No Step Back and the Barbarossa update maasively changed the game and the way it was played, and for me showed a massive improvement over previous updates. In comparison, this DLC and update (which I do judge along with the DLC) feel like a "dotting the i's" type of improvement. It's not groundbreaking, but the game is certainly worse off without it. The plane designer completes the vehicle designer trio, the overhaul for peace conferences and airwings were QOL fixes we definitely needed, and while arguably not *as* important a player, Italy still was one of the most important countries in the war, and absolutely deserves the detailed focus tree it got in this DLC. The minor country content for Switzerland and Ethiopia are welcome too, and I'm especially happy to see PDX experiment with paths that try to go beyond the rigid intepretation of their "4 ideologies" system.

Is it perfect? No. As much as I like the work put into Ethiopia and Switzerland I feel like other countries deserve the attention more, though to be fair, it'd be hard to thematically justify. There's some bugs and quite a few balancing issues at the moment. Lastly it's still expensive. Given the amount of time I put into this game over the years it's a price I'm willing to pay, but there will always be that small sour note to it.

No Step Back and the Barbarossa update maasively changed the game and the way it was played, and for me showed a massive improvement over previous updates. In comparison, this DLC and update (which I do judge along with the DLC) feel like a "dotting the i's" type of improvement. It's not groundbreaking, but the game is certainly worse off without it. The plane designer completes the vehicle designer trio, the overhaul for peace conferences and airwings were QOL fixes we definitely needed, and while arguably not *as* important a player, Italy still was one of the most important countries in the war, and absolutely deserves the detailed focus tree it got in this DLC. The minor country content for Switzerland and Ethiopia are welcome too, and I'm especially happy to see PDX experiment with paths that try to go beyond the rigid intepretation of their "4 ideologies" system. Is it perfect? No. As much as I like the work put into Ethiopia and Switzerland I feel like other countries deserve the attention more, though to be fair, it'd be hard to thematically justify. There's some bugs and quite a few balancing issues at the moment. Lastly it's still expensive. Given the amount of time I put into this game over the years it's a price I'm willing to pay, but there will always be that small sour note to it.