The White March Part 2 greatly expands on the game's divine lore and the player's ability to interact with the gods, meaningfully preparing the player for Pillars of Eternity II, where these things are even more prominent. But the lore is fascinating in its own right, even for a player who does not intend to continue the series!

As a history buff and a fan of emergent narratives, I am capable of enjoying Hearts of Iron IV despite its flaws. The player takes control of a nation in the late 1930's, with the goal of either staying or changing the course of World War II. It usually does an excellent job simulating the war, and has great replay value.

However, I cannot overstate how poorly the game simulates peace deals after large wars. The AI is unforgivably bad at making peace, to the point that a plausible peace deal can only be achieved by the player cheating (with mods or console commands; I have used both) to create one manually. This breaks my immersion, wastes my time, and almost ruins the game for me.

The game is still good overall. I like it. But I simply cannot give it a glowing recommendation.

This DLC is a bit all over the place geographically: it adds content to China, Japan, and Germany. In my experience, all the added content is good. Unfortunately, it is all packaged together, so that in order to experience Germany's new content, you must also buy China's, even if you're not really interested in China's.

I think this DLC is still worth having, even if you're only interested in parts of it like me. Especially if you can buy it during a sale.