Victoria 2 Expansion Just Announced!

Thumbs up Victoria II: A House Divided - In-depth Preview

Victoria II: A House Divided
In-depth preview

A House Divided expansion builds up from the idea that Victoria II was a good game that could become even greater as politics and economic mechanics get enhanced. As its title suggests, it features a brand new 1861 campaign, but not only that.
I had the opportunity to sit down with Paradox Interactive producer Johan Andersson at the E3 and get an insight of what the expansion brings to the table.


The 1861 campaign will focus on properly reflecting the American civil war through dedicated events chains and scenario datas. Not much details have been disclosed yet, although we already know there will be no new technologies, nor extended timeline for this expansion.

Yet A House Divided has even more to offer. For players will for instance now be able to undertake foreign investment. Countries in which one invests will in turn be less likely to get dragged into another's sphere of influence. Building infrastructures in foreign countries (e. g. the Germans building railroads in the Ottoman empire) will furthermore increase the amount of resources that can be traded from said country.

Despite its name, the expansion also brings about decisive changes in the ways XIXth century Asia is depicted. China will no longer be a united country, and will, instead, be divided up into cliques. Each of them can be vassaled and brought into great powers' spheres of influence, thus making an end to the irrational situations where a game was basically won just as soon as someone managed to get China into your own sphere.

Uncivilized countries will get two new reforms paths towards “civilization”, which allow even the smallest countries to somehow make their way into industrialized modernity.
New social reforms will deal with school system, whilst A House Divided will feature manufactured casus belli to reflect the build up whereby one makes up reasons to go to war against an enemy (be it by diplomatic influence, insults, or even press propaganda, e. g. USA war against Spain). Whereas this may usually take quite some time, manufacturing a casus belli against uncivilized nations could be quicker.

The expansion also tackles some issues related to the politics, and especially elections and revolts systems. Considering that the elections were not as exciting as first intended, the developers are implementing a new system, which has yet to be introduced in details. Political fiefs will for instance tend to form in areas where the same party wins over and over. This should open the way to portraying more diverse political landscape within countries.
On the other hand, reforms movements will now precede revolts. Players then has different options to interact with the “indignated”, to try and prevent actual revolts from taking place.

Scheduled for december 2011, “if everything goes well”, A House Divided will finally tweak economy mechanics, in such a way that, whether the State of the POPs will buy goods first for example now depends on economic policies (e.g. POPs will be prioritized in capitalist countries).

Rayan Nezzar from the E3