With the new release of Victoria 3 comes a game that focuses on the Victorian ages. If you’re a fan of “map-painting games” as the players jokingly call this genre, then you’re in for a treat. There’s a lot of different countries you can play in this game, and you can even go full ahistorical with some of them! You can try to win as Mexico against America, go full democratic as Russia, or even make China majority Christian! For those who like playing historical though then there’s also a lot of choices for you, and in this guide, we’ll show you how to play Japan in the game.
How To Play As Japan In Victoria 3
Japan is probably one of the harder countries to start the game as, but it also serves as a great way to learn the game because of how the different systems are used in running the country. Japan at the start is the Tokugawa Shogunate, just like in real life history, they’re in their historical era of Isolationism. That means no outside trade, so no goods going in and out of Japan. They’re also very Feudal, with little to no industry and that’s what we’ll try to fix first.
Politics
Japan has a very powerful Shogunate faction and they’ll usually block a majority of laws you want to pass. The country also starts with Isolationism so no outside trade allowed. What you need to do is to lower the power of the Shogunate by increasing the power of Intellectuals and Industrialists. Bolster the Intellectuals to increase their growth at the start. That’s why we’ll need to make a bunch of stuff.
Also remember to declare interests somewhere, the best place is Oceania so that you can colonize the lower island of New Zealand in the future. It’s good to take that because gold can be discovered there.
Starting Change
The Victorian Era is the time of great change, the abolition of slavery, the industrialization of nations, the scramble for Africa. This is also in the time where Japan changed from a country led by a Shogun to an Emperor, and all starts with wood.
Yes, that’s right. The best way to get the Intellectuals and Industrialists moving is to make Logging camps. Logging camps set to the Saw Mills Production Methods will make Mechanists and Capitalists, and some of them can turn into Intellectuals and Industrialists!
Remember to make them in your capital so that the new Intellectuals and Industrialists will have more sway.
Research
At the start of the game research Colonialism first! We don’t want those pesky Russians to get Northern Hokkaido and introduce Border Gore! Once you research Colonialism pass it into law as well, either of the flavors of Colonialism will do.
After that, Colonize the rest of Hokkaido, parts of Sakhalin if you can, and then colonize the Southern Island of New Zealand.
Then research Academia so that we can make Universities, which will print Intellectuals like it’s the printing press!
Laws
As the power of the Intellectuals increase, you can add them to your government. You can even try to get Landed Voting passed to have elections, and if you play it right and keep improving the economy and standard of living, the party the Intellectuals will make or join will win.
Keep on increasing the standard of living, pass laws that makes Japan more liberal and continue to diminish the power of the Shogunate.
The Goal
The goal of all of this is the removal of the Shogun from Japan and the Restoration of the Emperor. Once you remove the Shogunate from the government, the “Honorable Restoration” event will show in the Journal. You’ll need to make the Shogun have lower than 20% clout, not have them insurrect, be at peace and own all of Kanto. With all of that achieved, keep it like that for 10 years to fire up the event. With that you can finally open up the country and set Japan up for the world stage!
Congratulations you now know how to play Japan in Victoria 2. I know this is just the start of Japan, but most of the gameplay of Japan is setting it up to be a global super power and get out of Feudalism. From there you can try to keep historical, or do whatever you want!
Thanks!