The Tropico games are fun simulation games, through and through. This means you should expect a relatively slow-paced and complicated game, and Tropico definitely delivers. There are all sorts of things to manage, from the macro scale including what buildings to make to a smaller, micromanagement scale, including how much employees are paid or what employees should be, well, employed. It's fun just playing around and seeing what works or what doesn't, as well as playing with different 'styles' to determine what kind of dictator you are. As a fan of the old Maxis' Sim series, this game brings me back but adds a bit more 'personality' into the game due to all the small things you can manage.

Fairly addictive game play and simple to learn, I thoroughly enjoy this game. The fact it runs on Vista is a major plus. The price also cannot be beat. The game is simply a cross between Sim City/Anno 1701 series. You build a town, drop buildings here and there, and rake in the cash. The added elements of repressing your people, while keeping them content adds a large amount of depth.

Tropico was first released in 2001, so it was with some hesitation that I made this purchase. The price, in particular, is a bit high for a game of this age: $10 would be more appropriate. I have been very pleasantly surprised, however. The graphics are surprisingly very nice: the game designers did an excellent job to create quality graphics that have withstood the test of time. The game supports resolutions up to 1600x1200, where the graphics are very crisp and smooth. Gameplay is very enjoyable, and it seems safe to say that there hasn't been an analogous game to Tropico in the years since its release. This is a simulator that is fairly unique in that every building created has a *meaningful* impact, as opposed to a game like Sim City, for example, where buildings are pretty meaningless. Tropico is somewhat similar to "Victoria" from Paradox Interactive in regards to population management controls, where the mix of ideology and population needs are very similar to Victoria's POP system.

Tropico 1 and its expansion pack are probably my favorite city building. Watching a small island colony grow up is fun, but the flexibility of the economies and the depth of character are what make this game work. The game is limited to sand box type games and scenarios but that should be more than enough game play options. As Tropico 2 added a champaign mode but after getting the hang of the mechanics it is just dull. Tropico 2 is a much different game. Instead of most actions have immediate positive or negative repercussions all of the effects feel slowed down. Like Tropico 1 in a viscous fluid. However, it isn't nearly as bad as I have been lead to believe by other sources. Managing cities comes down to having slave areas and pirate areas and late game difficulty comes down to, at least for me, simply having enough room. Not to say that the game is easy. Mistakes in build order hurt a lot more in this sequel than in the predecessor. Managing dozens of pirates all with their own "levels" as well as several different ships is rewarding. Seeing pirate houses evolve from shacks into mansions is my favorite feature because the thing I hated most about the first game was having to build up houses for my people. It is streamlined here by pirates automatically leveling their homes. Massive bonus points in Tropico 2 for religion being a way to pacify slaves.