The player is in charge of a number of tools for managing the economy, science, domestic politics, diplomacy, army and navy.

The main difference from other global strategies of Paradox Interactive is a significant emphasis on the details of internal processes occurring in the state, and the developed system of diplomacy available to the great powers.

The game has many historical aspects to it, such as the ability to colonize places that, at the time, were not under the control of any European power, such as Sub-Saharan Africa, North and Western Canada, and parts of Asia.

[6] On the contrary, Johan Andersson, the initiator of the project, was confident that the game would be successful, referring to the requests and votes by fans and the opinion of the development team.

[8] On June 17, 2010, when it became known that there would be many pre-orders giving the game good sales, Wester asked Jessica Chobot at IGN to shave his head and upload the pictures to Twitter.

[12] A working beta version of Victoria II was demonstrated in June 2010 at the E3 show held in Los Angeles.

[13] Like its predecessor, Victoria II focuses on internal management, covering the industrialization and social/political changes in a country with 8 different government types.

The game gives a lot of importance to the economy of a country by having a complex market system with over 50 types of goods and factories.

There are several different population groups (or "pops"), such as aristocrats, army officers, clergy, soldiers, labourers, slaves, bureaucrats and others.

As in other Paradox titles such as Europa Universalis, historical missions called "decisions", which are micro-objectives in the larger game, have been added.

[13] Additionally, the functioning of ideology in the game was tweaked such that population groups are more sensitive to changes in their country's situation, as well as inclined to agitate for specific levels of political and social reforms.

War goals from Heir to the Throne, an expansion for Europa Universalis III have been integrated though they function in a slightly different way.

The struggle for influence that the Great Powers wage around the world is not a simple bilateral basis but occurs with each other inside different countries, giving an added dimension to diplomacy which was not present in the original Victoria.

A House Divided was announced at the Electronic Entertainment Expo 2011[20] as an expansion pack with an aim on "[improving the] political and economical aspects of the game, with focus on the American Civil War era".

Special pre-order content: Victoria II received generally favourable reviews, achieving a 75% average on Metacritic.

"[36] In a review of Victoria II in Black Gate, E. E. Knight said "While seeking an escape from the distressing politics of the early Twenty-First Century, I decided to plunge headlong into the distressing politics of the Nineteenth Century and picked up a game I've long been meaning to try: Victoria II.

[32] Gaming Nexus gave the final product a verdict of 8.5 ("very good") and commented that "after some patching and a couple of expansions, Victoria 2 is rounding into shape.

"[38] In an Ask Me Anything thread on Reddit in October 2013, PDS manager Johan Andersson stated that they would consider making a sequel to Victoria II, but that this would likely come after Hearts of Iron IV.

[40] This prompted speculation that there could be refreshed interest in the Victoria series, although in a Reddit thread these rumours were played down by Paradox developers.