For a fairly lengthy stretch of time, grand strategy game Victoria 3 seemed cursed to be the subject of a perpetual running joke that got brought up whenever publisher Paradox Interactive would announce a new title. Fast forward to today, and the title is about to celebrate its third anniversary.
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Although it shares DNA with the publisher’s other in-house developed grand strategy games, Victoria 3 stands out thanks to its detailed society simulation and focus on economics over warfare. Despite being a bit tougher to penetrate and launching with its own set of issues, the publisher has stuck by it, dedicating a full team to developing new content which, especially lately, seems to have paid off.
Victoria 3 Third Anniversary
“We have come so far in three years, and we’re very excited about where we are now,” said Game Director Martin Anward. “We’re building on a solid base, but, especially over the last year, Victoria 3 has become something truly unique - even among Paradox grand strategy games.
“We owe a great debt to our community, of course. Their feedback has been invaluable in planning the last three years as well as charting the course for the years to come. Morale is high and we can’t wait to show you what is coming next year.”
To mark Victoria 3’s third anniversary celebrations, Paradox Interactive has shared an infographic, which you can find above, that contains some interesting stats drawn from the past 12 months.
During this time, Scandinavia was formed 107,680 times, dwarfing Byzantium which only came into existence during 65,075 playthroughs.
Presidential democracy claims the first place on the list of most common government types, while China, Japan, and the USA are the top three most played countries.
Victoria 3 then captured the attention of its fans for more than 440 million hours during the past year, prompting the construction of 269,651 Trans-Siberian Railways, enough to take us to and from the Moon more than 6,000 times.
Having received its most recent DLC, National Awakening, last month, it’s certainly great to see Paradox’s most niche grand strategy game avoiding the fate of Imperator: Rome, which a portion of its playerbase still mourns.
There’s no word yet on when Victoria 3’s next batch of DLC will be unveiled, but chances are we won’t have to wait all that long. With a bit of luck, we’ll get the ability to point those Trans-Siberian Railways upwards and spread absolutism to the Moon.
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