Crusader Kings III will receive DLC after launch and the developers confirmed to us that it will not rehash the expansions from the previous games in the same way that The Sims games rehash their DLC. Crusader Kings III was announced at PDXCON 2019, which was accompanied by Crusader Kings II becoming a free game for anyone to enjoy.
Players who download Crusader Kings II will not be receiving the full version of the game, as Crusader Kings II received fifteen separate paid content expansions from 2012 to 2018, as well as many DLC packs that add new visuals and songs. The expansions are currently on sale as part of the PDXCON celebrations, but the combined price of all of the content DLC alone is still around ninety Euros. The DLC content for Crusader Kings II has been praised for how many different ways it changes the base game experience, so the fans of the series have been supportive of the additional paid content.
Crusader Kings III was shown to the public for the first time at PDXCON, as well as demos of Surviving the Aftermath and the Heavy Metal expansion for BATTLETECH. Screen Rant had the chance to speak to Crusader Kings III Lead Designer Alexander Oltner about the future DLC plans for the upcoming game and he confirmed that it will not reuse the content of previous DLC, unlike a certain other series.
Crusader Kings II continually received DLC throughout its run with the most recent being released in 2018. Will a similar plan be in effect for Crusader Kings III, where the game is supported with content after launch?
The Sims earned a bad reputation for its DLC strategy and rehashing old content is just one of the many complaints levied at the series. The new expansions for The Sims have a tendency to crash the base game at launch, while sequels have taken out content from earlier games in order to justify new expansions. These are problems that have occurred throughout the series and are unlikely to go away in the highly-anticipated Sims 5. The issues with The Sims expansions are such that it’s not surprising for the Crusader Kings III devs to want to avoid any sort of comparison with their upcoming game, especially as Crusader Kings II has an incredible amount of DLC of its own.
Alexander Oltner: We can’t really say what the DLC model will be like. It’s being rethought a little, I can’t spill the beans about it. I can say that we will not retread the exact same ground that we did in the CK2 expansions. We will have expansions, that much is certain. It will not be like in The Sims, like, rehashing the same expansions.
The fact that Crusader Kings II will be available for free in the future means that Crusader Kings III will need a lot of content in the base game in order to justify paying for a brand new title. It’s not surprising to learn that the game will receive DLC support in the future, but it’s at least reassuring to hear that the post-launch content won’t just be repackaged versions of the current crop of expansions that are available for Crusader Kings II.
Next: EA Play: What We Learned About The Sims 4
Crusader Kings III will be released for PC and Xbox Game Pass in 2020.
