Europa Universalis: Crown of the North review (PC)

Improving territories is the key to being able to field larger armies. There are seven or eight infrastructure buildings per territory (the castle, church, farm, market, city, defensive walls, and muster field, plus a harbor for coastal provinces) that determine how quickly the game's resources are collected, what kinds of military units can be produced, and how quickly those units are produced. The upgrading costs silver, and it's a fairly slow process, since only one building can be built or upgraded in a territory at any one time. Still, since the six factions are placed quite far apart at the start of a game, there's plenty of time to grab up some neutral lands before you have to worry about any real competition.

But as it turns out, the real competition never does show up. The economic model is such that any single territory will be too poor to build real armies, and since the independent neutral territories don't dare invade their neighbors, it's up to the five main computer-controlled factions to do something. But even at the higher settings for difficulty and AI aggressiveness, the computer players aren't at all smart about grabbing up land. They often seem content with a relatively small number of territories and don't use navies well to ferry armies around the Baltic to attack poorly defended rear-guard provinces. To make matters worse, the diplomacy system has been drastically simplified. Not only are there very few relevant powers to deal with, but there are few options other than to declare war, offer peace, or offer gifts in the hope of establishing an alliance. And it's just fine if one of the major powers does happen to declare war on you at an inopportune moment, because it doesn't cost anything to repeatedly click on the "peace offer" button, and even your worst enemy is likely to accept after a few tries.

The smaller scale and the simplified interface and mechanics make Crown of the North the easiest introduction to the world of Europa Universalis, but the lack of dynamic and challenging computer opponents drastically limits its depth and long-term appeal. And even if the interface is much simplified, it's still bound to be daunting for beginners. There isn't a tutorial specific to Crown of the North or any visual reminder of the necessary keyboard commands hidden at the back of the manual. For those who finish Crown of the North, Europa Universalis II is also included on the disc as a consolation prize. However, anyone just learning to play a game as challenging as Europa Universalis II might want to have the manual on hand, and somehow the PDF manual included here is missing every other page. And experienced Europa Universalis II players aren't likely to need the three user-created scenarios that are on the disc, since there are plenty of free scenarios on the Internet. As promising as some elements of Crown of the North are, it's too flawed to recommend.