Crusader Kings II

At some point in the last year or so my tastes in gaming underwent a sea-change. For a long time I enjoyed quantity of games over depth of play, favoring short, easily mastered games that could be finished and traded in quickly. Creative shooters like Bulletstorm, or action-adventure titles like Tomb Raider fit the bill perfectly-- games I could finish in 10-12 hours, trade in, and move on the next experience. It's not that I shunned difficulty, it was just that I wanted games that gave me relaxation and entertainment over a steep mental challenge. Plus, I had a big backlog of games I wanted to play and I valued the ability to have a multitude of experiences.

Lately, however, I have been drawn to deep, dense, highly complex games that take hours and hours just to learn the base gameplay, let alone experience the fullness of what they have to offer. Games that scoff at words like "accessibility" and "user-friendly," that punish you for your mistakes but reward patience and hard work. Games that test your patience and your skills, but forge you into a better gamer on the cold, hard anvil of their difficulty. Crusader Kings II is such a game and I have sunk many, many hours into plumbing its depths.

At first glance, CKII looks like your average, conquer-the-world strategy game, a la Civ or the Total War series. But oh, my, it's so much different than that. Because in Crusader Kings, you're not in charge of an army or a nation, but a dynasty, and your goal is to guide your noble house through history and gain as much renown as possible. This certainly includes fighting battles and conquering neighboring territories, but war is only a small (and costly) part of your job. Prestige comes in many forms, and you'll spend just as much time arranging marriages, cementing alliances, pleasing religious leaders, developing your economy, and of course answering (or rejecting) the odd call to crusade.

You play as an individual, the head of your dynasty, and you will control that person until they die and their heir takes over, at which point you shift to take control of the new head of your House. This continues through generations, and the game continues until 1453 unless your ruler dies with no legitimate heir to take over the dynasty. But transition is never easy, and whenever you transfer from one ruler to the next you'll find yourself dealing with a host of new problems. Every character in the game has a unique set of characteristics-- not just attributes like faith or diplomacy, but character traits like "avaricious," "lustful," or "wrathful," all of which contribute to people's opinion of you. It can be very difficult to hold on to your hard-won territory when your nobles disapprove of your religion, or have a low opinion because of your "cowardly" trait.

You can begin the game at any level of the aristocracy, from a lowly Count in a backwater Irish county all the way up to the Byzantine Emperor, and at any time between 1066 and 1453. The breadth of detail is truly astounding, especially when you consider that the majority of the characters are actual historical figures-- their profiles even include links to their Wikipedia entries, when available. At the end of the game, the success of your dynasty is compared to the accomplishments of actual historical dynasty, just to see how you measure up.

But a game this ambitious is not without its issues. By nature, the complexity is daunting, and I had to spend hours playing tutorials and watching YouTube guides just to learn the basics. Despite putting some 30 hours into this game, I am just barely scratching the surface. There are mechanics I have barely even touched yet, like managing the internal politics of your court. And it must be said, the user interface leaves something to be desired, as important options are often buried in submenus within submenus. The ability to hotkey certain functions, or create a custom toolbar would have been nice

Often, it can be opaque as to why certain events happen the way they do. For example, choosing tutors for the children in your family is a very important task. Children take on the strengths and weaknesses of their teachers, and choosing the right tutors can ensure the people in your court have strong abilities to help you lead your nation. I had been playing as the King of Ireland-- King Iacob "The Wicked"-- and I happened to have a very able Moor eunuch in my inner council. He had been given to me by a traveling merchant, and his martial ability score was through the roof, so I made him the Marshal of my army. The Pope was none too pleased that I had a Muslim in my court, but meh, I was on good relations with my local bishops and the Pope is all the way over in Italy, so screw him. Iacob's son had reached the age where he needed a tutor, and so of course I set him up with my badass Marshal so that my next king would have a great martial score. But what I did NOT realize was that in addition to learning abilities, children also have a solid chance of absorbing their tutor's culture and religion. Fast forward a few years, and Iacob's son and heir has come of age as a hardcore Muslim who hates his father for his staunch Catholicism. He immediately rebels, setting up the Sheikdom of Leinster and recruiting other counties to his cause. I ended up spending the next 15 years batting down the rebellion, eventually executing Iacob's son and hurriedly changing the succession laws so that his daughter could inherit the crown. Yeesh.

But even though that whole scenario resulted from a cock-up on my part for not understanding, it makes for an amazing story, doesn't it? The interface may be somewhat bare-bones, but as with FTL that just leaves plenty of room for your imagination to fill in the gaps. If you're a history nerd it's pretty fascinating to get a front row seat to how history plays out, or to see how things could have gone if fate had decided a few key events differently. In another of my campaigns, Norway swept down and took over most of the British Isles, and the Holy Roman Empire pushed down into Italy and Greece.

This is a game that takes an ocean of patience and tenacity to master, and it's not for everyone. But if any of this sounds enticing, I urge you to give it a try. There is game is a totally unique experience, and it will reward every bit of patience and practice you put into it.

And yes...there is a Game of Thrones mod.