Tropico 3 - Steam Special Edition

Tropico 3 - Steam Special Edition is the third of six Tropico games. As with the other Tropico games, you are El Presidente and you have a selection of 14 islands to run. Each Island in the campaign has different requirements, some Islands require a certain amount of tourists to visit to win, some will want you to keep the Americans and the USSR happy and others want you to extract a resource with a certain time period. You click on an Island and then have to pick an avatar from some of the nastiest dictators on Earth (minus people like Stalin and Hitler), selections include Peron, Pinochet, Castro and more.

Each avatar has their strengths and weaknesses which can either help you or hinder your attempts to succeed on the Island. After picking your avatar, the action moves to the Island, most of them will have teamsters (to move your goods), construction (to build), farms (corn for food), basic housing (Tenements), your Presidential Palace and a Dock to receive immigrants and ship out your goods.

Funding in the early years until you build your economy up comes from the USA and USSR, though if you upset them your funding will drop and they will threaten you with invasion. Building a logging camp and Lumber Mill could bring in a quick income or building a mine though both are expensive actions, if you are in debt you can be in the red up to $10,000 before spending ceases. Another quick source of cash is the Ranch, they cost $750 and you can feed the population and sell meat overseas. Military coups and rebel attacks are the biggest dangers, the military want to be well paid and well housed whilst the rebels attack buildings including your Presidential Palace. You also have to keep the respect of Tropico's many factions such as Communists, Capitalists, Intellectuals, Religious and more and they will demand things like Housing, Work, High School and College and Church and Cathedral. As leader you can issue edicts based on if you have the money to issue them or the right amount of respect, edicts include Social Security and doing extreme things like Martial Law and Secret Police. Every couple of years you will have elections, you can choose to run them early, speech or no speech and even don't have an election though that may anger the public. You could even have the opposition jailed or murdered if you want the full dictator experience. Figuring out what to do is the easiest part of Tropico, getting through everything is difficult and you can be guaranteed of no less than 40 hours of game play. I rate this game 4 out of 5.