I had mixed feelings about Paradox’s latest big strategy game, Victoria 3, because for everything cool and fun and interesting it managed, it was just as much saddled with an obsession with really boring, broken stuff. One thing I loved from the first game and will cherish until the end of time is the game’s art.
As we have seen Crusader Kings IIIwith its lush loading screens and in-game graphics, the days of Paradox games with disappointing graphics are long gone. Victoria 3 is a beautiful game that is impressive in almost every respect, from the extremely reasonable menu interface, to the 3D world map, to the illustrations that bring to life every crisis and decision you face as the leader of a 19th century nation have to ask. As I said in my review:
Victoria 3The map of is beautiful, a globe filled with color and diversity, and an ever-changing landscape as cities and railways expand over the decades.
So for today’s fine art, I’m excited to get the chance to showcase a lot of art Victoria 3 by the bulk of the teams that worked on it, both Paradox and outside studios. As such, below you’ll find pieces from three disciplines, starting with illustrations, then environment art, and finally UI stuff.
Links to each artist’s portfolio can be found below in their name.
In case you missed my review, aside from the looks (which I’ve already complimented and will do again now!) I’ve had the best of times with it Victoria 3:
What you do at that political level, like passing important new laws or pumping more money into services like education, is then reflected the back on pop and business. It’s a giant feedback loop in which the smallest change is made — maybe to the type of furniture a factory makes, or how many fisheries you build in a state, or how much tax you charge, or what the price of paper costs Your public service – can potentially have a huge economic and social impact.
Victoria 3 so is constantly in flux, heaving and sighing, always moving beneath your feet. Numbers go in and they come out the other end too, but what’s left in the middle when you get them all is something trying to get closer the world. The possibilities are seemingly endless, given that you can control every nation (or similar entity) that existed in 1836, from European superpowers to the smallest fledgling state.
And also the worst times:
I also never liked how much emphasis is placed on management here. i know this is the point of the gameto show us that politics has as much to do with how much we eat as what we think about immigrants or public schools. But it’s also a multi-faceted video game, offering global diplomacy, societal storytelling and the potential to reinvent World War I, but this is where I’ve spent most of my playtime grappling with government paper costs and dye production and the region livestock figures. The accountants and quartermasters among you might be very interested, but I’m not.
You can read the full review here.
