Old World is a beautiful historical 4X game set in the ancient world. But while it is a 4X game, it really has the spirit of a Grand Strategy game. The specific actions you take every turn might feel quite similar to what you would do in other Civ-like games, but the scope and depth of the interlocking systems transforms this into something that is much greater than the sum of its parts.

Managing my character and dynasty, my court, the relationships with the noble families, my generals and governors as well as my rivals (or allies), dealing with the intricate production and resource systems, developing my cities, reacting to the game's thousands of beautifully written events and leading my armies, all while keeping my ambitions in check through the ingenious orders system - what an exciting and immersive combination! And the atmospheric setting, graphics and soundtrack are the cherries on top.

But beware - it will take a while until you can really grasp all the details that the game wants you to keep track of. All these systems incur the cost of high complexity. Thankfully, there is a decent tutorial campaign, a fleshed-out nested-tooltip system, an in-game wiki and a very in-depth, entertaining and readable manual to help you through this process.

The steep learning-curved road you climbed will be forgotten when you mourn over the death of your King or Queen who so dearly cared for their people over the course of the last 50 turns, right before you continue your campaign with their heir who will write a new and different chapter in the history of your nation due to their different skill set and personality.

The only negative thing I can say about this game is that the performance could be a bit better.

This is simply essential if you like deep historical strategy games that allow you to either min-max or role-play to your heart's content.

Edit in 2024: What is also really remarkable about this game is the unbelievable long-term support the developers have committed to for Old World. Not only are there several DLCs to buy that provide nice additions, the game also receives patches pretty much every month to fix small issues, work on the balancing or even add new features. Still very much worth a buy, also in 2024!