Hearts of Iron III

Hearts of Iron III
Studio	Paradox Interactive
Publisher	Paradox Interactive Koch Media
Senior Developer	Johan Andersson
Erstveröffent- lichung	Windows August 11, 2009 August 28, 2009 Mac December 4, 2009
platform	Windows , Mac
Game engine	Clausewitz engine
genre	Real Time - Global Strategy Game
Game mode	Single player , multiplayer
control	Mouse , keyboard
system advantages preconditions	OS : Windows XP / Windows Vista CPU : 2.4 GHz RAM : 2 GB Graphics card : 512 MB Storage requirement (HDD) : 2 GB
medium	DVD-ROM
language	English , German , Spanish , Italian , French
Current version	1.4 (March 29, 2010)
Age rating	USK PEGI

Hearts of Iron III is a global strategy game released in 2009 and the third installment in the Hearts of Iron series. Like its predecessors, it was developed and published by the Swedish company Paradox Interactive .

Gameplay

General

Hearts of Iron III is a global strategy game set in World War II. The player takes control of one of over a hundred nations and leads them through the time of war. He has the option of joining one of the three factions, Axis , Allies or Comintern . However, this can also remain neutral. It is not possible to set up your own factions, but you can ally with other states directly.

The game happens exclusively on a two-dimensional world map. This is divided into approximately 15,000 provinces, which are assigned to the various nations. In every province that belongs to his own country, the player can erect buildings and infrastructure as well as station troops.

The player has numerous options in governing his own nation. He can influence the economy, domestic policy, foreign policy, troop leadership, research and the secret service. These tasks can also be partially or fully delegated to the computer.

campaign

The campaign consists of different scenarios depicting significant stages of World War II. They differ from each other primarily in the starting year. The earliest campaign begins in 1936.

The course of the game is relatively unbound. Some historical events mimick a rough historical course. The events include, for example, the Vienna arbitration awards or the Otto company .

Foreign policy

Foreign policy is divided into two parts, trade and the management of international relations. Trade serves to procure the necessary resources. International relations are crucial for the future of one's own country. Close ties with any of the three factions make it very likely that you will be drawn into the war.

Numerous foreign policy options are available to the player. He can conclude trade agreements, establish defensive and offensive alliances, declare war on nations or move closer to one of the three blocs.

Domestic politics

A central element in domestic policy is the promotion of industry and infrastructure. The efficiency of the industry determines how many troops, supplies or fortifications can be built.

The country is administered with the help of a government cabinet, which consists of twelve politicians with various functions, such as head of state, head of government or minister of economics. The politicians are all historical figures. B. under the leadership of President Roosevelt , while the German Reich is ruled by Adolf Hitler . Every cabinet politician has different modifiers. B. the number of available industrial capacity points.

It is similar with the current political system of the player. Different forms of government such as fascism , national socialism , social democracy or the constitutional monarchy are involved . These affect domestic and foreign policy. So increases z. B. a democratic system the satisfaction of the population in peacetime and improves the relationship with the allies. Fascist systems and military dictatorships, on the other hand, are able to act more effectively against spies.

The economic strength of a country is determined by the efficiency of the industry, which is indicated with points and is referred to as industrial capacity . Resources such as metal or oil are required for the functioning of industry. These are automatically mined in regions that have corresponding occurrences. The main purpose of industry is to produce and supply troops.

Warfare

The warfare takes place on the two-dimensional world map. The player places his troops in his own provinces. A large number of troops are available that are based on contemporary military units. These include infantry units , tanks or militiamen . In the event of war, if your own troops meet opposing troops, a fight ensues. This is calculated automatically based on various parameters such as type of troops carried, manpower, terrain and weather.

A nation is defeated when a certain number of key cities have been occupied by the enemy. The victor then has the option of either annexing the nation or setting up a puppet government . In the case of an annexation, the player has all the resources of the subject country at his disposal, but partisans can form against the occupier. There is no such risk with marionettes.

Nations

In Hearts of Iron are represented more than 100 countries, which can all be played by the player. In the course of the game, most of this nation join one of the three major power blocs, the Axis, the Allies or the Comintern. Initially only a few nations are represented in these blocks. B. the Axis powers initially only from the German Empire.

The nations in the game represent almost all of the real nations that existed at the time of World War II. Only the smallest states such as San Marino , Andorra or the Vatican are left out . For this there are some nations that were not yet founded then, for example Israel or Egypt . They can take part in the game when they are released into independence by their dominant power.

Overview of the political groups
flag	nation	Remarks	tendency
	United States		Allies
	Great Britain	Leader of the allies	Allies
	France	Member of the Allies from the start	Allies
	German Empire	Axis leader	axis
	Soviet Union	Leader of the Comintern bloc	Comintern
	Japan		axis
	Italy		axis
	Australia		Allies
	Sweden		Allies
	Norway		Allies
	Finland		axis
	Denmark		Allies
	Netherlands		Allies
	Belgium		Allies
	Luxembourg		Allies
	Ireland		Allies
	Spain		Comintern
	Spain	Created during the Spanish Civil War	axis
	Portugal		axis
	Yugoslavia		axis
	Hungary		axis
	Romania		axis
	Bulgaria		axis
	Greece		Allies
	Albania		Allies
	Czechoslovakia		Allies
	Poland		Allies
	Switzerland		Allies
	Estonia		axis
	Latvia		axis
	Lithuania		axis
	Slovakia	Arises from the annexation of Czechoslovakia by Germany as a puppet state	axis
	Croatia	Developed as a puppet state during the conquest of Yugoslavia by Germany	axis
	New Zealand		Allies
	China		Allies
	Manchukuo	Has been a puppet of Japan from the start	axis
	Iraq	Has been a puppet of Great Britain from the start	Allies
	Iran		axis
	Yemen	Has been a puppet of Great Britain from the start	Allies
	Nepal	Has been a puppet of Great Britain from the start	Allies
	Bhutan	Has been a puppet of Great Britain from the start	Allies
	Mongolia	Has been a puppet of the USSR from the start	Comintern
	Philippines	Has been a US puppet from the start	Allies
	Saudi Arabia		axis
	Tuvinian People's Republic	Has been a puppet of the USSR from the start	Comintern
	Siam		axis
	Tibet		axis
	Afghanistan		axis
	Ethiopia		Allies
	South Africa		Allies
	Liberia		Allies
	Brazil		axis
	Argentina		axis
	Chile		Allies
	Colombia		Allies
	Venezuela		Allies
	Peru		axis
	Uruguay		Allies
	Ecuador		Allies
	Bolivia		axis
	Guatemala		Allies
	El Salvador		Allies
	Costa Rica		Allies
	Panama		Allies
	Nicaragua		Allies
	Honduras		Allies
	Cuba		Allies
	Mexico		Allies
	Canada		Allies
	Italian social republic	arises when the Kingdom of Italy is defeated	axis
	Egypt	No independent nation at the start of a game
	India	No independent nation at the start of a game
	Syria	No independent nation at the start of a game
	Israel	No independent nation at the start of a game
	Indonesia	No independent nation at the start of a game
	Pakistan	No independent nation at the start of a game
	Jordan	No independent nation at the start of a game
	Lebanon	No independent nation at the start of a game
	Guyana	No independent nation at the start of a game
	South Korea	No independent nation at the start of a game
	North Korea	No independent nation at the start of a game
	Vietnam	No independent nation at the start of a game

Development history

development

Hearts of Iron III was first announced by Paradox Interactive at the Leipzig Games Convention in August 2008. The lead developer was Johan Andersson , who was already involved in Europa Universalis . One of the first innovations described was the new map, which should cover well over 10,000 provinces. At this point, the title had been in development for about four months, according to Paradox, and was expected to appear in the third or fourth quarter of 2009.

In early 2009 Paradox introduced the game at a launch of several new releases in Stockholm, including an expansion for Mount & Blade , Majesty 2 and Hearts of Iron III. The focus of the presentation was on the ability of the artificial intelligence to take over the tasks of the player, as well as improvements in details compared to its predecessor. In March the game was announced for the Game Developers Conference . At this point it was in beta.

After extensive beta tests, the developers confirmed that the game would be released in 2009. Before that, an almost finished version should be presented at the E3 game fair in Los Angeles.

Compared to its predecessor, the number of land and sea areas to be conquered has been significantly increased. The number of states has also increased significantly. A new option for states is to form a government in exile in the event of military defeat .

publication

On July 27, Paradox announced that the game had achieved gold status and that work was complete. Finally, Hearts of Iron was first released in North America on August 11, 2009. It was also released in Europe on August 28th. In the German version, pictures of high-ranking German politicians, such as Adolf Hitler or Hermann Göring , were removed for reasons of censorship and their names were replaced by fantasy names. In addition, the historical flag was replaced by the flag of the German Empire .

Three expansions followed the game. Hearts of Iron III: Semper Fi was released in June 2010 . For the Motherland followed in June 2011 . The last package appeared with Their Finest Hour in September 2012.

At the end of November 2011, the Hearts of Iron III: Collection was released , which contains Hearts of Iron III , Hearts of Iron III: Semper Fi and Hearts of Iron III: For the Motherland , as well as 9 Sprite Packs.

reception

reviews publication Rating 4players 81% GameSpot 8.5 / 10 GameStar 80% IGN 8.5 / 10 PC Games 64% Meta-ratings GameRankings 77.34% Metacritic 77/100

Hearts of Iron III initially received rather negative reviews after its release, as the game had a lot of programming errors.

“During battles, embarrassed two-tone bars fill up on the edge of the map, which could have been copied from an installation screen. Gray windows in the look of a Windows NT error message pop up and reveal that low-level planes have just blown half our invading army away, two provinces have defected and, oh yes, the atomic bomb has just been developed. "

- Martin Deppe : Test strategy. Hearts of Iron 3

"[...] a strategy game of impressive depth that will captivate you for the next few years (!)."

- Martin Deppe : Test strategy. Hearts of Iron 3

Web links

• Hearts of Iron III at MobyGames (English)
• heartsofirongame.com , Official Homepage
• Hearts of Iron III on paradoxplaza.com, the homepage of the developer and publisher Paradox Interactive
• Hearts of Iron III Wiki at paradoxplaza.com

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Hearts of Iron 3 . In: GameStar . IDG Entertainment Media GmbH , accessed on August 29, 2009 . 
2. ↑ forum.paradoxplaza.com
3. ↑ ^{a b c} Steve Butts: Hearts of Iron III Review. IGN Entertainment, August 13, 2009, accessed September 25, 2014 . 
4. ↑ Jeff Haynes: GC 2008: Hearts of Iron 3 Announced. IGN Entertainment, August 20, 2008, accessed September 25, 2014 . 
5. ↑ Charles Onyett: GC 2008: Hearts of Iron III First Look. IGN Entertainment, August 23, 2008, accessed September 25, 2014 . 
6. ↑ Paradox divulges New Details on Upcoming releases. IGN Entertainment, January 30, 2009, accessed September 25, 2014 . 
7. ↑ GDC 09: Paradox Announces Line-up. IGN Entertainment, March 12, 2009, accessed September 25, 2014 . 
8. ↑ Jeff Haynes: E3 2009: Paradox Interactive Announces E3 Plans. IGN Entertainment, May 7, 2009, accessed September 25, 2014 . 
9. ↑ The information on the number of provinces varies between "over 10,000" and "over 14,000". See Christian Schneider: Hearts of Iron 3 - Special # 1 . On: gamestar.de , March 4, 2009; as well as the Paradox press release GDC Announcement: Hearts of Iron 3 in Beta-testing stage ( Memento of the original from March 9, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . On: paradoxplaza.com , March 23, 2009. Around 15,000 provinces are specified at the time of publication: Martin Deppe: Test - Strategy. Hearts of Iron 3 . On: gamestar.de , August 25, 2009. 
10. ↑ Christian Schneider: Hearts of Iron 3 - Special # 2 . On: gamestar.de , March 8, 2009.
11. ↑ Hearts of Iron 3 Strikes Gold. IGN Entertainment, July 27, 2009, accessed September 25, 2014 . 
12. ↑ Bodo Naser: Test "Hearts of Iron III". 4players.de, September 4, 2009, accessed April 16, 2014 . 
13. ↑ Brett Todd: Test "Hearts of Iron III". In: GameSpot . CBS Corporation , August 12, 2009, accessed April 10, 2014 . 
14. ↑ Martin Deppe: Test "Hearts of Iron III". In: GameStar . IDG Entertainment Media GmbH , August 25, 2009, accessed April 16, 2014 . 
15. ^ Meta-evaluation "Hearts of Iron III". In: Metacritic . CBS Corporation , accessed April 16, 2014 . 
16. ^ Meta-evaluation "Hearts of Iron III". In: GameRankings. CBS Corporation , accessed December 30, 2014 . 
17. ↑ Stefan Weiss: Hearts of Iron 3 test. In: PC Games . Computec Media Group , accessed December 30, 2014 . 
18. ↑ ^{a b} Hearts of Iron 3 in the test. Editor's conclusion. GameStar , August 28, 2009, accessed September 27, 2014 .