Democracy 4
Democracy 4 lets you take the role of President / Prime minister, govern the country (choosing its policies, laws and other actions), and both transform the country as you see fit, while trying to retain enough popularity to get re-elected…
Built on a custom-built neural network designed to model the opinions, beliefs, thoughts and biases of thousands of virtual citizens, Democracy 4 is the state-of-the-art in political simulation games. A whole new vector-graphics engine gives the game a more adaptable, cleaner user interface, and the fourth in the series builds on the past while adding a host of new features such as media reports, coalition governments, emergency powers, three-party systems and a more sophisticated simulation that handles inflation, corruption and modern policy ideas such as quantitative easing, helicopter money, universal basic income and policies to cover current political topics such as police body cameras, transgender rights and tons more.
Democracy 4 is the ultimate sandbox for testing out your political ideas. We all think our politicians are useless and that we could do a better job ourselves, but is that really true? With one eye on the budget, one-eye on the polls, and somehow finding time to watch out for terrorist attacks at the same time, you will find that staying in power while changing society for the better is a tougher job than you ever imagined.
Would it really be a good idea to legalize all drugs? to give the police machineguns? to ban abortion? to invest heavily in green energy? would UBI really work? can you stay elected after cutting pensions in half to pay for your science budget? There is only one game that lets you find out!
The intention in designing this game is to have no implied bias whatsoever (tricky, but we try!) so this is NOT a game that is going to lecture you about politics, or tell you that your beliefs are wrong. This is a strategy game, not a political protest :D. If you want to turn your country into ayn rand’s fantasy, abolish all public spending and all taxes, you can do that. it might work, it might not! depending on how you handle it. On the other hand if you want to nationalise the railways, the energy companies, the water companies, cap CEO pay, ban second-home ownership and put universal income in place, you can do that too. All the game tries to do is model the *likely* effects, short and long term of any action you take.
Because modders have so enthusiastically supported earlier games in the series, we are doing our best to make Democracy 4 as mod-friendly as possible too, and steam workshop support will make choosing and installing mods easy. Ultimately all our data is in text files that you can edit yourself, so if you think our analysis of the link between car tax and car usage is wrong (for example), its trivial to edit it, and share your changes with other players.
Ultimately Democracy 4 is not a game about simply winning an election, but about running the country. Losing an election is just the end-game (unless you get assassinated), the real challenge to the game is whether or not you can create a country you are honestly proud of. I hope you enjoy trying 😀
Game Discussion
Steam User 61
>Take office in UK
>Reduce poverty
>Grow the economy majorly
>Balance the books, for the first since WW2 we're running a fiscal surplus
>Have a majorly positive effect on the country
>Get voted out
"This games too hard, imma play USA"
>Take office in the USA
>Spend years running the country into the ground
>Yeah I don't know how to play this game, just press buttons
>Cause every fucking crisis
>Election coming up, I don't even realise so I don't campaign
>Re-elected with a landslide
10/10
Steam User 20
I like the game, its very fun and intuitive. However, I believe that if you lose a election the ai should take over for a term and manage things, during this period of time you would be able to campaign and do all that jazz. once the term is over you would be able to run again and if you won go back to the normal game and you would be able to fix/change what has been done by the ai.
Steam User 17
Very fun game, takes me back to when bad political decisions had consequences
Steam User 17
The developer is a very nice person and has spent lots of time and effort to create this amazing game WITH FULL MOD SUPPORT! he even posted tutorials on his youtube channel. The base game is very fantastic but to offer all these features the game is a must have. The democratic simulation is very realistic and the game is actually fun while being challenging and realistic all at the same time. I really appreciate the effort it must have taken to do this. Please get this game you will have the time of your life especially if you like policics or simulations
Steam User 15
Played France. Damn socialists control everything. No private economy. Still losing money. Started by cutting everything i could find. Ended up losing the election first three times. Decided this time to remove all limits on tobacco consumption while doing everything else the same. Won election by a landslide. 10/10 realistic French experience.
Steam User 19
Just for the record, I am political independent. I vote the ones I think will benefit the country I live the most. Voted left and voted right.
Played several scenarios in this game and if you are Socialist, this game is for you. Also, Liberals can win here, but if you are Conservative or Right wing, don't bother to buy the game. Extremely difficult to implement something in your way.
e.g. Poland should be more Conservative and I couldn't win there with Conservative views, but could win there with Socialist views. Tried several countries and same result. Probably I am not good being right wing :-D
The game need some more development, it's pretty basic. Some more graphic stuff also, but it's a nice game to spend some free time, if you can't use the PC to more sophisticated games.
Steam User 12
Democracy 4 may look like a simple collection of buttons, charts, and sliders, but the game offers a surprisingly accurate representation of the intricate web of policies, economic factors and voter dynamics that shape a nation. While it's possible to focus solely on re-election, the game truly shines when you roleplay as a leader with a vision and long-term goals.
That said, the game could benefit from some additional features to encourage more strategic thinking. For instance, a global leaderboard comparing countries on metrics like GDP or standard of living (like in Victoria 3) could provide players with concrete long-term objectives beyond just winning the next election. Incorporating such features would significantly enhance the game's longevity, which currently feels somewhat limited.