Is this game like SimCity?

[poke_ravi]

I'm a long time SimCity 4 fan and I've been itching to try a new city building game. Of course with the chaos going on over at EA I don't think I'll be getting the new SimCity anytime soon. Does this game offer the same type of city building aspects?

[Waser]

Well, the chaos going over at EA is probably the reason why the game is on sale.

[Rev. Dr. Marine]

It's similar. The scale is a lot smaller but there's also a much greater on poltics (both national and international). It's more about making your character stay in power than it is about running the actual city.

[Hannibal]

I think its better than Simcity to be honest. After Simcity 2000 there were no worthwhile Simcities. Including the new one for obvious reasons. If I had a choice between this and the new SimCity even if it worked, Id take Tropico 4 instead.

[Noblesavage]

Tropico is like SimCity as Call of Duty is to Halo, if I can use that analogy. Both games are similar in that they're both a sim management game where you build and run a town and grow it into something larger, but the way each game delivers that experience is entirely different.

As Rev. Dr. Marine, PH.D DA CA pointed out, the sense of scale in Tropico is smaller as you are constructing individual buildings and not entire residential sectors or industrial sectors. You're running a small island, not a sprawling metropolis.

What Tropico also does differently is stress politics and economy. In Tropico 3 you had to always be aware of elections and how best to appeal to all the different factions on your island (Nationalists, Religious, Envrionmentalists, Capitalists, Communists, etc.), upset one group too much and they will cause you trouble. As for the economy, you have to build a string of buildings that will help with your exports and get the best return for your investments. Both of these aspects can be a little tricky to wrap your head around, but once you figure out the best way to get money and at the same time make everyone happy the game can be incredibly fun. I've sunk a good 60 hours in Tropico 3 (I could still squeeze a few more hours out of it if I was so inclined) and I'm looking forward to playing Tropico 4 with all the DLC.

[Twelvefield]

Tropico definitely trumps Sim City. Tropico is an easy game to win, though, and it is repetitive. Good thing the gameplay is so much fun.

[PancakeWizard]

It's not nearly as complicated as SimCity, but it is competent and fun.

[S]

It's smaller. There's more emphasis on individual buildings and it's not quite as in-depth as SC4.

You don't place down huge residential zones and have a massive city in 5 minutes. You have to build each house individually to try and keep up with your growing population.

It's not complicated and it's honestly quite easy to win, but it is FUN. Like, a lot of fun. The base game can get repetitive, but buying the bundle adds so much content, especially that Modern Times expansion (it feels like Tropico 5 lol).

[owake up dhorny horny slut]

damn u guys now i want to buy on my wish list lol

[Cito]

and Tropico 4 you don't have to be online 24/7 to play and your save files aren't stored on EA servers.

Tropico 4 you can play it offline and savegames are on your own pc so if the company goes out of business you can still play the game.

unlike SimCity 5 in 2 years when EA shuts down the DRM server everyone who buys simcity 5 won't ever be able to play again

I bought Tropico 4 collectors edition when it went on sale this week

[Autarca]

It's more like Settlers IMHO

[Valannor]

It's way better than SimCity.

[LastSide]

Originally posted by Cito:

and Tropico 4 you don't have to be online 24/7 to play and your save files aren't stored on EA servers.

Tropico 4 you can play it offline and savegames are on your own pc so if the company goes out of business you can still play the game.

unlike SimCity 5 in 2 years when EA shuts down the DRM server everyone who buys simcity 5 won't ever be able to play again

I bought Tropico 4 collectors edition when it went on sale this week

Actually, the saves are on your PC and on the cloud... I was pretty amazed by that.

[Etherlight]

Originally posted by Cito:

and Tropico 4 you don't have to be online 24/7 to play and your save files aren't stored on EA servers.

Tropico 4 you can play it offline and savegames are on your own pc so if the company goes out of business you can still play the game.

unlike SimCity 5 in 2 years when EA shuts down the DRM server everyone who buys simcity 5 won't ever be able to play again

I bought Tropico 4 collectors edition when it went on sale this week

Well said, this is definite much more worthwhile that that pile of ♥♥♥♥ called SimCity.

[Qutsemnie]

That is an a good question.

TBH like others I bought it because I didn't want to pay EA 60 dollars when I could scratch the same itch for 10 dollars. That said I can only compare it to old simcities and what I have seen of the new one (which looks pretty cool).

Tropico is like simcity meets Dwarf Fortress meets The Sims. It doesn't have the difficultly or world of Dwarf Fortress, but if you make a list of everything everyone hates about Dwarf Fortress, remove it from Dwarf Fortress, you kind of get Tropico. (Only now that I mention it there are no pathogens, cold, viruses, in the Tropico city to pass around) Paint over that with Simcity mechanics and now you get the picture. Tropico is more of a "Sim"-"City" then "simcity". Each citizen in your town has a name, a job, wants, and location, where as in simcity I am not sure each individually is actually simulated. This makes it a bit more micro-interaction oriented, so the way things interact are very specific.

Another difference between Simcity and Tropico is that the timelimit is a thing in Tropico. Meaning in Simcity you will eventually get to your goal whatever your goal is for a city if you play it long enough, but in Tropico it set in 1950 to 2000, and the 1980s come pretty stinking fast, so while you won't actually fail very often in the sense that the screen paints "you lose" across the screen, you can definately have a pretty sucky city going and the time limit will come and that will be it.


I did two campaign missions, and then I did a few "sandbox" plays (basically a simcity type gameplay), and I discovered that you might as well do missions because the sandbox will hit the modern era in one longish play sessions, and the game will at that point will have lost its character.

In the end because simulating every single individual on an island is such an ambitious game, you can't help but love Tropico. They get jobs, educations, become criminals, get stuck, become rebels, have individual wants, abandon your island, move to your island, etc. The fact that they went for that and didn't end up with a totally dry simulation is worth rewarding with a purchase.

Summary:
Good game. Kind of like simcity, but not in the sense of CitiesXL. Tropico has a distinct point of view.

[Regergek]

Originally posted by Rev. Dr. Marine, Ph.D DA CA:

It's similar. The scale is a lot smaller but there's also a much greater on poltics (both national and international). It's more about making your character stay in power than it is about running the actual city.

Not really, most maps are bigger than Sim City's maps.