Takes time to get into it, like any good book or movie. But when you do, you wont leave your computer for a long time.
The time and effort put into this game is amazing. The cutscenes are well put together and the voice acting is very good. Although some cutscenes such as when dueling, while cool, you cannot tell which is your gentleman or rake (spy), there is not a color to signify your nation. So you see them duking it out, you're amazed but you don't know if you're winning or not.
The game is overall very good, as you lead your nation, you will unlock new technologies, provided that you have universities researching, and will be able to use this knowledge on the field of battle. it is so satisfying killing your adversaries with superior firepower and discipline.
There are however, some things I've noticed about the game that's NOT so amazing: Some AI issues where the last enemy unit on the field just sits there and awaits death. some campaign map issues where they don't seem to care when you're attacking their over-seas territories. But this is contradictory because some times the AI is very good on the battle field and you'll find your self out flanked and out of luck. Another thing is the game will crash every now and then when you click on a certain thing, this problem has been addressed and there are several patches and bug fixes even within the first few months, but there is nothing major to worry about.
** you should have a computer that can run this game. check the requirements before buying. - if you cannot run this game smoothly it will become very boring. If you already own this game, I suggest that you turn off the "show AI campaign movement" option in the settings.
Some complain about steam, but you only need to connect once to the interwebs and you can play offline. Overall, though there are some problems and bugs, the pros outweigh the cons and this is a must-buy for strategy lovers. 95% - that's an A...