is £1.99/€2.49/$2.49.
- Sons of Abraham, while not yet reviewed on this site, adds a large amount of content for all three of the Abrahamic faith. You can play a Jewish lord and reform the Kingdom of Israel, but most importantly is the expansion to the Papacy and the Holy Orders. The College of Cardinals is added to the game,and with it the ability to control the Holy Father for your own needs. And in a time of need, why not borrow money from the first European bank, the Knight’s Templar? Cost is £1.99/€2.49/$2.49.
That’s the most essential, gameplay increasing DLC that will be used by most players. Each of those adds something to everyone, regardless of their position in the world. Total cost of all this DLC combined is £7.46 or €9.96/$9.96.
Once you have these done, you’ve got the majority of the main DLC, but there are a few more things that you should grab if you still have the money, such as Sword of Islam, which allows the player the ability to control a Muslim ruler, the Ruler Designer DLC, which lets you create your own rulers and dynasties from scratch and lastly, Rajas of India, which allows you to play an Indian ruler. After that, you’ve got all the immersion DLC such as music and art packs – it’s completely up to you on what to get there!
Europa Universalis IV – Review, Steam Store. Cost £8.74/€9.99/$9.99
Well, what else could take this spot but Conquest of Paradise? While my review of it might not have painted the DLC in an entirely positive light, the random map generator alone makes this worth a purchase, especially during the sale. It finally brings the first of the four Xs into Europa Universalis, with truly random exploration. With the default random map, you always know where the gold is in the New World, where the natives are and so forth, but with a randomly generated New World…who can truly know what lies across the oceans? Cost is £3.39/€5.09/$5.09.
But unfortunately, I can’t recommend any further EUIV DLC past this point – most of them are small things whose features are already added to the game via patches. They just serve as icing on the cake, and I would recommend leaving them for a future sale, where they’ll be even cheaper and perhaps worth the cost of buying them. But once again, look to the immersion packs, I highly recommend getting some more music! There are only so many times you can hear Eire or Battle of Lepanto before you go raving mad.
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Nice sale. I have CK 2 already. Had some money from selling items and bought Victoria Collection, not enough for EUIV :)
Europa Universalis IV is good but not outstanding.
Crusader Kings II however, is worth every money. Even their DLC’s are worth their price.
Just my two cents – visit http://www.allkeyshop.com if you want even better prices than the epic steam sale :)
Even with the current epic steam sale, the site above offers you cheaper… europe universalis 4 is 8.58EUr right now (im skipping the offers what requires russian IP, those are even cheaper :D). And no time restrictions, such prices available all the time.
Hope I’m not messing up the income of this blog – but really, check prices on the site above before you buy something. I learned about it recently and it is great.
Then, one day steam just removes your game from your library “on the request of the publisher” and after half a dozen emails you only get some vague info about compromised cd key and that you should talk to the store where you bought it.
I would advise anyone against key selling sites that are significantly cheaper than the same stuff on steam, let alone a steam sale.
I agree with csebal. There are reports of people selling steam keys that were obtained from developers without them knowing that that was the intention behind the request.
I’m not saying that that’s the case with the shop you mention, but caution is advised when prices are “almost too good to be true” much cheaper than in the Steam store itself, especially when sales are running, as csebal as pointed out.
Oh, with such approach you can worry that steam will remove your acc just because… well, just because it think u did something. Just read their T&C, you are in the hands of steam anyway.
So anyone worrying about the online world, have the games on DVD on your shelf :)
For me the option to be able to buy steam games much cheaper ANYTIME than on steam is good to have. And honestly, since steam plays the game that a 10 USD game costs 10 EUR for me, I don’t worry If I reduce their income :)
But of course it is up to us how we decide. It’s good that we have balanced view on this topic anyway.
I spoke from personal experience as I was burned by CD keys in the past. If I consider that it was like 1 out of 6-7 I bought up to that point, its not a terrible ratio, but that 15% is more than what I am willing to risk.
People should just learn: there is no free lunch in the world of entertainment.
Certain CD key stores might be cheap, but they come with an added risk of the keys being compromised. If you accept that risk willingly, that’s fine, not my business. Just make sure you also talk about the risks when you are promoting it as otherwise you are misleading people – gullible people, but still..
i never ever got burned and saved trillions of dollars.
there are trusted offers and untrusted and there are user experiences… if you dont buy everything blindly you wont get burned with keys.
i just would not promote any offers where paradox won´t get the most possible money out of it because paradox is the most awesome publisher existing and their games are true gems. i´m not a fanboy.
Thanks for the heads-up!
I already owned Eu4 and Ck2 and now got hearts of iron 3 and victoria 2 as well :).
any idea from people here wichone I should play first?
Victoria 2! Go on :p It’s a brilliant game, the depth the devs put into the politics, demographics and industries is outright jaw droppingly awesome.
I loved EU3 and especially Magna Mundi and MEIOU mods. I can’t enjoy EU games now for some reasons. Think I’m bored of the province/map system.