Venice was (arguably) the dominant force in Europe at its heyday. The actions of Venice would be affecting those up north in England, as well as South into Africa. Poland and Hungary didn't have the same effect on the continent. I doubt that many Iberians ever even concerned themselves with the actions of any Polish Kingdom. Venice brought upon exploration and trade in droves through Marco Polo's expedition to China. Many of the wealthiest merchants lived in Venice. Venice constructed a world class navy that was rivalled by none. Venice organized the Fourth Crusade, and used Crusaders from around Europe for its own personal gain (attacking a rebellious Venetian city.) It then used the Crusaders to carry out (arguably) the most infamous sacking of a city in history, Constantinople's. Constantinople, being the crown jewel of the Byzantine Empire, one of the greatest empires the Mediterranean has ever seen, brought to its knees by the clever manoeuvring of Venetians. (A sacking that is IMHO, much more impressive than conquering Moscow at one of its lowest points of history.) (Not that I'm some disturbing person who takes joy in rape and pillaging!)
I think an innovative and dominant trade civ that fuelled exploration and found a route to conquering through creative diplomacy and trade deserves a spot much more than 'the most powerful central-eastern european country in the medieval era'.
Sigh okay here's another version of those same events.
The 4th Crusade - The Germans and English ignored it and the army was almost entirely made up of a bunch of French and Italians who of course proceeded to Jerusalem as they were tasked too ... oh no wait instead they attacked the Christian Eastern Roman Empire acting like barbarians. They established a latin empire in Byzantia which lasted about 2 years before collapsing under counter-attacks. The Crusade was seen as an utter failure although the barbarian horde did of course bring back plenty of stolen treasures. 150 years later when the weakened Byzantines finally succumbs to the Ottomans the Venitians found themselves getting slaughtered. A handful of Crusaders actually made it to the Holy Land. All up 5 years of utter stupidity that other than lining the pockets of some of the barbarian horde ended up acheiving nothing except weakening their eastern borders to the encroaching Islamic forces.
Enrico Dandolo might be cool visually but his actions in the 4th Crusade make him that ages equivalent of Hitler - a brutal war criminal.
The Venitian's really were a Eastern Med power and had little influence over Spain, Portugal, The Dutch or England who rarely imported goods from the Venitian trade network (note English cuisine has little Italian influence until much later). When the Age of Exploration began in the 1400's Venice's ludicrously outdated navy proved their undoing as a trade power as the aforementioned Western European nations found far more efficient and lucrative trade routes.
So their iconic leader is a war criminal, their Crusade was either a failure or more accurately a charade to cover their effective Piracy, their trade power is overrated, their vaunted navy was a bunch of galleys which saw them limited to their part of the Eastern Med and ultimately their own stupidity and greed saw their chance to become a true enduring power destroyed by an enemy that they would probably have avoided if not for their Crusade.
They are the Bozo the clowns of the Civ series. A joke.
The truth of course is somewhere in between. Had they had more foresight and not sacked Constantinople or had they upgraded their navy when everybody else did then they would probably have become an enduring power. In the end they made a heap of errors that led to their slow decline. They had a decent run from 1200 to 1450 but after the Ottomans took Constantinople in 1453 their chances of enduring grandeur as a power ended and they declined.
So they are worthy of consideration but again I point to Keivan Rus, Florence, The Papal States, Aragon, The Visigoths, The Vandals, The Scots, HRE, Yugoslavia, Hungary Burgandy,the Golden Horde, The Khazars, etc etc and say that frankly Venice is no more worthy than them and it could be argued that they are probably less worthy than half of them. To me they are not even the most obvious choice for this expansion out of the Italian city states because Florence and the Papal States (which is a mix of France/Italy) offer more obviously unique design elements to me. I also dont necessarily see them that far in front of any of the other Italian CS style factions.
If they are in they are in and that's fine by me but lets not oversell them. They are a mid level Euro power that much like other mid level Euro power rose and fell. At their height they had a shot at becoming a major power but faltered and fell back to the pack. That isn't particularly unusual Kievan Rus faltered before the Mongols, The Scots Aragon, and Burgandy were absorbed etc etc.
If designed right they have plenty of elements that could make for a good civ to play. If designed poorly they will be a tremendously bad inclusion because unless they have come up with something interesting design wise there was no need to bring them in.
