Game 89 - Tropico 4 - Week 173 - Apr 23

ropico 4 is a title that has a lot in common with the Anno series. Not only from a gameplay perspective, but also in the sense that I’ve wanted to get into it since I was in university. So deciding to continue my trend with city builders jump in I did. 

The characters are all amazing or should I say Caricatures considering how they’re all drawn like goofy Saturday morning newspaper comics. From the education advisor dressed like a sexy teacher with a MASSIVE forehead who flirts with students and the dictator alike to the US ambassador who is completely self-righteous and arrogant in their capitalistic ideals, not making suggestions, but simply putting fourth the “most intelligent option”. It gives the game a distinctive sense of charm, parodying one of the most fearful periods in human history. The voices are on point, reminding me of Stronghold in how each character was an exaggerated version of what you’d expect from that time period. Special shoutout to your main advisor – his “Tropican” accent is fantastic as he guides you through the tutorial, campaign and whenever you hit a snag.

The tutorial crammed a lot in, or so it felt at first – but it was still good in no part due to the fantastic voice acting. Once I played this I jumped straight into the campaign and this was even better at introducing mechanics. Focusing on one at a time with an objective – it almost makes the tutorial redundant. The campaign has no real story – instead you’re a consultant* with 20 missions, each with a unique scenario with the overarching goal of creating an archipelago paradise.

*It’s never explained what you are – as you can choose a dictator for ever scenario and they refer to you as a scenario that doesn’t line up perfectly – but fortunately this doesn't seem to matter 

In the campaign most mechanics are drip-fed, for example

1. Farm & Industry Exports (Tobacco)
2. Mines
3. Tourism
4. Import Resources to create Industry Exports

Like Anno 2070 this is the best way to do it. All of the above synergise to create interesting in-depth gameplay on how to create your Tropico Island. As an example you rarely want to go into the negatives in your treasury as that effects foreign relations and thus imports/exports. So instead look at your expenses (or have a rough idea) and your next export revenue, then use that as your profit margin for your next projects. Or just do what I usually do and build away and then cancel projects (which usually incurs costs) as you hit the negatives, a far less effective and lazy method. Constantly managing wages of every building can get painful. Once you learn how to set it or all buildings and you gain familiarity with the different builders/work types it gets easier. But I do wish there was a better way to macro-manage this (perhaps a building in itself) as I often forgot about a building at which point it whittles down to no employees/production as everything else has risen in wages.

Almanac is your best friend.

The mechanics regarding political factions is interesting and so is developing your Tropican factions which pops up in subtle ways. For example when you build a school you can mandate it focuses on religion or military at the cost of general education by (15%). Or there is my favourite the ministry and edicts. Want to sway the religious populace? Appoint people as ministers, then host a Book BBQ. Intellectuals might not like it but a zealous nation sure will. Couple this with Ideology book and a lack of education and you have a very loyal population (albeit stupid)! Or do the vice versa with Same-Sex Marriage, Literacy Programs and host a Mardi Gras. People not happy? Do you have a rebel problem? Build several Army Camps, Guard Towers and Armouries. Then invoke conscription on your unemployed populace and setup a Secret Police to root out an insurgency before it begins! The gravity at which you enact this inhuman acts is offset by how humorous everything is from the music to the characters. That being said I’m not sure you could get away with Inquisition anymore, which had the picture of a KKK group.

I enjoyed managing imports to create industry but it was a little hard to nail down. There’s no way to see what you’re importing or going to, you just allow or forbid exports. Which doesn’t make sense from an economical POV. Imagine buying a raw resource and not knowing how much you’ll get? Also it’s a shame there's no way to turn off imports. The fact that the game will export a raw resource like sugar when you imported it for the exact purpose of using it is nothing below absurdity. Special shout-out to the UI - having right-click bring up your build menu instead of having it off to the corner is such a huge boon to city building that every game should adopt. Various analytical tools are here from financial graphs to heatmaps that show (and predict) crime or pollution as well as tsunami and volcano danger zones.

Following Tropican's and Tourists, checking their thoughts is one of the best features - a must in any city builder to play big brother! 

Mission scenarios and the dynamic task system do a good job of adding flavour compared to sandbox modes: Accept a task and it gives you $5000 or a free blueprint. But it takes up a 1/5 slot. So you need to complete them before you can take another. It does get boring eventually – some more interesting tasks or even challenges due to dynamic events would be interesting (e.g. imprison or execute 5 criminals, etc). It was around Mission 6 I felt like I’d peaked and experienced everything. I got excited for the scenario where I’d be facing abundant rebels. After rushing military buildings and jobs I was disappointed to find out this was even less than the 0% commie relationship disaster of the last mission. As a comparison in the last mission I provided Amnesty to 30 rebels. On the backfoot, fighting a loosing battle (and loosing buildings) and only just improving hapiness so I could provide hapiness. It was intense and exactly what I want. But this time after silencing several waves of 5 and 7 rebels at a time in the final battle it was 31 in my army vs 3 rebels. It was just too easy and a bore. In the end I was basically rehashing everything I'd already done – Tourism and Attractions. Resources, Imports and Exports. Government, Military and Secret Police and focus on the lowest happiness/faction. It'd be cool if doing something else usually was at an irrevocable cost to another (perhaps on harder difficulties). For example in Mission 4 I had 100% happiness and relationship with every faction but perhaps choosing one factions means there’s a ceiling on relations with another – I like that it can happen but it should be almost impossible (again on a harder difficulty). Disasters are also pretty meek. For the Volcano and Tsunami you get a cutscene and then nothing. No flooded lands or lava spreading over your paradise. At least the Tornado tears through you cities. This could have been a great opportunity to mix up the formula – similar to Anno 2070 sending a hurricane through my city centre and wiping out my entire economy and massive treasury. But as a counterpoint, perhaps it's just not the type of game you're meant to binge but instead play a session and come back in a few weeks. As a result in the end I wasn’t feeling it much. It’s somewhere between Rail Road Tycoon “yeah I could play this but probably not” and Anno 2070 “holy shit did 3 hours just pass… just… one… more… turn…”.

Cutscene is meh - wish you'd see people running as a wave washes over your tourist 'trap'.

At least oil spills have a presence on the map.

I didn’t try any of the other modes but if I come back I’ll definitely be giving Sandbox ago. Seems like you can create some interesting scenarios and basically make your own campaign, change the topography and resources then the world starting state such as stability, tourism appeal, random events – but also random effects like rebel attacks occur often or God Mode (start with 500k and there’s no attacks). So it could fix my issue with boring and easy map conditions. There’s also the Extra Missions which had nothing to be found (perhaps DLC?) and Challenges which I’m not sure what this is but seems to be related to multiplayer. Perhaps challenges or maps created by fans but I'll never know. Overall the light hearted parodic Tropico 4 was a blast and I look forward to being a dictator again in the future with Tropico 5. 

My best island - welcome to Jesus Land!