Recently tried the Steamworld Build demo, and it was great. Looking for something to scratch the itch until release though. I've heard Farthest Frontier is good, any opinions on that, or other recommendation?

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[–] dragontamer 10 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Tropico series is pretty good.

Tropico 6 is the newest and the most joke-like, but all of them are extremely tongue-in-cheek. The addition of Carmen Sandiego-like "Steal the Whitehouse with Hackers" mechanic is going a bit too far with the joke IMO, but there is a solid city-builder here.

Tropico is somewhere between Sims and Sim City: a "Large" Tropico is ~10,000 people, and every person has their food/rest/religion/job/entertainment/political scores tracked individually (much like in Sims where food/hygine/etc. etc. scores are tracked). You cannot control anyone on the island except "El Presidente". But you do have orders that probably get followed, such as arrests, assassinations and the like.

If you lose an election, you instantly lose the game. If you piss off "the Superpowers", you instantly lose the game (In earlier games, USA and Soviet Union are the superpowers. In Tropico 6, the superpowers change from age-to-age).

I'd say that Tropico is "unstable" after reaching high populations. Its more designed as a scenario where you play until the point of instability, and then you end your save. Its still many months of real-life gameplay before you reach unstable points, but its really designed to play different scenarios rather than perfecting a singular island chain. Think "Roller-coaster Tycoon", or "Ceasar 3", or Cleopatra.

Which btw: Cesar 3 and Cleopatra are also excellent citybuilders, albeit aimed towards the "scenario" slant rather than the infinite slant... and also 20+ years old. But these oldies are a goodie for a good reason.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I vouch for Tropico! Tropico 4 is my favorite. It captures the original spirit of the series but feels modern enough that it's not difficult to play mechanically. There's fun and rewarding scenarios to play through and just sandbox mode if that's more your speed.

[–] dragontamer 1 points 1 year ago

Tropico 4 definitely had some instability problems with regards to traffic.

Because Tropico 4's traffic was somewhat realistically modeled, you'd grow and grow until your roads got congested, and then your entire island collapses economically (and you'll likely be deposed as a leader, or piss off the Americans / Soviets enough that they invade and you lose since your politics with them likely relied upon trade deals that you're failing). And unlike Cities: Skylines (or Tropico 5/6), there weren't as many options for fixing (or preventing) traffic problems.

But if we ignore the traffic problems with very-late state islands, Tropico 4 is probably my favorite too.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Last time I played it, I tried to play as a communist dictator for once, instead of just a good leader.

Everyone just left my island. I was drone striking suspected rebels, but cmon.