Yep, it's another Tropico game...

There really isn't much more to say other than that. It just feels lazy. All your old favourite buildings return, very few new ones. DLC is silly expensive, customization is meh. Save your money and go play one of the other tropicos. Either 1, or if you like roads, 3.

To elaborate.

Building Variety - Tropico has never been big on this, but it's 2014. Would it kill to have 2 models for a Bunhouse/house/etc?

Eras - These are esentially mini-goals. If you fail to achieve them within the time limit, you lose. That's about it. All they do is lock buildings from you, making it harder to layout a good city -from the start-

Ships - You get to own ships, that sounds cool, and I really thought it was going to be like Tropico 2 managing pirate fleets. But it's not. You couldn't have any less interaction with them, No naming, no colouring, and with each era, the ship just poofs into the next eras ship and keeps doing what it does. Huge let down.

Mines - Ugly eyesores that just look silly when you upgrade them. A mini Bagger 288 just sits there, and it's grosly undersized.

Tanks - Yep, I'm gonna say this too. The introduction of Tropico tanks. They are T-34. That's it. Every nation be it america, soviets, modern armour,, oh and of course Tropico, all use the same model T-34.

Bring Back TNT radio - I mean the Tropico 3 one, (but 4 is even better than this schlock).

Some of these sound nitpicky, but this is why the game just feels lazy. Would it of killed them to make a few differnt tank models? Woud it of been that much of an effort to make another bunk house?

Sure, these are just visuals, but this game is very difficult to mod. And there are virtually no new gameplay from say Tropico 3, or 4. So if the game play is the same, then the visuals better be amazing......but they aren't. Hence a lazy, forgetable, "next tropico game".

Unfortunately I just can't recommend this game as much as I would have loved to.

When I first played it, it was a nice refresh and continuation of Tropico 4. As I played it more, I found more and more problems with the game. The fighting, the buildings, the overlays (pre building placement and post placement), rebels, population cap, to name a few. I'll summarise these quickly:

The fighting: Essentially, its build a huge military or be wiped out. Once rebels appear, if they break through your military (which they will as they are OP most of the time), they head straight to the palace and game over. Your military doesn't respawn, you cannot rebuild military buildings either. Even if your barracks refill with 8 troopers, they won't go and fight the rebels attacking the palace. Totally ridiculous and to me, its a game breaker.

The buildings: Only apartments have 'variations' and even then they look pretty much the same. Throughout the eras, the building all look the same, modern housing in colonial periods. Really? There needs to be much more variation in models. As it stands now, its bland. There are buildings missing too that should really be in there. Since when did a police station act as a fire station? Seems lazy. Modern tanks appearing in the cold war era too.

Overlays: When you place buildings that say 'Affects nearby plantations' or 'Generates funds off nearby housing', there is nothing to say how far this radius is. You have no idea what it will affect until its placed and built. These buildings often cost alot to make and many times where you place can be a total waste of resources. For a modern 2014 game, this is not acceptable to me. Kalypso merely say its meant to be this way and is fine, and then point about overlays in the Almanac which are irrelivent to the point raised to them. There is nothing to say what the radius is of any building. This is a poor effort.

Rebels - too common, too OP. Doesn't give the feeling of a dictatorship game at all. Even on high happiness (some people have rebel attacks at 100 happiness). There are no real reasons for rebels alot of the time, and to many, its unknown why they are attacking since everyone is happy. The only real way to counter rebels is to have a huge military, which generates more rebels in itself. Lose lose situation ultimately.

2000 people population cap. You have often use 1/4 of the island and reach this pop cap. Very poor. Dev excuses for this are poor and obsurd. As of patch 1.08 a population slider has finally been implemented. Only took them 9 months.

Last point i'll make is the DLC for this. £3 for most DLC, gives 1 building, an outfit you never see, 1 short mission and a music track. Most of the DLC was already included in the base game and can be unlocked via mods and working correctly. Your paying to play with what should have been there in the first place really. Considering the base price of the game is £29.99, its really not worth it.

Could only recommend the game if game price drops below £15 and all DLC included.

The ethos of sequels back in the day used to be that they were bigger, better, and with more content. Unfortunatley the modern mindset seems to be that you can push out a minimal product at full price, and charge for "DLC" that should have been in the main game.
Every step taken by kalypso seems to be a step backwards. There are less buildings, less avenues for economy, less player agency. In tropico 4 you could entirely eschew certain areas of economy and still make it work. Want a industrial complex that sucks the minerals from the land for massive profit? No problem. Want to protect mother earth, build your economy by becoming a tourist trap, or an island vegas? Go for it! Do you want to create an atheist state, a complete theocracy, a communist regime, or a capitalist paradise? All do-able!
Not so with tropico 5. Make a single move that the people dont like, and you're done. in some cases there is no way to correct this (sign the wrong thing into your constitution, watch your approval tank. just watch, you can do nothing about it now.) its game over. You -must- build a church if you want to have any hope of making out of colonial era. You -must- build a mine if you want to have any economy at all. While in tropico 4 you had to keep citizen happiness in mind, now it is the single driving factor of the entire game, and you will have to play it their way, not yours. Now that buildings are tied to eras, the game is completely homogonized. Every game is "A" leads to "B" leads to "C". you -must- start with farming, which -must- lead to industrialization, with no options for tourism or even entertainment until the right era.
And the DLC that is planned for this game is beyond insulting. there are so many features from tropico 4 that were taken out so that they could be resold in bits and pieces. Remove jails and make the game activley punish you for trying to deal with criminals. Oh but dont worry, there is a prison DLC coming out that you can buy. It reminds me of a mobile free to play game, only i unfortunatley payed money for it.
Tropico 4 was one of my favotire city building games, with many interesting mechanics and conecpts that couldn't be found elsewhere. Tropico 5 is an incredible disappointment, i cant recomend anyone buy this game. To echo many other sentiments, buy tropico 4 if you are interested in it.

We pre-ordered our copies. I didn't review this game until now, hoping that after the inital "shock" I would change my mind. I haven't.

I've been a huge fan of the Tropico series since 2001, but I'm afraid I've lost that lovin' feelin' with Tropico 5. We loved the Tropico games so much that we upgraded ALL our computers so we could run T5 (DX11) to the tune of about $400 (just for new hardware). We had no other reason/need to upgrade (nothing else, to this day, has required us to upgrade). IMHO, that is some pretty serious game love. :)

One complaint I have is muti-player: we purchased multiple copies to play TOGETHER, but it doesn't really work that way (read the forums to see why, they explain it better than I can).

The reason why I don't play anymore (single player) is because of how they make the scenaries work. It goes back and forth between TWO islands, each time continuing where you left off. That might sound good, but for me it's a total pain. I have a VERY hard time remembering which buildings were upgraded before, how upgraded were they, which ones need managers, etc. etc. etc. For me it was SOOOOO much better starting a new island each time. That way I could build not only for the general needs of my people, but for the needs of the scenario.

T5 was the only game I had looked forward to in years. My family and I are very disppointed.

I see that Tropico 5 share the curse of all the good series, the curse of predecessor. If you already have a very succesful game in your hands, developers are facing somehow a dilemma: if they try to keep the old mechanics and game design, fans will accuse them of copying the old game. And if they try to implement new mechanics, then fans will complain about how the new game spoiled what it was good. The curse of homm3 over its succesors is the best example of that.

In case you had great fun playing tropico 3 or 4, this game probably won't give more to you only because it's developed few years later. In this perspective, i find most of fan's critics are right. Yet, for those who didn't play a tropico game before and for those who seek an enjoyable simulation, i strongly recommend Tropico 5. Particularly the campaign is well designed, and most of all game is fun.

I'm a big fan of the series and tycoon games in general. Unfortunately, a low population cap makes Tropico 5 unplayable by its second half.

The player will find his citizens emigrating en masse starting around the beginning of the Cold War, which will cause his economy to collapse. Factories go unmanned, exports are never transported to the docks, expensive buildings are rendered useless by rolling blackouts as power plants run short on staff and fuel. Pulling people from entertainment and welfare buildings causes Happiness to plummet. Hiring even illiterate foreign workers quickly becomes prohibitively expensive, and pointless, as they're likely to leave on the next transport.

As the population cap is invisible to the player, he may spend many frustrating hours trying to placate his citizens before he realizes it's nothing he's doing wrong.

In order to play successfully, one has to very consciously limit expansion from the start of the campaign onwards. (Unlike in previous installments, scenarios don't start with a blank slate; everything you've built in earlier eras is still there, although the money in your treasury, mysteriously, is not.)

In short, this game is essentially broken without mods. I appreciate the detail, beauty and realism that Haemimont have added, but they are in no way worth the losses in gameplay.

Review by : Panda Waifu

- Lovely art style.
- Added Multiplayer.
- More eras to play in.

- A barebones single player experience.
- Not enough songs.
- Glitch prone multiplayer.

Tropico 5 is a Strategy/Citybuilder Simulation game where you take the role of El Presidente leading the small banana republic of Tropico.
As the dictator you wield absolute authority over your people and the island.
With a simple but functional campaign mode and a new added multiplayer mode, Tropico 5 feel like a lot of the same but its a new way...

The first big thing added to Tropico 5 is the eras.
The eras allow you to play through multiple time periods, starting in the Colonial Era where you play as a governor for the English Crown, and ending in Modern times, where you have to make Tropico future proof.
This idea sounds amazing on paper but doesn't really play out that well.
The biggest problem is that eras feel short and become boring rather quickly. I would have rather seen them working with one time period (like in Tropico 4), but giving it a lot of depth and attention.

The second big thing they added in Tropico 5 was multiplayer.
You can play with up to 4 friends in Tropico 5's multiplayer. The multiplayer is largely mission based, for example:
>Who can earn the most tax money in 5 minutes
or
>Who can export 5000 canned fish first
Completing these objectives will give a player a point, and the first to 10 points will be the winner.
It's fun for a while but suffers from horrible server slowdowns from time to time, and can feel a bit repetitive.

Other than a few minor additions the game feels the same as Tropico 4, although Tropico 4 did a few things better.
For example, the Tropico 4 had a better singleplayer campaign.
Tropico 4's base game also had more content on release than Tropico 5 has (such as prisons), although they plan on adding additional content to Tropico 5 over coming months.
There were also visual improvements to the game, and the UI is nicer to look at.

Overall the game offers enough to earn a true sequel status, but Tropico 4 is overall just a better product.
I still recommend this game because it's still alot of fun to play.

Developer : Haemimont Games
Publisher : Kalypso Media Digital
Genre : RPG, Simulatie, Strategie
Website : http://www.tropico5.com
Released on Steam on : 23th of may 2014
Tropico 5 is also on : Xbox360 and Playstation 4


Always do more research than just reading a review, to ensure that you get the right product.
[sorry for any grammatical errors]

Thanks for reading!

Tropico 4 was better. Tropico 5 felt more like a slight improvement or DLC over 4, but that's it. Not worth buying on hindsight.

Citizens in rage because of lack of food

Riot starts

They burn down all farms because of it

11/10

I cannot stress enough how disappointing this game is. Tropico 4 was fresh, a worthy update, humourous. Tropico 5 descends into racialized caricatures of Latin Americans worthy of Family Guy. The gameplay itself is lacklustre at best, with a nonsensical tech system, overly difficult and repetitive mission objectives, this game is just crap. Also, they packed the DLC into the download, which is probably the most underhanded thing publishers do these days. This won't get much more play from me and I definitely won't be buying any DLC. Pirate this trash.

The main storyline mission is short. There's the signature silly Tropico feel – but it falls flat before anything really happens with it. There's still the typos and bugs from 4 that should've been taken care of. The DLC is insulting – overpriced installments for a stupid hat, an uninteresting map with buggy mission and a new building.

The game is... prettier than previous installments? It has that going for it. The Swiss bank account is an interesting mechanic now. The Manager system is a nice touch.

Go with Tropico 4.

Lacking so many features comparing to Tropico 4. Recommend T4 instead of this.

Awful, lacking all of the charm of Tropico 4 and the Modern Times expansion. As someone who has played the series since Tropico 3 I feel like this game is a real step backwards. There are fewer buildings than the other Tropico's, the advisors are boring and the game takes itself too seriously in general. Do not waste your money on this game.

While the "eras" system is a plus, the lack of building variety and Islands compared to it's predecessor, abeit with DLCs, feels like a step forward and two steps back.

Tropico 5
~~~~~~~

This series is getting better with each sequel.

Of course you have to build and reach your objectives as usual but in Tropico 5 you have more options than before. From customizing your El Presidente, hiring manager to your building, finding technology and much more. Using the tutorial is actually a good idea to be honest.

But do not worry; you can actually set the level of difficulty easily.

Visually, this game is beautiful and run smoothly. The soundtrack is a pleasure to your ears as we would expect from this franchise.

My only criticism is with the control, I am wondering why the gamepad is the primary control. To me this type of game is so much better with your keyboard and mouse. Saying this, you can play with the keyboard and mouse but it is not smooth in my opinion.

Positives:
~~~~~~~
- Visually splendid
- Fantastic soundtracks
- Plenty things to do
- Setup your levels of difficulties (political, economic, etc) before you start each mission
- Challenging
- Achievements
- Trading cards

Negatives:
~~~~~~~~

- Gamepad as primary control

Overall this game is a solid 8 out of 10 (just because of the gamepad), Otherwise I would give it a 10 out of 10.

Well done El Presidente!

MORE THE_CPT_FROGGY REVIEWS HERE

I loved Tropico 4, rule your own country, make your economy rise, satisfy your people, execute those in your way, piss off foreign countries and wave your nuke around to prevent them from invading. These are just some of the things you can do in the previous game and are still present in 5.

But Tropico 5 changed in different ways, military became much more critical, forces are stronger thus stronger defense is required. Trade routes can be chosen and relations with foreign countries' relations affect these. You progress through time and things change even more than Modern Times DLC in 4. Housing is more interconnected with job salary and sometimes you experience problems but don't know the details until you see a detail that changes your prespective. The game provides a bigger mirror to the perspective of a dictator, things need to be watched more often and closely, you must be prepared and at the same time be able to adapt to the situations you must be watchful of such as civil unrest and the end of WWII.

Everything got more difficult, more complex, in some cases worse than 4, I miss the old Penultimo, I missing allowing no rent to all residentials, I miss the diverse set of characters and more. But 5 had some things I really liked, the campaign was something I didn't expect and loved, the fact that you make your island grow and don't abandon it at the end of the episode makes you see how difficult it gets to run a country the longer it stays alive. You have multiplayer (which sucked earlier on until some updates) where you cooperate or kill each other with armies and resources. Military played a bigger role, both a good thing and a bad thing because I didn't give a damn about it til 5.

Bottomline, Tropico 5 is like a more difficult version of 4, things need to be watched more often as the threat level of everything got more critical such as rebels, civil unrest and pirates and the campaign requires you to realize that you are NOT going to abandon your country and ALL problems you experience now WILL happen into the future unless YOU fix it while you can. Tropico 5 is a great game and I value it as I value 4 but in different ways.

If you've played Tropico 4 and loved it as it is and don't want things to change, then stick with it. If you value a bigger challenge, a more complex way of playing it, a chance to compete with other dictators (heads up, few people go online anymore so find a friend) and to realize how difficult it is to manage your own lil island then go buy this, hell it's Steam anyway. Price too high? Steam Sale!

Okay. This is coming from a big, big Tropico fan. I played Tropico 3, 4 and 5. Let's get into this review.

I was very excited about the game before release. Ever since Tropico 4 came out, I've been waiting and waiting for news about the newer one. But sadly, this game disappointed me. First, let me talk about the things I liked.

The textures and graphics are amazing. They have been improved alot. I played the old versions on my Xbox 360, and right when I changed to PC and tried this one out, I noticed the differences. The buildings look very nice, and when you zoom in, full in, you see all the details. The interiors of a shack, the faces on the people and sometimes just the trees. The developers went all out on this game and I say that the graphics are a plus.

The new online mode is awesome. You can play against three other people in an island, and race to finish quests or even try to invade the other person.

But those are really the only things I liked about this game.

In Tropico 5, you play alot of missions in the same island. You're basically switching islands and going back to them. I didn't like this move. Alot of times you feel like you're handed the island to you again. I know how this would have worked, but I don't really like it. In the old versions, every single mission is another challenge to you. You go on a different, all new island and building it out of nothing. Alot of times this game just feels repetitive.

I feel like the direction Kalypso is moving is not helping the game. The game relies on DLC after DLC to try to keep it fresh again. A game shouldn't fully rely on expansions to make it better. Those DLC's could instead be implemented to the actual game and when you play the old game and the new one, you feel like it's a big step.

There have already been four DLC's out that could have instead been in the original game, that would have made it better. I still don't know how there's no offline multiplayer yet. It would be awesome to have people controlling different part of the island.

And also, the soundtrack. I loved the older soundtracks, but when you compare Tropico 5's to the older ones, it's just not as good.

Tropico 3 and 4 both amazed me. I loved both of those games instantly. I expected the same to happen with Tropico 5, but sadly that was not the case. It feels like this whole series just relies on DLC's to make the game fresh again. I can't see many people buying DLC after DLC after DLC. It's just, not how it should go. I feel like Tropico can be one of the biggest strategy/city-building games out there if it just fills in all the gaps. After just a few hours of playing this game, I was already disappointed. I felt at times I was forcing myself to continue, and that it felt like a chore to keep playing.

If you've never played a Tropico game before, or you're just new at city-building games, I recommend you try this out. But if you are a hardcore gamer, or a just experienced at Tropico, chances are you won't like this game - at least not as much as the older ones.

And for this, I give the game a 5/10.

The game is good its not great its a new tropico which means there should be lots of new features that actullay make the game better and if they don't add lots of new features they can add in expansions but no they have to make these stupid add on's with a new mission and building and clothing instead give us better expansions with new features or make the features that the game already has better with more options and just make this game better because i have found myself playing tropico 4 more than tropico 5 because there is more options in tropio 4 like more buildings,edicts and clothing

couldn't spend more than 2hr each time I play,
compared to previous one this one seems not so charming to me.

still Better than simcity tho.

Has some improvements over Tropico 4, welcomed improvements. Unfortunately, this game lacks some things that made Tropico 4 great. Tropico 4 had generally more character throughout, as well as the polish. Tropico 4 is very iterative of Tropico 3, meaning Tropico 4 is basically a good game improved and polished to be a really great game. Tropico 5 feels like it tried to re-imagine the series, but got rushed out the door. It lacks character, I encountered a fair few bugs and annoyances and generally the entire game has a lot of cool ideas that aren't implemented well.

I don't hate the game, its not a bad game. Overall its pretty good, and I hope Tropico 6 really fleshes out the new ideas and expands upon whats seen here, because the ideas are all great. The game in general is still pretty dang good. The only issue is that when you compare it to Tropico 4, a game thats better in most every way, including price, its not worth it.

Tropico 4 is a better thought out, more polished game that has more content in the base game, all for a cheaper price.

Oh, and the Almanac that basically lets you figure out what the hell is causing everyone to think you're a mongoloid scumbucket is crap in Tropico 5.