Imperator: Rome

An ostensibly underrated game whose only observable drawback is being the product of a company that routinely releases map painter RTS games. Or more precisely routinely releases DLC for the same 3 games. (EU4s launch date was 2013 my dudes).
Imperator Rome is great. You really do feel like you're controlling an antiquity era Empire. Republics have civil wars, monarchies have usurpers, migratory Germanic tribes can.... migrate. Egypt, Carthage, India (Muarya), Persia, Thrace, and of course Rome are all presented with a fair degree of uniqueness and character.
While there's map painting there's also character interactions with generals, senators, leaders etc. You can ransom captured generals back to their countries for money or you can make them fight to the death in gladiatorial arenas. You can bribe people to ensure loyalty and you can appoint governors and imprison / kill / assassinate disloyal characters etc. Comparatively it's a good balance between the character focus of the Crusader Kings games and the nation building aspect of EU4. It does feel like a unique experience in that regard.
Wars are straight forward but include AI options for your armies. You can tell your armies what they should be doing in times of war and if it's a major campaign or you're fighting a civil war, it's helpful. You can also micro-manage. Your military is a combination of standing armies (mercenaries and legions) and Levies that you call up in times of serious conflicts. These armies are made up of smaller units that contain unit diversities and different cultures prioritize different army compositions. But you as a player can design whatever army you want. This is important should you wish to challenge Rome. The Rome units and research paths are mostly heavy infantry and heavy cavalry, this is rare for the time period as most other contemporaries are investing in light cavalry and archers…. This means most AI comes up lacking when the Roman juggernaut pulls up.
ROME, the entire reason you’re contemplating this game (unless you’re weird like me and thought ancient india was more interesting). ROME:™ starts off as its historic republic in central Italy and expands outward until holding most of Europe. If you as the player want to play as Rome that's definitely where most of the game's flavor lies. You justify claims and expand outward rapidly until facing your first real threat, Carthage or beta-Gaul (sometimes one of the french or germanic tribes subjugates the rest and that means there’s a large European empire to deal with after you unify Italy). After you take on Carthage or beta Gaul you snowball until you fight whatever empire rose out of Persia / Egypt. After that you just fight civil wars until you decide you want Britannia or India.
The economy is intricate enough, nothing fancy just imports and exports with a fair degree of automation. (But you can import Camels and Elephants to create Elephant and Camel units which is cool). Taxes / expenses come in different selections you can manually increase or decrease etc, basic paradox map painter stuff.
Multiplayer is also functional, I tested it with a friend for around three hours, no issues. Connectivity was fine.
Alright time to address the elephant in the room, is it “Bare Bones?” No, it really isn’t. You have to be spoiled by EU4 and shocked that a decade old game with a DLC released every 4 months has “more content” to feel this way. What this game is, is an honest attempt at an antiquity era map painter RTS that is completed. Look around, look at those DLCs for Imperator Rome, all 5 of them (one being free, one being a soundtrack and three being greek ‘flavor’ packs for skins and greek related missions. This game had its development cut prematurely and is better off for it. For $40 you get a complete and functional base game, no dlc wishlists, no subscription, you just get to own this solid game.
The games has community support and many new / constantly updated community mods and what remains of the original paradox team has said they are happy mods have brought life back to Imperator.
A solid 82/100

TLDR: Forget the launch. Get it now. It’s really good!
I rarely leave a review here, but this game deserves one.
Like everyone else, I heard about the flop that was this game when it came out. So, I skipped it and only remembered it as “the boring Paradoxgame”. However, a couple of years later I stumbled upon a playthrough on YouTube of this game and thought “Yea, I’m bored and have some minutes to waste. Seeing someone try to endure it might be a laugh.”
I ended up watching the whole thing. I was hooked on watching video after video, shocked that the darn thing was actually looking really fun! It seemed to have a surprising level of depth. Coincidentally, it was on a steam sale at the same time, practically free.
I played the hell out of it…
I then found the mod “Invictus” recommended by someone.
I played the hell out of it…
Suddenly, out of nowhere, came an update to this abandonware-game!
I played the hell out of it…
Now, approx. 1 year later and 550h played it turns out that this game is at the same time the cheapest paradox game I’ve ever bought and is soon to be my most played one. It’s surprising the stories you can find (and make) in this game!

Don't let the old reviews scare you, this is very good grand strategy game, especially with the invictus mod. It's entertaining from start to finish. I don't feel overpowered with one of the most powerful empires in my current game. Still plenty of challenges and things to do. If you're interested in the ancient time period and a fan of grand strategy games, you gotta get this.

This game deserves to be taken back into development. It still is the best pop-based Paradox game, and the series (and I) need a version of the real time strategy game placed in this timeframe. The game is playable and enjoyable as it is, but Paradox should work on more content in stead of abandoning it.

It was a disappointment at launch, but thanks to a few passionate devs working on updates and working together with modders to give them tools to work with, even incorporating some of their fixes into the base game: It is actually in a really good state right now. I play with the Terra Indominata mod, wich is a derrivative of the Invictus mod and Invictus is basically the intended way of playing the game at this point, it's the base game but bigger and better. The devs even turned on Ironman mode for modded saves so you can still earn achievements.
It's a Paradox game but well-adapted to the ancient world. I think the mechanics for managing your Empire is some of the best I've seen, it incorporates some of the best aspects of Crusader Kings and Europa Universalis but puts its own spin on it and introduces new mechanics. Aside from the conquest keeping your nation together by managing the power-base and loyalty of characters/factions within the country as well as the loyalty of provinces that have pops of different classes, cultures and religions is suprisingly fun and continues to be a necessity in your campaign without quickly becoming tedious or snowbally like some other Paradox games have a tendency to become.
So basically, it's a shame that they released the game in a sorry state and basically abandoned it, it severely reduced the playerbase. This being said, the consensus at this point is that thanks to some updates and the mods it's genuinly a really good game. So if you want a Paradox game set in the Ancient world, I highly recommend it.

Even after years of neglect, official updates come around from time to time now, and modders have picked up the torch. If you play this game with mods (particularly Invictus, Indomita and the plethora of submods) its a damn good experience.

Imperator: Invictus is the best grand strategy game to play right now.
I've played all paradox games and enjoy this one + Invictus mod the most.