I think I’m just looking for some hope or catharsis lately. What’s a good game where I can see some success as a communist group, country, etc?
Would playing as the USSR for Hearts of Iron IV work? It sounds super satisfying to defeat the Nazis in a war, but the game also sounds extremely complicated - well, the one time I tried it (and found a 6 hour tutorial or something like that on YouTube, then gave up).
What do people think of that game? Are there other alternatives to scratch that itch?
There’s the recent game where you play as the Mensheviks or Bolsheviks post USSR Revolution in 1917, but I’m still figuring out the German SDP version of the game. My brain isn’t ready to learn all the nuance of a new version of that yet, I don’t think lol.
Victoria 3 is the only paradox game I’ve gotten really into, it’s super heavily focused on economy and internal politics rather than building doom stacks to paint the map. It’s also a lot less intimidating to get into as there’s less micromanagement needed to do well (especially after the recent overhaul to trade). I really enjoy the fact that the majority of the game is focused on improving the internal conditions of your nation rather than on fighting your neighbors. You can become an absolute economic powerhouse with just a few well managed states and good trade deals, simply capturing territory is often a bad thing as you will inherit their problems. You can join (or form) power blocs with friendly nations to get preferential trade deals and prevent other nations from bullying you into submission. There is a well fleshed out system of gradually enacting social progress by manipulating which social groups are in power, you can absolutely transition to a full command economy with universal healthcare, education, and social services but it’s far more involved than just pressing the communism button