Campaign or Sandbox?

[Cupcake]

So which do you prefer? I usually like Campaign so I have some sort of objective or goal besides keeping people happy but when this game first launched, I didn't care for it. Granted I only made it to the 2nd or 3rd one but I went straight to Sandbox and seemed to like it more.

[MaxDoomSWE]

The games core functions arent working so at the time, none. But the abscense of trade functions in the later eras are of course less noticable when you play the campaign.

[sean.rul]

For the moment I prefer the campaign mode (just started with the game), it gives me some more meaningful goal in the game. Moreover, the in-game comments are hilarious.

[BlackAlpha]

I'd say, the campaign. It will give you a purpose. It will add challenges. It will force you to play each mission in a different way. You will experience the story line and amusing dialogue.

Just remember, your islands carry over to the next game! So don't do anything stupid near the end of a mission because you will have to deal with it in a future mission.

[Dave1029]

Campaign until you beat the game. After that it just gets annoying to replay them since they don't let you progress era's until certain story checkpoints are met.

[Kozzy]

sandbox is what makes these gaems, Anno, Tropicoetc... the sandbox are the meat and potatoes of the games. The Cmpaigns are jsut glorified tutorials.

[fredreed2000]

Sandbox is way better then campaign specifically If you love sandbox mode games. I heard that the campaign mode is somewhat hard but that It's not completed enough from the developers that It's missing a few things. Now I haven't played It I have only played the sandbox mode because I like playing without restrictions I like being able to set my own victory conditions up I will say this that the sandbox mode is somewhat better then 4 was but still there's room for improvement. Campaign to my understanding is basically a guide to starting the game. I heard that a lot of people have been having issues with certain aspects of the campaign mode like they can't get past part 1 or part 2 because they couldn't defeat the other countries armies.

[Lightbringer]

I loved the campaign in the previous Tropico games, especially for its weird humor. The Tropico 5 is rather short and too easy for my taste. Part of it is that you basically just have four islands and the later missions just build on top of your previous missions. If you excelled in earlier missions, you can win the last mission of the campaign in under 10 minutes.

[slovenian89]

Sandbox, never played the campaigns in any of the Tropico games.

[Pimpmaster Bob]

Play the campaign through once to enjoy the story and first exposure to new eras, then sandbox away. :)

[AlexMBrennan]

Campaign if it was any good (instead of confronting you with unique challenges like T4 did, T5's campaign just feels like doing the same things over and over again as you have to "level up" four islands), player made challanges if there were any (challenge editor was cut since T4).

[ogreballerina]

Sandbox only.
I just like making cities.
Anno series, Children of the Nile etc...all the way back to Zeus, Ceaser.
Never once played campaigns or missions,

[NanoByteGhost]

Sandbox all the way

[Twelvefield]

I like the Campaign. The writing and the plot twist is clever, at least for city-builders. Yes, it could be better, but it could be a lot worse. I thought I would like Anno's Campaign, but it just ground me down. My friends say the sandbox is much better, but it looks like I will have to book a lot of free time to get to enjoy it.

Fortunately for Tropico and Anno, there's no restriction on playing both. In the early versions of these games, we weren't so lucky.

[mr.badluck]

Haven't played camp from 1 to 5 ;D
Sandbox it is how it meant to be played :>

[Cool Beans]

Both are fantastic.

I prefer sandbox myself. I like to challenge myself to make the most beautiful city possible, while still running a great economy. If I wouldn't screenshot my city, I wouldn't bother reloading the save :)