Crusader Kings III

Crusader Kings III is a grand strategy role-playing video game set in the Middle Ages, developed by Paradox Development Studio and published by Paradox Interactive as a sequel to Crusader Kings (2004) and Crusader Kings II (2012). The game was released on PC on 1 September 2020 and on the Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5 on 29 March 2022 in most regions. The game received generally positive reviews on release, and has sold over 3 million copies as of September 2023.

Gameplay
Like its predecessors Crusader Kings and Crusader Kings II, Crusader Kings III is a grand strategy game and dynasty simulator set in the Middle Ages. Players begin as a character in either 867 or 1066. Upon the death or deposition of a player's character they continue to play as that character's heir. Overall, players develop a dynasty over the centuries, with the game ending in 1453.

Dynasties can form cadet branches that have their own heads and act mostly independently from their parent dynasty. The heads of dynasties are able to use a new resource known as Renown to assert their control over their house. For example, the heads of houses are responsible for legitimizing bastards.

Characters have full-body, 3D-rendered character models instead of 2D portraits. These character models can be customized with clothes and headwear by clicking the Barbershop button in the character menu. The characters' models change slightly to represent their status and health, such as having a flushed face when addicted to alcohol, and rulers donning a suit of armor in times of war. As in Crusader Kings II, they have traits that affect their stats and behavior. Making choices that go against a character's traits will increase that character's stress. The game's genetics system allows characters to pass on some of their characteristics to their descendants. Characters are able to frighten their vassals into staying loyal by increasing their Dread, which increases when the character performs malevolent actions, such as executing or torturing other characters. Characters are able to select one of five lifestyles to follow. Each lifestyle has three skill trees that allow characters to enhance skills related to that lifestyle.

Players' realms may have the feudal, tribal, or clan government types. Republics and theocracies exist as well, but are unplayable. Religion and culture are both aspects of the game. Leaders can advance their goals by warfare, diplomacy, or subterfuge. Players may undergo pilgrimages and wage holy wars, and entire religions can be called to arms in crusades or jihads. Religions have Tenets, which are bonuses given to all practitioners of that faith, and Doctrines, which deal with the religion's stances towards issues like homosexuality and female clergy. The principal resource for interacting with religion mechanics is Piety, and a player with sufficient piety may choose to develop their own heresy, with the Tenets and Doctrines being chosen by the player.

Levies are represented primarily by low-quality infantry composed of peasants. Characters will need to hire men-at-arms in order to field higher-quality soldiers, such as crossbowmen and cavalry. Characters can make other characters from their court or realm with significant combat skills into powerful knights.

The game map is about four times more detailed than the one in Crusader Kings II and slightly larger, incorporating Europe, Africa roughly as far south as the equator, and Asia as far East as Tibet.

Development
Game director Henrik Fåhraeus commented that development of the game commenced "about 1 year before Imperator", indicating a starting time of 2015. Describing the game engine of Crusader Kings II as cobbled and "held together with tape", he explained that the new game features an updated engine (i.e. Clausewitz Engine and Jomini toolset) with more power to run new features.

As is the case with many of Paradox's unreleased and currently supported works, the developers publish a weekly developer diary. Each post focuses on a single aspect of the game, such as government types, user interface, governments, war, etc., how this aspect of the game will be handled in Crusader Kings III, and how it is different from Crusader Kings II. A monthly update video is also published on the Paradox Interactive YouTube channel, summarizing all of the changes which have been made in that month's developer diaries.

Mods
Crusader Kings III is also known for its large number of third-party mods available on the Steam Workshop. These mods can add new game mechanics as well as make graphical improvements. Some popular mods include the total conversion mod A Game of Thrones, which is set in the world of A Song of Ice and Fire, and The Fallen Eagle, which changes the game's timeline to around the fall of the Roman Empire.

Release
The game was released on 1 September 2020 and is available through Steam and Xbox Game Pass for PC. The game is available in two editions: the Base Game Edition, which includes the base game and a pre-order bonus, and the Royal Edition, which includes the base game and an expansion pass. The expansion pass contains a collection of additional content packs and the first expansion.

Crusader Kings III was initially rejected by the Australian Classification Board, reportedly over complications regarding the game's classification. The game was eventually cleared and released in Australia six days after its initial release, on 7 September 2020. Because of its delayed release, the pre-order bonus window was extended to 21 September exclusively for Australian Steam users.

A console version of the game was released on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X and Series S on 29 March 2022. The game was made available on Xbox Game Pass on the same day.

Reception
Crusader Kings III received "generally favorable" reviews for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S according to review aggregator Metacritic; the PC version received "universal acclaim". Leana Hafer of IGN wrote that the game "is a superb strategy game, a great RPG, and a master class in how to take the best parts of existing systems and make them deeper and better"; scoring it 10/10 in her review. Lauren Aitken from VG247 also gave the game a perfect score; in her review, she wrote, "Crusader Kings 3 is just as bonkers, unpredictable and enthralling as its predecessor."

David Wildgoose of GameSpot praised the procedural narratives of the game saying that they are rarely as affecting and poignant as they are here; on the other hand, as a negative point, he wrote that "when the story engine isn't firing, your actions can feel rote and uninspired".

In December 2020, Crusader Kings III was nominated in the Best Sims/Strategy category at The Game Awards, but lost to Microsoft Flight Simulator. In April 2021, Crusader Kings III also received a nomination for Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year at the 24th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, again losing out to Microsoft Flight Simulator.

The game sold more than 1 million copies within 1 month of release. It was the seventh best-selling game in September 2020 in the US, and had the highest launch month sales for any Paradox Interactive title. In March 2022, Paradox Interactive announced that Crusader Kings III had sold over 2 million units worldwide. In September 2023, Paradox Interactive announced that Crusader Kings III had sold over 3 million units worldwide.