Europa Universalis 4, Paradox Interactive's dizzyingly rich grand strategy game, will be getting its 17th major expansion, titled Leviathan, on 27th April.
Leviathan is focussed on offering new ways to succeed beyond endless expansion and warmongering, introducing a range of new diplomatic and economic options to meet that goal. "Build a force of diplomats," explains Paradox by way of example, "and use your flattery as a weapon against others. Or draw wealth and power from the remote regions of your realm to construct a metropolis to be the engine of your economy."
One of Leviathan's most significant additions is the ability for diplomats to proactively gain Favours with a nation (previously they were accrued over time), which can then be used to perform useful diplomatic functions - such as abandoning an alliance, or having a nation return a core province - without having to declare war.
Following the introduction of a monthly subscription service for Crusader Kings 2 last month, Paradox Interactive has launched a similar model for its dizzyingly rich flagship grand strategy game Europa Universalis 4, providing an easier entry point for its mountain of DLC.
Paradox initially began exploring a potential subscription model for Europa Universalis 4 last January, offering the feature to a "limited group of people" in an experimental capacity.
At the time, it explained, "We have heard for years from existing and potential new players that the cost of getting the game and all expansions all at once is quite expensive (and might be discouraging for completely new EU4 fans), it's been supported for almost 7 years after all. A subscription model has been suggested to us on many occasions, so we thought we'd run a test to see how popular such a service would be."
