Tropico

I realised there wasn't a generalised thread for one of the better city builder series out there, so I decided to make one.

So anyways. Recently, I was gifted a complete edition of Tropico 4 (the one with all the DLC available pre-installed) when it was on sale for 6 bucks. And I safely say that it's one of the most fun an funniest games I have played in a while. One could say could say that I'm hooked.

I'm currently working my way through the main campaign before I start working on the Mordern Times and other DLC missions. I'm currently up to Bickering Factions. I must say that I do love the humour in this game, and that a majority of Tropico News Today are Actually Pretty Funny. Same with a majority of Penultimo's lines.

So what are your thoughts on Tropico, my fellow tropes? Remember, vote El Presidente! OR ELSE.

edited 24th Mar '13 5:44:16 PM by PippingFool

I've long been a fan of this series, having played Tropico 1 (and Mucho Macho Edition) near to a decade and recently gotten Tropico 3.

I'll say one thing about this series, though. It's easy. Building a lucrative island (though possibly not an extremely lucrative island) in a decade or so isn't that hard of a task, and like a lot of games there's less incentive to be cruel simply because being a just ruler is just so much more effective, whereas being unnecessarily iron fisted comes with lots of drawbacks and few benefits.

Plus, there's less of an incentive to play different ways - or more precisely pretty much every island will follow the same procedure.

Self-Imposed Challenge, I guess. This series lends itself to a lot of those: play maps with less vegetation, smaller maps, more politically volatile maps, etc.

I loved the changes Tropico 3 made, but it there's just so many ways it feels near exactly the same as Tropico 1 with pretty much every building having the exact same effect, meaning the whole "every island is built up the same way" thing doesn't change - though the big difference of cars allowing more traditional cities did make things more interesting, the added things just felt more expansion pack-y. And the exciting advertized timeline turning out to just be a multiplayer thing was disappointing.

Juantio is hilarious (if repetitive) in his passive-aggressive glory, though. And being the same isn't really a problem (I've never really gotten why people see that as a debilitating flaw on principle, rather than for some specific flaw or reason) since I loved Tropico 1, and will probably continue to play it for a long, long time. It's just... it feels more like a replacement for the first Tropico than a sequel, and there's still kind of a "played one island, played 'em all" feel, which makes me spend long periods of time between playing just to shake it off.

Maybe I should've gotten 4.

edited 24th Mar '13 5:19:16 PM by KnownUnknown

Tropico 4, from what I've heard, is a basically The Same But More of Tropico 3. With a few subtle things like that it's even easier to make money.

What really makes me love this game is, again, the humor of it.

If you really wanted to play a "different", more sequel esque Tropico game, Tropico 2 apparently is much different to it's predecessor and sucessors. Of course, this is because Tropico 2 is based around The Golden Age Of Piracy, raiding and traffiking rather than being the dictator of a Banana Republic.

I've also haven't found a reason not to be benevolant, as factions are rather easy to please even if you go against their will.

edited 24th Mar '13 6:49:15 PM by PippingFool