Tropico 3 is a testament to the stability of a franchise.  Not only does it compound the good decisions made by the developers in the early days, but it adds flavor that could only come from a fully rendered 3D atmosphere.

During game play, I’m most often reminded of Railroad Tycoon 3.  The overall complexity of the game is masked behind levels of detail.  You can choose to be the best ruler for any given individual, or you can attempt to tackle the “big picture” issues and instead play the game zoomed all the way out.  In additon, the interface has much the same detail level of RT3 in that your additions to the landscape slightly deform it to the point where the starting area resembles very little of what you end up with at the end of the mission.

Hell, if someone would come out with a game that mixes the game play of Railroad Tycoon 3 and Tropico 3, and then gives me a sandbox mode with achievements and moveable goal posts, I don’t think I’d ever stop playing it.  The only drawback to this manipulation of the landscape is that it’s not entirely clear what is acceptable and what isn’t.  On some of the more advanced islands, you have to determine how you’re going to run a road up the side of a steep series of cliffs to get construction workers and deliverymen working efficiently with your coffee plantations (coffee likes height).

The graphics of this game are spectacular.  You can zoom all the way down to the individual labourer, tourist, or even El Presidente himself.  You can click on them, and the interface will tell you their needs.  Clicking on El Presidente or clicking the special icon in your interface puts you in “Avatar” mode, allowing you to direct the actions of the fearless leader.  Now, when I say “fearless”, I’m not kidding:  If there’s a rebel attack or a military coup, your avatar isn’t afraid to draw his pistole and take out a few cabalieros.

While you’re at this level of detail, you’ll notice that the buildings in your burgeoning island nation aren’t lacking in detail, either:  Tenements will have clothes hanging from clothes lines, the tourists will be swimming in their pools, and the trees and field plants will be swaying in the wind.

You can sit at a middle-tier level of detail as well, watching the cars drive through the streets, and your little ant-sized people jumping out of them, trying to deliver money and resources at just the right time before you run out of both.  I, personally, try and sit at this level, as I can’t stand being let out of any action that might transpire.

There’s a completely zoomed out mode where most of the detail of your island is obscured in a 3D fog effect.  I suppose one could use this mode for quick navigation, but a mini-map in the corner of your screen has the same effect, and doesn’t let you miss out on anything either.

You’re given the chance to create a leader who’s appearance and traits reflect your playstyle, or the playstyle that might be the best response to the demands of the mission.  Customization options for the avatar resemble those of some less sophisticated RPGs and MMORPGs.  The downfall of all of this customization is that you only really ever see your avatar in miniature.  You could give him a goatee (points go to Kalypso for knowing the difference between a goatee and a Van Dyke beard), but you’ll probably never be able to tell that he hasn’t shaved that day.  The only really meaningful thing you’re doing with the customization is settling on some traits that give you pluses or minuses to your capabilities (i.e. a “Harvard U.” education gets you some pull with the delegation from the United States whereas coming to power through a “Socialist Uprising” might find you favor with the USSR).

The goals of the game are pretty standard to the franchise:  You’ve been put in charge of an island for one reason or another, and you’re given a set amount of time and set series of goals to meet.  Tropico 3 expands on this, somewhat, in that they’ve also included a “challenge” mode, achievements when you reach some point in the game worth mentioning (Achievement whores, rejoice), and a rich campaign mode where the missions go beyond “get X amount of money in Y number of years.”

It’s in its own promise where the game ultimately fails to live up to my personal expectations, and I imagine, yours as well. The detail level of the leader avatar seems like a meaningless exercise in customization, and fails to bring any meaning to the game.  If I select certain traits, it would be nice if my appearance would change to meet those traits.  Like, for example, if I was put in power through Mafia backing, I would naturally dress the part in my black pin-stripe suit and matching fedora.

Additionally, there’s absolutely no continuity in the campaign missions.  Each mission is a well thought-through mixture of strategy, interesting situation, and humor, but your accomplishments in the last mission have no impact on how well you do this time around.  Now, I understand there’s no meaning to have one mission play you from 1950-1985, and then the next mission play you through the same years again, and expect that your leader, outside of having a really useful time travel machine, would have any bearing from mission to mission.  I still wouldn’t mind having the radio announcer tell me that in 1956, El Presidente Thomas from the island of La Pata declared an edict allowing Same Sex marriage.

Speaking of the radio announcer, I thought he was funny and an interesting voice to hear for about an hour into play.  After that point, I turned him off, just like I turned off the otherwise good music.  Really, I need to hear less about Llamas getting my name shaved into their fur for the 20th time in the same game.  Thank you, Juanito, you may go now.  I ended up putting on a Ziggy Marley station on Pandora, and just playing through that.

Outside of the game, the interaction with my computer wasn’t as friendly as I’d like.  I’m so used to using WASD as my movement through RTS and FPS games now, it’s odd to me when a game doesn’t support that keyset, and I’m left bringing my left hand over to the arrow keys and manuevering in that method.  Oh, sure, I could use all mouse movements and the minimap to move about, but I’m so old school that I can’t just stop using my left hand for things.  Unless, of course, I wanted to play Tropico 3 and The Stranger.

Also, the game doesn’t seem to carry a Windowed mode.  I can max out the resolution, and go full detail mode on everything, and it runs just fine, but Alt-tab out of that sucker, and you sit and wait for a video mode refresh, and some issues with the sound drivers.  I imagine that someone with less RAM or less capable video card is going to have a lot more to complain about.  And why do you need to Alt-Tab, you say?  Well, the game has no internal clock.  I can’t figure out if I’ve burned through the 15 minutes I intended to waste on it, or if I’ve left my food to burn on the stove while I put down yet another military coup.

Even with these faults, I find Tropico 3 hard to put down.  I’m a city builder addict, and this fits the bill nicely.  I still haven’t conquered all of the missions in the campaign, as some of the strategies required to kill them off are a little more esoteric than “throw money at the problem”…but willing and eager to meet this challenge.

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