Happy Wednesday everyone! But today isn’t any normal Wednesday, it’s November 4th 2026, the 1 year anniversary of Europa Universalis V! Devs are hard at work patching our most recent update and Chronicle Pack, but I thought I’d take the opportunity to make this Tinto Talk short but impactful. Let’s jump right into it.

One year of EU5 today​

We launched Europa Universalis V one year ago today, and, despite being confident of our course, the ship had some problems. We appreciate those who reported their issues. Many of you stayed aboard, continuing to give us vital feedback as you built your empires even as the game changed under your feet. Twelve months and several updates later, we are still hard at work crafting a Grand Strategy game that can live up to the legacy of the Europa Universalis series.

To Commemorate EU5’s first birthday, we asked one of our artists to create a nice piece of birthday art! We also have some docuementation of the process, so if that's something you are interested in taking a behind the scenes look at, let us know.

Give us your feedback​

It’s been one week since 1.4 hit live servers. It’s still early, and we’ve already seen concerns being raised, so we thought we’d use this anniversary post as another opportunity to hear more from you, our players. We know that we still have a lot of work ahead of us for the game as a whole: bugs that need ironing out, balance that needs tuning, and entire systems that are in need of a fresh look. We’re proud of what EU5 is, but we are also not blind to its unrealized potential.

We are still committed to our vision of EU5 as a simulation of a living world that responds to player and AI controlled nations’ decisions. How you manage your pops, the markets and your military ambitions should reverberate through the game. The challenges in the game should come from the game, not from scripted narrative events that might not suit the actual game state. This does not mean that narrative events are cast aside, only that should feel natural to the world in which they happen.

This, of course, presents a number of challenges. Having many interlocking systems means a deeper and richer world, but also one where it can be hard to anticipate the consequences of changes or updates. We should certainly not entirely rely on our player-base to sort all of this out, but you are a large living laboratory that is vital to the success of any simulation game on this scale.

So, with that shared vision in mind, we’d like to use this Tinto Talk as a fresh opportunity to ask for your feedback with a twist. We’ve long been gathering what areas of the game are in most need for improvement, and that’s something we will continue to commit ourselves to doing. But in spirit of the Anniversary, we wanted to pose a different question for you:
What parts of the game do you enjoy the most?

It’s easy to respond to player complaints and concerns, but, as noted above, this can sometimes have collateral effects that ruin the experience of other parts of EU5. So, what parts of the game do you think we’ve gotten right? Knowing what to leave untouched or only lightly adjusted is as important as knowing where we need to make a course correction, so let us know what is working for you.

A new testing branch for hourly ticks​

Before we go, we have some good news for those of you who were missing hourly ticks in 1.4

Starting next Tuesday, we’ll be opening a new opt-in testing branch for the game, and this branch will bring a game rule/setting allowing players to choose between daily, and hourly ticks, with daily ticks being the default. After sufficient testing on this opt in branch, we eventually intend to roll the game rule into the live version of the game. The live version, of course, will also come with the necessary balancing changes to ensure both game rules are viable options.

Based on the discussions as of late, we’ve determined this is a good middle ground that serves both preferences. We know this topic is something many of you have questions about, so we’ve put together a brief FAQ on the matter:

Why wasn’t this done initially in October as part of the open beta?
It was discussed, but at the time there were some technical hurdles that needed to be solved first. Enough so that it wasn’t something we were willing to promise or announce at the time. It’s in part thanks to deeper investigations (partially with AI assistance) that we were able to untangle a solution.

Is this a reaction to the Across the Pillars reception? If so, why did you not listen to those of us in the beta period?
Partly, yes. Player feedback is important to us regardless of how it’s delivered, be that a negative review, a forum comment, or a Reddit post. Beta testers raised hourly ticks, and we took it seriously, but we underestimated how much it would affect the wider playerbase. The reception of Across the Pillars made that clear, and we moved this higher up our priorities as a result. That’s on us. Beta feedback on this topic should have been enough on its own, and we’re looking at how future beta topics can carry the weight they deserve.

Which tick rate of the game best adheres to the vision you as developers intended?
Put simply, both of them do. To us, the vision we described above does not necessitate a particular tick rate and can be achieved with either option. Initially EU5 was designed with Daily Ticks in mind, but as we grew closer to release, hourly ticks became the default. Internally some devs have a preference for hourly ticks, while others have a preference for daily ticks. One of the reasons we are putting this gamerule first into a separate branch is so that we can continue to experiment with it alongside you the players.

How will you ensure both options are supported and balanced?
Right now, our intent is to support both versions in the same manner we do other game rules. It’s inevitable that one version is the default gamerule. And right now that’s Daily Ticks. This doesn’t mean we’ll completely abandon the hourly tick rule after launch however. We’ll continue to monitor both gamerules, gather the data, and prioritize accordingly.

Have you considered a middle ground, something like 4 tick days?
This came up internally as an option, but we deemed it was simply a half measure between the two that didn’t serve to fully satisfy either’s objective.

If your question isn’t above, worry not, ask below and we’ll do our best to answer.
That’s all the news this week, we’ll be keeping an eye on the ongoing discussion and feedback. Don’t forget to give us your feedback on what you enjoy most!
Next week, we’ll be having a look at some of the numbers behind the 1.4 Open Beta, and do a general retrospective. Until then!