This is the story of the once great nation of Sweden.
Its the early 1840's, Sweden is in crippling debt and the people are on the verge of revolution.
The new king is crowned and begins to reform the goverment, becoming a conservitive party.
Sweden begins to thrive under the rule of this new king, with the United Kingdom taking notice.
Over many decades Sweden finally becomes a great power leading in both prestige and industry.
After on and off war with Norway and Denmark, Sweden abandones it's desire for expansion.
Over the years Sweden had its fair share of rebel uprisings, none the Swedish military couldn't handle.
Breaking News hits the papers, Swedish patriots storm the capital of Finland, causing them to surrender.
The Swedish king then annexes most of Finland, leaving one tiny province.
Sweden begins a new golden age, becoming one of the most respected nations in the world.
Germany, Sweden's neighbor down south becomes a democracy and allies with Sweden.
While Russia becomes the Soviet Union and puts troops on the Swedish Border.
1904, the great war starts.
The UK and Germany fight together against the French and Austria
Sweden joins the war and sends their best men to help out on the Magniot.
Germany pushes hard into Austria while Sweden protects them from the french.
The people of germany, tired from the war, rise up.
The entire country is at war with itself, with millions of rebels helping the French-Austrian Alliance.
The 1st Swedish Royal army, Sweden's best and most prestigious army comes under fire from the German Rebels.
The battle lasts for many weeks untill the Swedish army is slaughtered by the Rebel Tide.
Thousands Die.
The Second Swedish Reserve Army is trapped in Austria.
Led by Sweden's best general, they manage to fight their way through the remaining Austrian army and the Rebels to the last bastion of the German Military.
The German Military covers the swedish escape to the last port.
Millions Die.
The Reserve army finally escapes europe and returns home.
Germany and the UK both fall to rebel uprisings.
The Great War ends and Sweden is surrounded by the Russians and the French.
Fighting a war on 2 fronts the Swedish people are slaughtered by the thousands.
After many years of fighting Sweden falls.
The king is killed and Sweden is annexed to The Soviet Union.
Even though the goverment and the country has fallen, the Swedish resistance still fights their Soviet Masters to this day.
Some say you can still hear the echoes of the brave men who fell in defense of their homeland.

ethnic cleansing has never been so much fun

Victoria 2 is a next level of depth for a game that I had no idea was possible. Everything from encouraging a certain type of job in some far off tiny colony in Africa to managing your country's economy is possible along with everything in between. This is not just a map simulator, but more of a world simulator. Not appeasing the public's will will bring rebellions and will shift the balance of your government. You can go from having a war-happy nation to one that cuts itself off from the world because your population drastically shifted their vote due to you gaining too much infamy or not passing a policy reform that 2+ million people wanted. This game is for people that love to do nothing but micro-manage on a large scale. The conquering of countries and waging wars is the fun side of this game, but what really creates another level of realism is managing your country like a true president/dictator/king would.

After playing the game without mods for about 500 hours, I decided to download the HPM mod. I have never turned back. Here is my expierence:

- I decided to play a game as Finland. I started out with a relatively high literacy rate, at about 65%, however they were a puppet under Russia
- Even though my pop was low, at about 300k, I trained as many troops as I could, I only had about 10 I could train altogether.
- I started to increase my relations with Prussia, in hopes that they would support me in an independence war.
- I began to research military tech out of my ♥♥♥ to get ahead of Russia, which usually has a very hard time researching tech.
- The year 1852 rolls around, it's about mid August. I decided it was time to declare independence. Unfortunatley for me Prussia didn't want to support me when I declared independence.
- Frustrated, I moved my only army of about 30,000 into St. Petersburg. For about 3 months I was met with no resistance.
- Late November 1852, the Russians attack my soldiers in St. Petersburg with more than 100,000 troops. As the epic Battle of St. Petersburg rages on, the Russian start sending troops into my territory. I decide to mobilize all I could, which was about 60,000 troops. I manage to fight off most of the invading Russians.
- I begin to feel good about myself, that is until I lost the battle in St. Petersburg. I lost about half of my troops while inflicting about 40,000 casualties on the Russians.
- About 4 years later and some couple hundred thousand casualties later, Sweden rises as a great power, and decides to join my war. The war continues on for about another year and half, resulting in my independence and the conquest of St. Petersbug.
- Because of this victory, I was able to quickly conquer southern China, East Africa, and a fair amount of Indo China.
- Then, in 1920, my empire collapsed due to Sweden declaring war on me and dismantling me.

Awesome game, best one of the franchise if Vic 3 is ever a thing I will buy it and hopefully it will grant me as much enjoyment as Crushing the US of A with Britians ludicrous power did. Britania rules the seas for ever!

>starts out as Russian Empire
>kicks ♥♥♥ as the Russian Empire
>kicks more ♥♥♥ as the Russian Empire
>creates Communist Revolution in early 1900s and forms Soviet Union, throwing the remainders into a mess
>manages to industrialize the USSR and get it back into the great powers in less than 50 years

I have become Father Stalin.

>finishes the game with a war where I ally with France and the U.S. against the U.K. and Italy, and we're winning

Though in all honesty, I would seriously recommend this game.

Carefully guide your nation from the era of absolute monarchies in the early 19th century, through expansion and colonization, to finally become a truly great power by the dawn of the 20th century. Victoria II is a grand strategy game played during the colonial era of the 19th century, where the player takes

I could see how someone could really enjoy Victoria II. I got about 20 minutes into the tutorial, had covered less than half the material, and my head was spinning. It seems like "Total War" on steriods: you know when you start a game as a big nation and spend your first few turns getting your feet under you, consolidating and getting a feel for what's going on? From what I can tell, that's basically the whole game. Micromanaging everything. It's just too complex, and not my thing. But if you're into super in-depth grand strategy, go for it.

I begin with the United Kingdom, quickly releasing all nations that it holds such as that of Australia, Canada, Ireland... Ireland...This shall be my empire, this shall be where I forge my glorious ideals of a world wide state, dominated by guiness and whiskey. I began expanding, I was making a lot of money, so much infact that I had begun taking over the world's market, despite the fact I was only a small nation. I needed raw materials, Ireland as an island, was not quite enough. My military slowly grew, soldier after soldier poured out of the gates of the Dublin Military Academy. I tried begging France to join me on my righteous crusade. I built boats as to carry my army, now I shall leave the greatest cities of Asia but smouldering piles of rock and ash. I landed in Johore, a small country in the Malay area. The many armies, 1st of Cork, 3rd of Derry, all fought hard in the jungle and despite disease and famine pulled through, it was now mine, it was now Ireland's.

I begun developing this hell-hole into a place where an Irishman could hop off the steamboat and expect a pint waiting for him by the beach. Sadly, the Ottoman Empire decided we were getting too big for ourselves, too cocky. They landed in Galloway, forcing up to Dublin through the few troops that were left behind after the conquest of General O'Doherty in Asia. I quickly negotiated peace, they demanded we disarm, we had little option. I began to rebuild the country, look to other places for inspiration. Maybe Africa? What about Western America? As I gazed off into the sea from my cosy office in Dublin I got news of Portugal declaring war? What for? I haven't got the slightest idea. And then again, Britain had now declared war on me! What was I to do? My navy was still half way around the world attempting to frantically sail back to the homeland, disbanding the colony in Johore dismantling that pub that had become so popular with the plantation owners.

The British army quickly crossed from Wales and Belgium, my closest ally at the time, refused to aid me in my most finest hour. I quickly negotiated peace with Britain once again, however Portugal was more stubborn. By calling my peasants to arms I managed to fend off the assault from Lisbon and just as the troops were recovering, awaiting supplies and reinforcements from Asia, the Netherlands declared war. I once again quickly negotiated with Portugal to face my new oponent, the sky was looking dark for Ireland and her dreams of imperialism. The Dutch landed in Derry, I couldn't fend them off, all other nations had put me under mandatory disarmament - I couldn't call any more units to arms, it was a disaster! The Netherlands thankfully backed off, supposedly seeing some dim light in my attempts of peace. Now under four consecutive disarmament orders and being passed pillar-to-post by nations like a puppet state, Ireland sits thoughtfully on the side of Britain - its empire decimated, its people sat in sadness and its cities burning from the cannons of Europe. Not much to do now but bide our time in hopes of another oppurtunity...one day...

Such is the life of a potato farmer with big dreams.

A deep and sophisticated grand strategy/gommunism simulator from Paradox Interactive, Victoria II poses several fascinating questions, such as:

"Why is Britain such a lazy doucһebag?"

"How can I have 6 million rebels every year when I have a population of 5 million?"

"Why does Fascist Tibet have a better economy than me?"

"How is Fascist Tibet even possible?"

"Why is everyone leaving my country?

"Britain, help, Tibet is invading me!"

"How is that a game over??"

In addition to creating endless possibilities for such believable worlds, Victoria II features a robust and realistic world economy that's too complex for any mere mortal to comprehend. Constantly bail out bankrupt factories and watch your country spiral into debt, just like real life!

The political aspect of the game is also breathtakingly realistic. Watch as your pops do the exact opposite of what you want them to, always be upset with your decisions, and rebel at the worst possible time. A basic guide to politics is that just like in the real world, communism is always the answer. With it, the only one you have to blame for your fuϲkups is yourself, not incompetent AI.

Diplomacy is an important part of the game, especially alliances. If a country is even slightly favorable towards a great power, you can expect them to always intervene against you, ruling out any conflict with that country. Your own allies will constantly call on you for aid, but won't have any problems with leaving you on your own when you need help. There's also the great infamy system, which supposedly prevents blobbing but really just creates artificial difficulty.

The game might seem way too complex at first, but after an hour or 50 you'll see that it's just as complex as you thought it was, but at least you sort of understand it now. If you stick with it long enough to git gud, the game will be a lot of fun.

Overall: 10/10, it's decent

P.S. Expect to have fun with massive yearly Jacobin rebellions in the latter half of the game unless if you're the USA or Gutter Germany. Although, if you're Gutter Germany, you should probably just kill yourself.

P.P.S. I forgot to mention the many amazing mods there are for this game, including the infamous Pop Demand Mod, which adds great features such as three different kinds of shoe factories, the amazing-and-totally-not-broken Victoria Ultimate which tries to apply 19th century politics and economics to 400 years of history, and vickymod, letting you experience all the epic reddit memes you can fit in your fedora.