Previous Next

Taking the city building of Sim City, resource gathering gameplay from The Settlers and giving it a cheeky, satirical Cold War twist, Tropico 4 casts you as the dictator of a small Caribbean nation, free to be as corrupt or idealistic as you wish. With catchy calypso rhythms and a flavour all of its own, in a genre not known for colour and personality, it is a lot like its predecessor Tropico 3. Seasoned vets of this series will actually struggle to see the genuine progression this game brings to the series.

This game is pretty much Tropico 3 with added exports and natural disasters. The graphics have been tightened up a little, but it's not a massive improvement. There are also 20 new building types, but most are dead-ends in gameplay terms. Tropico 3 suffered for its restricted technology trees, it was nothing like the expansive technology trees available in Civilization. It's a shame this hasn't been overhauled in Tropico 4.

The mechanics of the game stay the same. You build a logging camp to make use of the forests on your island. Then you build a lumberyard to transform the wood into usable timber. Then you build a furniture factory to drive up your exports. Rather than opening up new aspects of gameplay, it's a straightforward process with no room for experimentation or real choice.

Rather than address this limitation, Tropico 4 instead offers theme park rides like ferris wheels and roller coasters. A shopping mall for tourists could have opened up dozens of interlocking retail opportunities, but instead it just acts the same way as a zoo - it's there to give your tiny figures somewhere to go, not to give the player more to do or extra strategic options.

The new Ministry building lets you pick citizens (or hire overseas experts) to fill your government, but once again the impact on gameplay is minimal. You'll be issuing mostly the same edicts as in Tropico 3; such ground-breaking legislation as anti-littering laws and tax cuts. Also new are natural disasters, introduced hot on the heels of Sim City (which unleashed earthquakes, volcanoes and tornadoes only 22 years ago).

Tropico was never the deepest strategy game around, but it was one of the most fun, and the humour returns as strong as before. Radio broadcasts poke fun at your decisions while caricatures pop up with their requests for specific buildings, more exports or just a handful of cash. These requests now appear as floating exclamation mark icons that can be clicked, then accepted or dismissed.

It's hard not to like Tropico 4, because it's based on a solid foundation that is naturally charming. It's a real tragedy the developers haven't built on top of the solid foundation Tropico 3 set them.

Newcomers to the series will find much to enjoy, but existing fans may wish that El Presidente had invested a little more in the infrastrcture. Still, if it was titled Tropico 3.1 and released last year it would have been a big hit.

Price: £24.99 Publisher: Kalypso Website: www.worldoftropico.com Required Spec: 2GHz Dual Core processor, 1GB RAM, 256MB Video Card, 5GB free disk space, Windows XP SP3 (or later)