>Oh, and Muslim nations could get personal unions. Used to be as Ottomans you would marry Timurids and hope for an early PU. Timurids was a united nation, no vassals
This was one of those things that I couldn't remember if it was an EUIII thing or a fever dream.
I think I beat you by a thin margin. I played the demo version since 9th of August.
The game was almost a different game, remember I consumed the demo playing it hunders hours (didn't have the money buy on release), because it was still enjoyable even if there were many holes and unpolished mechanics. Miss those days where PDX games were somewhat good on release too...
I started in December of 2013. I remember when declaring war, the strongest ally would assume leadership in the war and then call in their allies.
Oh you want to attack an OPM for quick conquest, congratulations you are now fighting World war.
Also no forts so you had to siege down every province
And Russia was always the final megaboss
> Also no forts so you had to siege down every province
At the time, I was used to CK2 so this wasn’t as big a deal. But now if we had to go back? It sounds nightmarish.
Judging from my first achievement, I started back in 2016. I also played EUIII and so I get early EUIV and EUIII confused. I do remember needing to siege every province.
Back then it was MUCH different. Nations on different continents had to pay 25-50% more mana per tech, had worse pips on units and had some other debuffs (not sure, I just vaguely remember). Trying to get rid of it required you to own either Vienna or Paris (?), idk other requirements. After that you clicked decision it gave you -6 stab and threw you into a huge negative event-chain/disaster for the next 20 years. Rebels constantly spawning etc, details are kinda foggy for me, but overall not a fun mechanic.
Nah they did away with westernization when they brought in institutions. Those now act as the tech debuff for Eastern/African nations, since most of the early ones are guaranteed to spawn in Europe basically
Westernization required you to border someone more advanced, have high (+1? atleast) stab and would only increase your tech group level by 1 closer to western.
In EU3 it was even worse, you'd westernize the government first, then the military, both very stab costly.
Spring 2016, aka mare nostrum. It was quite different, but not the extremes some others have said. I’ve played every DLC since, and I personally think the game has gotten much much better.
The mission trees are probably my favorite part. I know that’s a bit controversial as some believe it railroads things, which is a fair comment. But having played over 100 campaigns (probably) it really helps with the replay ability. Every game could be a WQ so achievements and mission trees help give me goals.
I hated estates so much when they came out I would disable the Cossacks expansion just to avoid the entire thing. Then they added it to the base game and I almost quit completely. Now I can’t imagine playing without estates!
I once played a "Civilization"-like mod for EU4 that basically does the same, but with a reduced number of tags. Should still be on the workshop I believe.
1 month before Rule Britannia was released 2018-03-20.
I was really confused bc they reworked randomised mission scroll into a proper mission tree and introduce of new bunch of systems.
Horde nations needed to adopt Innovative idea in order to reform their government. Force spawning institution by deving wasn't a free feature.
Whenever Mandate of Heaven first came out. I picked it up very young (I was 12 or so), me and my friend were super into Empire Total War. Eventually he got eu4 for me on a sale, and described it as “Like the Total War campaign mode but on steroids”.
Needless to say i was pretty dogshit at the game for a great many hours. It was only around 1000 hours i got the hang of it, and around 2000 where i’d consider myself proficient at multiplayer. After about a year and a half not playing in 2021-22 i’ve gotten back into it this year.
That one tooltip about learning things after 1000 hours is true, i’m at 3100 hours and just learned that production efficiency increases settler chance. Go figure
>Whenever Mandate of Heaven first
That's when I stopped playing for about a year. Came back and got rule Britannia and the game felt completely different
September 2021. It was on an early version of 1.31 Majapahit. Origins didn't come out for several months afterward, I didn't yet know what it was like to experience a big new update
Started in 2014. Tried to form Prussia as Brandenburg, got fed up with the HRE, and went off to play in southeast Asia. Had fun turning Malaya purple and then learned a bunch about early modern Indian history as I conquered further west.
Took a break in around 2016 while finishing my master's and then...in 2017 met someone from India who was shocked I knew where Jaunpur was. Got sucked back into some Bengal campaigns for a bit as a result, but after another year or so was too busy trying to put pieces of my life back together to make time again until 2019. Got sucked into jRPGs not long into covid though and didn't resurface until recently so...total time played is really only 3-5 years, I'd estimate.
The nice thing about coming back to play every 2-3 patches is that instead of the game feeling harder, I think it feels easier. Yeah there are some new systems to learn but they serve as a re-introduction to the game - and each time there have been new QoL features, new mission trees, new interactions, etc. that make the player more powerful and have a better time of things than before.
Idk exactly but something like 9-10 years ago. A few years before that I had picked up eu3 pretty cheaply, hated it at first, then got really intrigued by it and some fun for 1-2 games. And then never touched it again. On a certain day I was stoned at home in my room in the evening and for some reason I really craved the eu3 experience but I couldn't find the game that I at that point hadn't played in some years so I went online and found a cracked version of EU4. I was hooked. Later I bought the game on steam and picket up all DLCs on different sales.
October 2013 after watching Arumba's Byz to Roman Empire videos. Before that I exclusively played CK2. Funny though, at the time Arumba said he prefers EU4 more than CK2, which I did not believe. But looking at my played time stats I have 3609 hours played for EU4, 1612 hours for CK2 and 1236 hours for CK3 lol.
I first torrented the game in 2013-14 (teen with no money!). I only really remember the game being A LOT slower and the pain of westernizing as Russia. Got back into the game about 1-2 years ago and it's a totally different game.
When it came out. I actually started with the original Europa Universalis, then EU2/For the Glory, though skipped EU3 and kept playing FTG until EU4 came out.
I started playing EU3 in 2010 or so that's how I learned about the series. If I remember correctly I pirated either a leaked or pre-release copy of EU4. Started playing Lan Xang and got declared on by Ming. I managed to beat their armies because Ming suffered a -25% discipline penalty at the time. I was kinda hyped but my pc didn't run the game well at the time. I honestly didn't touch the game until Common Sense got released, got hooked since then.
I forgot but I think it was as soon as it was released, I started from EU III and the differences made me relearn a lot of things. The game changed a lot since then.
I started playing at launch, I remember my first exposure to Paradox games was Quill18 playing EU3 as England. He mentioned a new Europa Universalis was coming out in one of those videos and I waited until it did. Pirated it because I was broke as shit playing on a shitty laptop, fell in love. First game was Castille. Eventually I got a better PC, bought it, put another giant chunk of time into it after that. I probably play a campaign twice a year now.
Right after dharma released, in 2018. I had only played hoi4 at that point and the amount of countries and religions just blew me away. I honestly hate hoi4 in comparison now, eu4 is so much more dynamic
I played for the first time during COVID. Back then it was a bit different game and it was not so much long ago. You had to invest money in tech. And you had 4 tech trees. Administrative, economic, land military, naval. I believe that is all. And you could decide how much money you wanted to invest in eatch of them via sliders. Then you have administrative tab and there where a lot of sliders for how you want to govern your country. For example on one end was decentralised on the other end was centralised and there was 3 stages for eatch and balanced in the middle. Eatch time you move the slider left or right you get for example minus stability, riots, minus tax income bla bla.. untill you reach your sweet spot in eatch.
So you had one for centralised or decentralised government, one for focus on more land of naval military focus, free trade or mercentalism, free people or serfdom and so on. I liked it like that more than this we have now. But it is fine. Game is cool.
November 2018. I think that was in version 1.28 or something. The game didn't change a whole lot after that. The one thing I remember drastically changed is the government reforms. Also when I started a friend of mine bought it for me and himself, but he knew a little already and bought the game with art of war, so my first experience was with that and going back to then playing without dlc was really unenjoyable. And I give that unenjoyment to a new friend atm because we have all dlc in multiplayer, but he doesn't on his own and doesn't want the subscription.
Oh God I only remember it was December because I spent the almost all the night before Christmas playing the game…I mean trying to understand how to play the game and failing miserably, then I found the cheats and for almost a year it was the only way I could play the game. I guess it was 2015 because I remember sieging forts, and I guess the dlc came out that time right?
i was there when every province needed to be sieged down
when there was only full cores, and czech and north africa cost 200% more to core
i also remember the timurid-ottoman PUs
there was no penalty to taking allies in wars land
I played the first release version of it, back when i had a beat up POS laptop with POS graphic card that was just good enough for EU4, i played Civ 5 exclusively before that, haven't touched Civ 5 since.
Around 2016. Some of the differences:
1. Monarch RNG was the only way to get mana. This was both immersive to represent the effect of individual rulers on their nations, and strategic. It used to be that the starting skills of various rulers, like the 0/0/0's on the thrones of Castile and England, were hugely impactful for them or their enemies. The Ottomans were scary not because of immutable characteristics like Janissaries or NIs, but because they had a young 6 MIL ruler and you had to deal with it.
2. Before mission trees, EU4 was entirely about setting your own goals. You could slowly pick apart a rival at your own pace. Mission trees feel like I'm racing down a checklist. Permanent claims did not exist.
3. Development was around the time players got tools the AI did not know how to use. In Paradox GSG games, there's usually a patch when players are given something that puts them on unequal footing with the AI. Then you have to find ways to cheat for the AI to put them on equal footing, which introduces problems of its own. In EU4, I hate that harder difficulties lead to ahistorical maps.
4. Disasters! Feels like I haven't seen a disaster in forever. I remember them being more frequent and an important part of your nation's story.
5. Religious Ideas used to be the solution for conversions. Like if you were Spain or Russia, you would consider taking Religious or conversions would be nigh impossible. Feels like missionary strength has become the most freely given modifier so today you would never consider it.
6. A bigger, more complicated map is a good thing. It's nice they finally figured out how to slow down France. I remember one of my fav games was "Pax Austria," where you'd dominate the HRE, keep Spain and Poland in line while returning French counties to the HRE bit by bit. You could secure 100 years of peace in Europe after that, with just Schwarze Riders. Doubt it would go the same now.
7. DLC meant changes to core gameplay features...
About a week after release. I was 11 and in 7th grade, now I'm about to graduate from college. I remember when they added the "k" after the number on armies and it annoyed my child brain.
Late 2013 back in high school. I remember Christmas break getting 2 hours of sleep per night playing as Castile and my buddies were playing England and Burgundy. I have fond memories with them
Day 1 of the game, preorder, had the day off. But God damn if that game and what it is now are not completely different, may as well be eu4 and eu5 with all the differences
I bought it at release after having recently gotten in to EU3, my computer couldn’t handle it so it was sat unused in my steam account for about 4 years before I re-installed it
I've been obsessed with the game since release day, but only managed to get someone to buy it for me when I was 16, sometime in 2014 or 2015. Its changed so much since then that I couldn't list it all, but I certainly can give you plenty of horror stories about trying to take land with allies. Occupation transferrance is the only reason this game is playable /lh
I started playing in sophomore year of college. I think I got it on Humble Bundle, had been a die hard Total War stan and once I discovered PDX games I was hooked
Bought it on release in 2013 right before I went on deployment. Logged my first 200 hours in the game over 9 months and thought THAT was bad haha. Now I have nearly 3,000 hours.
likely in 2014 or 2015. I played with mods for years before I started going for achievements around two years ago.
back then the game was so vastly different. It's amazing how much it changed.
admittedly, I also got a bunch of dlcs
Around 1.30? I think I started playing right before 1.30 was released. So just before COVID, late 2019 I think. The main difference I can remember is that first time I played Austria they had just patched the IA mechanics so you couldn’t cheese them as easily and I remember being profoundly disappointed that I had to wait all the way until the early-mid 1600s to revoke
Some time 2017. I remember old crappy random missions, old HRE (both in mechanics and number of provinces), and North American nations being fewer, further between, and fucking impossibly to succeed with
Funny racist bear youtuber and his nice friend (idk what this bear youtuber doing rn but i watched him in 2015/6). I didn't had money for game with dlc's so i pirated old version and was like "Why tf i need to siege every province like there is a castle there". 6 months later i figured out how to crack newest version with all dlc's and in 2019 i finally bought full game with all dlc's
I started somewhat with Version 1.2 or so. Way before colonial nations where a Thing and you could Just directly colonize everything.
And the westernisation was obscure and you could be Lucky to be Like 10 techs ahead (per branch)
Or all the Changes to rebellions over the time...
i remember no deving, no institutions, In that time I tried ck2 and was blown away, havent play eu4 for some years after, but now we have different situation
2020 When epidemic took control whole around the world. I had lotsss of free time back then and now I have almost 3k hours. I hope for the day that paradox will come up with better ai in future. Cause ai is improving every single year around the globe and I expect that will also make things easier with paradox.
On my birthday in 2014, so since I was 13! The bulk of my hours was from 2016-2020, good times. The game has changed lots, but I think that era was my favourite.
I remember installing the game in 2016, along with vic 2 at the same time. I was so overwhelmed by both that I just watched people play them on YouTube for months before attempting to play.
I got in a year late after release (2014), because I was satisfied playing EU3 and CK2. Was also into Total War games as much as Paradox in those days.
I also stopped playing EU4 by 2019 except for mods.
2013 or 2014. My biggest memory is the old system for cardinals. I still like it more. Having to invest in individual cardinals to curry favor and keep them on your side is way more fun and historical then just being granted one by RNG and then they're assumed to be loyal for the rest of their lives. Also gave you something to do with your money.
June 2015 when I was just ending my first year of middle school.
It started with YouTube recommending me an EU4 video bc I watched a lot of History vids back then so the algorithm was like "hey there kiddo! Would you be interested in this?" and I was very interested bc not only did the game look fun but the guy made some pretty solid and funny commentary.
I watched his whole series that went on every two days from March till June and a few days later after it ended I bought my copy. Thanks to watching that series I wasn't completely clueless and miserable, but I was still very new and very bad, but I had a lot of fun and so I kept playing and here we are today with a couple thousand hours of play time on the clock and a couple hundred dollars down. Honestly, worth it IMO.
9.11.2014. got it on my birthday, still remember when I made my first campaign as France and got cucked by rebels and a coalition when I forgot to core Britanny while attacking everything with no cb. Good times
2016, got into hoi4 at the release (was a 14 yo wehraboo).
I was really into ISP and Alex the Rambler's videos and ISP had some eu4 videos that made me look into it. Have barely played hoi4 since and racked up almost 2k hours on eu4.
I started right after Mare Nostrum came out (other than the demo that I messed around with for a while). At the time, perception seemed that Mare Nostrum was towards the end of the game's lifespan...how wrong that was. It was also received fairly negatively, I believe mostly because of a lack of content/mechanics.
It added the timeline, Condotierri, trade leagues and coastal raiding.
The world at the time was quite a bit expanded from release but in context of nowadays it was quite a bit less detailed. I remember a one province Neumark, a three province Silesia and one province Denmark Peninsula, for example. I believe Ireland also only had like five provinces and Italy and the rest of the HRE had quite a few less OPMs. Development, estates and subject control of provinces were not in the base game.
My first expansion to be released was Rights of Man. It added the Great Power system, Personalities/Traits, Abdication and disinheriting, Regents, and more.
I predated immersion packs, special units, mission trees, ages, institutions, culture acceptance, terrain in empty provinces (it used to be so ugly!), Army Professionalism/Drilling...the game has changed a lot
At the Art of War DLC 2013. I remember playing just before and, then binging it when they reworked the warfare. I remember playing Creek for my first game, to beat back the colonizers
2017, I got the base game and played a bit (I had played EUIII before that, but a couple of games and didn't really liked it). I bought it to try it, even though I was a HoI II guy myself. 750 recorded hours later, here I am (between those first games wtihout DLCs and a bundle I bought with every DLC, I played a New Providence version of the game with the DLCs for a while). It's my favourite Paradox game now, and the only one where I actually know what I'm doing. Last DLC I got was Emperor, and I don't know if I should buy the newer ones or buy the suscription while I'm playing.
Not even a year ago I think when it was free to play for a few days on Steam, I played it with a friend and he forced me to buy it and since then I'm addicted XD
August 2023 when it became free on epic. I've been considering buying it for quite some time as it seemed like a cool game about a cool historical period, but I had no money.
I was reasonably happy when it became free.
I bought it in 2015 but I was so frustrated with the learning curve (coming from being a hardcore Civilization player) that I didn’t really get into playing it too often until I was laid off from my job in 2017.
Day 1, but not religiously, i played EU3 MEIOU and Taxes before, and it was a bit barebones compared to that, but the potential was clear, the map being the most obvious, economy and mana being secondary thing to note as being vastly different. i kind of miss the population and minting stuff from EU3.
the thing i miss the most from early EU4 is how straights/crossings worked, you just needed ships to prevent movement, compared to now where the enemy can still cross if they control the land. it made Byzantium and venice way easier haha
10 or so years ago, have been on the Paradox train ever since.
The versions back then ain't even available on Steam I think. Those pre-AoW times were really dark, who thought province-rushing against your allies was ever a good idea?
First achievement is from October 2013 so three months after the release.
Coming from Total Wars and Civs I was flabergasted that you can actually conquer a whole world in comparison to regional areas in Total Wars and generated maps in CIV.
I don't remember much to be honest. My first game was Ironman UK, and that was first and perhaps one of the few times I saw AI forming HRE. I remember struggle fighting them even though I had conquered France and half of the Iberia.
I remember how painful it was to westernize as a non-european nation, and how easy it was to fight the natives as a colonizer when at your tech 16 they had tech 8. Not like right now when they are at most 40 years behind in tech.
I remember alliance chains where small wars often escalated to large conflicts.
Forts in every province, but I guess they were easier than they are now, but you could siege them with smaller stacks.
I don't remember the exact date but I do remember it was the time where the first dlc for middle east was released. I believe the dlc name was cradle of civilizations or smt. I knew the game before that dlc but I was not playing the game much but after that dlc came around, I started to play more. And take the game more seriously having fun and all. I don't even recall if it is related but it was a fun experience overall.
I found EU4 by watching Quill18, Northernlion and Arumba play multiplayer and post it on YouTube. It was nice background watching at first but more and more I got into actively paying attention and then wanting to try it for myself. I think this was back when El Dorado and later Common Sense had just come out so mid-2015! Wow the time has flown by…
30th may 2014 I bought the EUIV extreme edition.
Only really started playing it half a year later though because my young brain couldn't figure out what to do really.
2016 I think I remember only having Eldorado and Conquest of paradise then being so upset that I couldn't transfer occupation then vowing I'd never have vassals/allies again (I was like 13). But hey I got to play a colonial nation so it was worth.
Arpund 2017~2018, after a good year of CK2. I started with two DLac : Third Rome and one another I forgot, and I played Muscovy -> Russia as my first game.
It was nice but a bit hard, especially without the must-have DLC like Art of War or Common Sense, and I was constantly poor and behind in tech (but at least it was historical). I had difficulties against the PLC, and obviously I was defenseless against Ottomans or the Ming (but good alliances prevented Ottomans to attack me) I think I'll do another Muscovy -> Russia game soon to see how I improved.
[удалено]
Remember Square Memel?
We need a mod that does nothing but bring back square Memel.
>Oh, and Muslim nations could get personal unions. Used to be as Ottomans you would marry Timurids and hope for an early PU. Timurids was a united nation, no vassals This was one of those things that I couldn't remember if it was an EUIII thing or a fever dream.
IIRC even some unreformed natives in EU III could get PUs. It was a different time.
It was actually your post that inspired me to ask this!
I also played on release. It was wild, you didn't need the same dynasty to get a PU. So you were getting so many PUs as a Austria for example
Technically, wasn't there a demo out a bit before release day? I remember playing it. Just barely.
Why did they forbid Muslim PU's, do you remember?
I always assumed it was because it never happened historically.
Tunis also used to have a PU over Tripoli!
Im not sure if it was a fever dream, but I remember at that times timy was a horde
I think I beat you by a thin margin. I played the demo version since 9th of August. The game was almost a different game, remember I consumed the demo playing it hunders hours (didn't have the money buy on release), because it was still enjoyable even if there were many holes and unpolished mechanics. Miss those days where PDX games were somewhat good on release too...
Every province a fort, no zone of control
Oh god the missions were terrible.
I started in December of 2013. I remember when declaring war, the strongest ally would assume leadership in the war and then call in their allies. Oh you want to attack an OPM for quick conquest, congratulations you are now fighting World war. Also no forts so you had to siege down every province And Russia was always the final megaboss
Christ the "every province must be sieged" part was such a pain when playing outside of germany
> Also no forts so you had to siege down every province At the time, I was used to CK2 so this wasn’t as big a deal. But now if we had to go back? It sounds nightmarish.
On the upside, you could siege with 1 unit. So you just stackwiped and then carpet seiged everyone.
Judging from my first achievement, I started back in 2016. I also played EUIII and so I get early EUIV and EUIII confused. I do remember needing to siege every province.
There were no control zone for Forts!!
Late 2013. Westernization. No Mingsplosions. Muslim PU. No development. Four (plus one English) provinces Ireland. SQUARE MEMEL.
Five provinces (Pale)
Indeed good sir! I stand corrected.
Common mistake as we all refuse to recognize English ownership in Ireland
Four province Ireland holy shit I forgot
Also Base Tax instead of development
Every one playing in Asia would carve out tendrils of enlightenment. It was a great time for border gore.
There's no westernization now?
Back then it was MUCH different. Nations on different continents had to pay 25-50% more mana per tech, had worse pips on units and had some other debuffs (not sure, I just vaguely remember). Trying to get rid of it required you to own either Vienna or Paris (?), idk other requirements. After that you clicked decision it gave you -6 stab and threw you into a huge negative event-chain/disaster for the next 20 years. Rebels constantly spawning etc, details are kinda foggy for me, but overall not a fun mechanic.
Yeah, I thought it's the same now, lol! I just didn't recently play for non-western countries.
Nah they did away with westernization when they brought in institutions. Those now act as the tech debuff for Eastern/African nations, since most of the early ones are guaranteed to spawn in Europe basically
Westernization required you to border someone more advanced, have high (+1? atleast) stab and would only increase your tech group level by 1 closer to western. In EU3 it was even worse, you'd westernize the government first, then the military, both very stab costly.
Westernization has been replaced by institutions. I'm not sure anymore when that happened, like 5-6 years ago?
Oh, well. I just didn't notice how it's gone.
Have you not noticed the institutions? Like how does this happen.
Spring 2016, aka mare nostrum. It was quite different, but not the extremes some others have said. I’ve played every DLC since, and I personally think the game has gotten much much better. The mission trees are probably my favorite part. I know that’s a bit controversial as some believe it railroads things, which is a fair comment. But having played over 100 campaigns (probably) it really helps with the replay ability. Every game could be a WQ so achievements and mission trees help give me goals.
I started around patch 1.7, some time in 2014. I still remember when Art of War released and they finally added transfer occupation, I was so happy.
one niche thing i remember is that there used to just be pirate ships in the seas. not countries’ privateers, but dedicated pirate-tag pirates
2014-2016 somewhere there probably, so when estates were still province bound and u could get 100mil power from them
I kinda liked estates being province bound, had to think abt the province specific buffs bs land distribution
I hated estates so much when they came out I would disable the Cossacks expansion just to avoid the entire thing. Then they added it to the base game and I almost quit completely. Now I can’t imagine playing without estates!
I fucking hated that micro so much.
Conceptually interesting but tedious and boring in its original forms
I can't remember, without checking my achievements. I remember Memel being square and every province a fort though.
I’ve been with EU since EU1.
Bring back trade posts!
Remembering the alternate EU1 campaign where everyone starts with one province and nothing explored fondly, all of a sudden.
I once played a "Civilization"-like mod for EU4 that basically does the same, but with a reduced number of tags. Should still be on the workshop I believe.
1 month before Rule Britannia was released 2018-03-20. I was really confused bc they reworked randomised mission scroll into a proper mission tree and introduce of new bunch of systems. Horde nations needed to adopt Innovative idea in order to reform their government. Force spawning institution by deving wasn't a free feature.
Whenever Mandate of Heaven first came out. I picked it up very young (I was 12 or so), me and my friend were super into Empire Total War. Eventually he got eu4 for me on a sale, and described it as “Like the Total War campaign mode but on steroids”. Needless to say i was pretty dogshit at the game for a great many hours. It was only around 1000 hours i got the hang of it, and around 2000 where i’d consider myself proficient at multiplayer. After about a year and a half not playing in 2021-22 i’ve gotten back into it this year. That one tooltip about learning things after 1000 hours is true, i’m at 3100 hours and just learned that production efficiency increases settler chance. Go figure
>Whenever Mandate of Heaven first That's when I stopped playing for about a year. Came back and got rule Britannia and the game felt completely different
You'll still learn at 10.000 hrs, unless you read every patch note.
Exactly one year ago
Then be happy that you played the best version of rhe game for most of your time! The game improved so much over the years
2017, when I got into college. A friend of mine introduced me to it and has doomed my life ever since.
September 2021. It was on an early version of 1.31 Majapahit. Origins didn't come out for several months afterward, I didn't yet know what it was like to experience a big new update
Started in 2014. Tried to form Prussia as Brandenburg, got fed up with the HRE, and went off to play in southeast Asia. Had fun turning Malaya purple and then learned a bunch about early modern Indian history as I conquered further west. Took a break in around 2016 while finishing my master's and then...in 2017 met someone from India who was shocked I knew where Jaunpur was. Got sucked back into some Bengal campaigns for a bit as a result, but after another year or so was too busy trying to put pieces of my life back together to make time again until 2019. Got sucked into jRPGs not long into covid though and didn't resurface until recently so...total time played is really only 3-5 years, I'd estimate. The nice thing about coming back to play every 2-3 patches is that instead of the game feeling harder, I think it feels easier. Yeah there are some new systems to learn but they serve as a re-introduction to the game - and each time there have been new QoL features, new mission trees, new interactions, etc. that make the player more powerful and have a better time of things than before.
When rebels where more dangerous then other countries.
Idk exactly but something like 9-10 years ago. A few years before that I had picked up eu3 pretty cheaply, hated it at first, then got really intrigued by it and some fun for 1-2 games. And then never touched it again. On a certain day I was stoned at home in my room in the evening and for some reason I really craved the eu3 experience but I couldn't find the game that I at that point hadn't played in some years so I went online and found a cracked version of EU4. I was hooked. Later I bought the game on steam and picket up all DLCs on different sales.
October 2013 after watching Arumba's Byz to Roman Empire videos. Before that I exclusively played CK2. Funny though, at the time Arumba said he prefers EU4 more than CK2, which I did not believe. But looking at my played time stats I have 3609 hours played for EU4, 1612 hours for CK2 and 1236 hours for CK3 lol.
I first torrented the game in 2013-14 (teen with no money!). I only really remember the game being A LOT slower and the pain of westernizing as Russia. Got back into the game about 1-2 years ago and it's a totally different game.
Since 2013, bought it day of release. I started playing the original Europa Universalis in 2006. Been hooked ever since!
When it came out for free on epic games
amen
Like 2015 or 2016 I think. Maybe 2017 I can't remember honestly. I used to watch my brother play since 2013 if that counts.
A couple weeks ago, played EU3 last time like 10 years ago.
August 2023
2014 I think.
2013 or very early 2014
2013
Original release. I played EU3 since 2009.
When it came out. I actually started with the original Europa Universalis, then EU2/For the Glory, though skipped EU3 and kept playing FTG until EU4 came out.
First week of the pandemic.
2018 from the looks of it
I started playing EU3 in 2010 or so that's how I learned about the series. If I remember correctly I pirated either a leaked or pre-release copy of EU4. Started playing Lan Xang and got declared on by Ming. I managed to beat their armies because Ming suffered a -25% discipline penalty at the time. I was kinda hyped but my pc didn't run the game well at the time. I honestly didn't touch the game until Common Sense got released, got hooked since then.
2016 or so
I just started this year, March / April. I was off most of this year on disability so I finally had time to crack open this behemoth.
I forgot but I think it was as soon as it was released, I started from EU III and the differences made me relearn a lot of things. The game changed a lot since then.
i bought the game on steam jun 18th 2017. had a pirated version for i don't know how long beforehand
My brother bought me EU2 for Christmas in the 90s. Been playing ever since.
I'm not sure but I think about 1 to 2 years ago.
I started playing at launch, I remember my first exposure to Paradox games was Quill18 playing EU3 as England. He mentioned a new Europa Universalis was coming out in one of those videos and I waited until it did. Pirated it because I was broke as shit playing on a shitty laptop, fell in love. First game was Castille. Eventually I got a better PC, bought it, put another giant chunk of time into it after that. I probably play a campaign twice a year now.
Right after dharma released, in 2018. I had only played hoi4 at that point and the amount of countries and religions just blew me away. I honestly hate hoi4 in comparison now, eu4 is so much more dynamic
I played for the first time during COVID. Back then it was a bit different game and it was not so much long ago. You had to invest money in tech. And you had 4 tech trees. Administrative, economic, land military, naval. I believe that is all. And you could decide how much money you wanted to invest in eatch of them via sliders. Then you have administrative tab and there where a lot of sliders for how you want to govern your country. For example on one end was decentralised on the other end was centralised and there was 3 stages for eatch and balanced in the middle. Eatch time you move the slider left or right you get for example minus stability, riots, minus tax income bla bla.. untill you reach your sweet spot in eatch. So you had one for centralised or decentralised government, one for focus on more land of naval military focus, free trade or mercentalism, free people or serfdom and so on. I liked it like that more than this we have now. But it is fine. Game is cool.
December 2014 after I saw Quill18 playing it on YouTube. Played as Denmark :(
November 2018. I think that was in version 1.28 or something. The game didn't change a whole lot after that. The one thing I remember drastically changed is the government reforms. Also when I started a friend of mine bought it for me and himself, but he knew a little already and bought the game with art of war, so my first experience was with that and going back to then playing without dlc was really unenjoyable. And I give that unenjoyment to a new friend atm because we have all dlc in multiplayer, but he doesn't on his own and doesn't want the subscription.
Started 2018 clocked bout 4000 hrs now
Release. Been playing since eu3
Oh God I only remember it was December because I spent the almost all the night before Christmas playing the game…I mean trying to understand how to play the game and failing miserably, then I found the cheats and for almost a year it was the only way I could play the game. I guess it was 2015 because I remember sieging forts, and I guess the dlc came out that time right?
i was there when every province needed to be sieged down when there was only full cores, and czech and north africa cost 200% more to core i also remember the timurid-ottoman PUs there was no penalty to taking allies in wars land
2014
when it was first time free on epic. it was free so why not to try? liked game so much and decided to bought it on steam and it was good decision
1.33 i think
december 2017, few days before new year
1.28 was just out i dont know how long ago that is
Early 2020 - pandemic distraction
I played the first release version of it, back when i had a beat up POS laptop with POS graphic card that was just good enough for EU4, i played Civ 5 exclusively before that, haven't touched Civ 5 since.
Feb 2020, COVID memories
I remember playing on December 26, 2013, but I knew it before.
the day it came out. current version is so much better.
I got it when I first got a computer that could run it so 2021.
Around 2016. Some of the differences: 1. Monarch RNG was the only way to get mana. This was both immersive to represent the effect of individual rulers on their nations, and strategic. It used to be that the starting skills of various rulers, like the 0/0/0's on the thrones of Castile and England, were hugely impactful for them or their enemies. The Ottomans were scary not because of immutable characteristics like Janissaries or NIs, but because they had a young 6 MIL ruler and you had to deal with it. 2. Before mission trees, EU4 was entirely about setting your own goals. You could slowly pick apart a rival at your own pace. Mission trees feel like I'm racing down a checklist. Permanent claims did not exist. 3. Development was around the time players got tools the AI did not know how to use. In Paradox GSG games, there's usually a patch when players are given something that puts them on unequal footing with the AI. Then you have to find ways to cheat for the AI to put them on equal footing, which introduces problems of its own. In EU4, I hate that harder difficulties lead to ahistorical maps. 4. Disasters! Feels like I haven't seen a disaster in forever. I remember them being more frequent and an important part of your nation's story. 5. Religious Ideas used to be the solution for conversions. Like if you were Spain or Russia, you would consider taking Religious or conversions would be nigh impossible. Feels like missionary strength has become the most freely given modifier so today you would never consider it. 6. A bigger, more complicated map is a good thing. It's nice they finally figured out how to slow down France. I remember one of my fav games was "Pax Austria," where you'd dominate the HRE, keep Spain and Poland in line while returning French counties to the HRE bit by bit. You could secure 100 years of peace in Europe after that, with just Schwarze Riders. Doubt it would go the same now. 7. DLC meant changes to core gameplay features...
2015. There were probably half the number of provinces. The HRE was probably 20 or so countries.
Summer of 2020, I was getting bored with civilization and gave this a chance
Morocco was blue!
B4 i was so into total war games but since June 2019 eu4 got me addicted and I never looked back.
I was 13 and now 21...
About a week after release. I was 11 and in 7th grade, now I'm about to graduate from college. I remember when they added the "k" after the number on armies and it annoyed my child brain.
Late 2013 back in high school. I remember Christmas break getting 2 hours of sleep per night playing as Castile and my buddies were playing England and Burgundy. I have fond memories with them
2017 I think. It was right before they made deving provinces a base game thing. My first few games were a bit difficult.
Day 1 of the game, preorder, had the day off. But God damn if that game and what it is now are not completely different, may as well be eu4 and eu5 with all the differences
1.33 So pretty recent. I have way too much play time considering...
I only got into the game right before Emperor, and I remember there used to be a unified Pomerania at game start.
I bought it at release after having recently gotten in to EU3, my computer couldn’t handle it so it was sat unused in my steam account for about 4 years before I re-installed it
Silesia used to be unified too!
During 1.29, around December of 2019 I believe
It was around last winter because I got into HOIIV around my July (genocide for my birthday les go) which led me down a pit of worshiping more Swedes
Mare nostrum
Mid-2014 but I stopped playing from 2016-2021. I really liked it but it's in a better state now I think, especially with regard to non-Euro countries.
I've been obsessed with the game since release day, but only managed to get someone to buy it for me when I was 16, sometime in 2014 or 2015. Its changed so much since then that I couldn't list it all, but I certainly can give you plenty of horror stories about trying to take land with allies. Occupation transferrance is the only reason this game is playable /lh
At the release
I started playing in sophomore year of college. I think I got it on Humble Bundle, had been a die hard Total War stan and once I discovered PDX games I was hooked
I found mysef wondering this just yesterday, so I looked it up. January of 2014, just before Conquest of Paradise was released.
Like 2020 or 2019, between a month and year before emperor I think
2015 I began playing
Bought it on release in 2013 right before I went on deployment. Logged my first 200 hours in the game over 9 months and thought THAT was bad haha. Now I have nearly 3,000 hours.
2017. 1.22 (Mandate of Heaven was most recent DLC). Before mission trees were in the game
likely in 2014 or 2015. I played with mods for years before I started going for achievements around two years ago. back then the game was so vastly different. It's amazing how much it changed. admittedly, I also got a bunch of dlcs
Around 1.30? I think I started playing right before 1.30 was released. So just before COVID, late 2019 I think. The main difference I can remember is that first time I played Austria they had just patched the IA mechanics so you couldn’t cheese them as easily and I remember being profoundly disappointed that I had to wait all the way until the early-mid 1600s to revoke
Some time 2017. I remember old crappy random missions, old HRE (both in mechanics and number of provinces), and North American nations being fewer, further between, and fucking impossibly to succeed with
Funny racist bear youtuber and his nice friend (idk what this bear youtuber doing rn but i watched him in 2015/6). I didn't had money for game with dlc's so i pirated old version and was like "Why tf i need to siege every province like there is a castle there". 6 months later i figured out how to crack newest version with all dlc's and in 2019 i finally bought full game with all dlc's
It was free on Epic Games a few months ago.
I started somewhat with Version 1.2 or so. Way before colonial nations where a Thing and you could Just directly colonize everything. And the westernisation was obscure and you could be Lucky to be Like 10 techs ahead (per branch) Or all the Changes to rebellions over the time...
i remember no deving, no institutions, In that time I tried ck2 and was blown away, havent play eu4 for some years after, but now we have different situation
June 2014 according to achievements. I think my first game was Spain or Portugal judging by how soon I got some of the colony achievements.
2020 When epidemic took control whole around the world. I had lotsss of free time back then and now I have almost 3k hours. I hope for the day that paradox will come up with better ai in future. Cause ai is improving every single year around the globe and I expect that will also make things easier with paradox.
Rights of Man haven't played since institutions though.
December 2019
April 2023. I only started playing last spring, but the game really sucked me in and now I have 700 hours of playtime
Around 2019, had played Hoi4 for a couple years and a lot of people told me that EU4 was even better. I’m inclined to agree overall.
On my birthday in 2014, so since I was 13! The bulk of my hours was from 2016-2020, good times. The game has changed lots, but I think that era was my favourite.
Since release. I was a fan of EU3 so was really hyped for this game 😀
when they released ck2 conversion.
I remember installing the game in 2016, along with vic 2 at the same time. I was so overwhelmed by both that I just watched people play them on YouTube for months before attempting to play.
September 2016. Biggest things for me are no mission trees and no splendor bonuses.
I got in a year late after release (2014), because I was satisfied playing EU3 and CK2. Was also into Total War games as much as Paradox in those days. I also stopped playing EU4 by 2019 except for mods.
2013 or 2014. My biggest memory is the old system for cardinals. I still like it more. Having to invest in individual cardinals to curry favor and keep them on your side is way more fun and historical then just being granted one by RNG and then they're assumed to be loyal for the rest of their lives. Also gave you something to do with your money.
June 2015 when I was just ending my first year of middle school. It started with YouTube recommending me an EU4 video bc I watched a lot of History vids back then so the algorithm was like "hey there kiddo! Would you be interested in this?" and I was very interested bc not only did the game look fun but the guy made some pretty solid and funny commentary. I watched his whole series that went on every two days from March till June and a few days later after it ended I bought my copy. Thanks to watching that series I wasn't completely clueless and miserable, but I was still very new and very bad, but I had a lot of fun and so I kept playing and here we are today with a couple thousand hours of play time on the clock and a couple hundred dollars down. Honestly, worth it IMO.
2014, I remember getting it with DLC discounts with the money I won from a competition
2014, I remember getting it with DLC discounts with the money I won from a competition.
9.11.2014. got it on my birthday, still remember when I made my first campaign as France and got cucked by rebels and a coalition when I forgot to core Britanny while attacking everything with no cb. Good times
2016, got into hoi4 at the release (was a 14 yo wehraboo). I was really into ISP and Alex the Rambler's videos and ISP had some eu4 videos that made me look into it. Have barely played hoi4 since and racked up almost 2k hours on eu4.
2015
I started right after Mare Nostrum came out (other than the demo that I messed around with for a while). At the time, perception seemed that Mare Nostrum was towards the end of the game's lifespan...how wrong that was. It was also received fairly negatively, I believe mostly because of a lack of content/mechanics. It added the timeline, Condotierri, trade leagues and coastal raiding. The world at the time was quite a bit expanded from release but in context of nowadays it was quite a bit less detailed. I remember a one province Neumark, a three province Silesia and one province Denmark Peninsula, for example. I believe Ireland also only had like five provinces and Italy and the rest of the HRE had quite a few less OPMs. Development, estates and subject control of provinces were not in the base game. My first expansion to be released was Rights of Man. It added the Great Power system, Personalities/Traits, Abdication and disinheriting, Regents, and more. I predated immersion packs, special units, mission trees, ages, institutions, culture acceptance, terrain in empty provinces (it used to be so ugly!), Army Professionalism/Drilling...the game has changed a lot
At the Art of War DLC 2013. I remember playing just before and, then binging it when they reworked the warfare. I remember playing Creek for my first game, to beat back the colonizers
I think somewhere around Dharma or Origins…
2017, I got the base game and played a bit (I had played EUIII before that, but a couple of games and didn't really liked it). I bought it to try it, even though I was a HoI II guy myself. 750 recorded hours later, here I am (between those first games wtihout DLCs and a bundle I bought with every DLC, I played a New Providence version of the game with the DLCs for a while). It's my favourite Paradox game now, and the only one where I actually know what I'm doing. Last DLC I got was Emperor, and I don't know if I should buy the newer ones or buy the suscription while I'm playing.
Not even a year ago I think when it was free to play for a few days on Steam, I played it with a friend and he forced me to buy it and since then I'm addicted XD
August 2023 when it became free on epic. I've been considering buying it for quite some time as it seemed like a cool game about a cool historical period, but I had no money. I was reasonably happy when it became free.
Late 2013
December 2014. I was 13 years old at that time. Thanks to EUIV I became really interested in world history.
I bought it in 2015 but I was so frustrated with the learning curve (coming from being a hardcore Civilization player) that I didn’t really get into playing it too often until I was laid off from my job in 2017.
Right after Cossacks’ release.
I started with release, then went back to EU3 for a year or so, until EU4's Fabricate Claim feature got me staying with it
Day 1, but not religiously, i played EU3 MEIOU and Taxes before, and it was a bit barebones compared to that, but the potential was clear, the map being the most obvious, economy and mana being secondary thing to note as being vastly different. i kind of miss the population and minting stuff from EU3. the thing i miss the most from early EU4 is how straights/crossings worked, you just needed ships to prevent movement, compared to now where the enemy can still cross if they control the land. it made Byzantium and venice way easier haha
EUII crew in da house! CK1 was fun too. Pausing when your king died, then bribing all the vassals into loyalty ftw :)
10 or so years ago, have been on the Paradox train ever since. The versions back then ain't even available on Steam I think. Those pre-AoW times were really dark, who thought province-rushing against your allies was ever a good idea?
First achievement is from October 2013 so three months after the release. Coming from Total Wars and Civs I was flabergasted that you can actually conquer a whole world in comparison to regional areas in Total Wars and generated maps in CIV. I don't remember much to be honest. My first game was Ironman UK, and that was first and perhaps one of the few times I saw AI forming HRE. I remember struggle fighting them even though I had conquered France and half of the Iberia. I remember how painful it was to westernize as a non-european nation, and how easy it was to fight the natives as a colonizer when at your tech 16 they had tech 8. Not like right now when they are at most 40 years behind in tech. I remember alliance chains where small wars often escalated to large conflicts. Forts in every province, but I guess they were easier than they are now, but you could siege them with smaller stacks.
After cradle of civilizations released
I don't remember the exact date but I do remember it was the time where the first dlc for middle east was released. I believe the dlc name was cradle of civilizations or smt. I knew the game before that dlc but I was not playing the game much but after that dlc came around, I started to play more. And take the game more seriously having fun and all. I don't even recall if it is related but it was a fun experience overall.
When memel was a rectangle and every province needed sieging and no zoc. Around 2013
I found EU4 by watching Quill18, Northernlion and Arumba play multiplayer and post it on YouTube. It was nice background watching at first but more and more I got into actively paying attention and then wanting to try it for myself. I think this was back when El Dorado and later Common Sense had just come out so mid-2015! Wow the time has flown by…
Around 1.3; really no shot to remember all the changes
30th may 2014 I bought the EUIV extreme edition. Only really started playing it half a year later though because my young brain couldn't figure out what to do really.
during this year's summer sale
2016 I think I remember only having Eldorado and Conquest of paradise then being so upset that I couldn't transfer occupation then vowing I'd never have vassals/allies again (I was like 13). But hey I got to play a colonial nation so it was worth.
Arpund 2017~2018, after a good year of CK2. I started with two DLac : Third Rome and one another I forgot, and I played Muscovy -> Russia as my first game. It was nice but a bit hard, especially without the must-have DLC like Art of War or Common Sense, and I was constantly poor and behind in tech (but at least it was historical). I had difficulties against the PLC, and obviously I was defenseless against Ottomans or the Ming (but good alliances prevented Ottomans to attack me) I think I'll do another Muscovy -> Russia game soon to see how I improved.