Poor design, they copied T5 when they made T6. What you're asking for was present in the first 4.

Originally posted by Kunovega:

Poor design, they copied T5 when they made T6. What you're asking for was present in the first 4.

Ok but....they gave us so many extensions. And not one of them seems to contain anything that does the job when it would have been so easy. Instead they gave us this op trading post that makes making money even easier than before.

Originally posted by Pfiffi:

Originally posted by Kunovega:

Poor design, they copied T5 when they made T6. What you're asking for was present in the first 4.

Ok but....they gave us so many extensions. And not one of them seems to contain anything that does the job when it would have been so easy. Instead they gave us this op trading post that makes making money even easier than before.

You're asking about decisions made across four different companies.

The original design from the first developer lasted through 4 games until it was changed by haimemont for 5 when they made a new engine, design carried over by limbic when they made 6 in another new engine and the game is now maintained by realmforge who isn't going to change core mechanics while making DLC add ons.

Some of us have been complaining about it for over ten years since the release of 5, including throughout the entire beta testing process prior to release of 6.

It's not something they are going to change at this point.

At best you can hope it's different in 7 which is being made by yet another developer and another new engine.

This is a series that hasn't had a consistent developer in two decades.

24 years
6 games (soon to be 7)
6 developers (soon to be 7)
3 publishers
3 game engines (soon to be 4)

When you ask "why" to anything, it's usually because someone that doesn't even work on the game anymore made a decision a long time ago that's too difficult to change now and you're just hoping that in the next game someone is paying attention to complaints and requests.

Originally posted by Pfiffi:

An apiary worker is making 7$ at max budget, while an herb gardener makes 27, whats that bs? Apiaries are just not viable in more advanced eras and that sucks.

How exactly are Apiaries not viable in later eras? Actual income and expenses don't matter; Tropicans can occupy any housing or use any service for which their wealth rating is high enough, and even if you cannot completely eradicate the Poor class there are plenty of options for providing at least adequate housing and services, especially in the Modern Era. Fully-upgraded max-budget Clinics on Paid Healthcare provide 97 service quality to the Poor; Funfair Piers can theoretically provide well over 100 service quality, things like Movie Theaters and Climbing Parks provide ~90 service quality on max budget before accounting for the bonus from Radio Stations with the Music All Day upgrade, and Theaters on max budget and the Improv Theater work mode provide 75 service quality to the Poor while more or less ensuring that the Intellectual faction loves your work; Tenements can get up to 75 housing quality on max budget if electrified and on the Armed Caretaker work mode while Capsule Home Clusters do about the same as long as you don't stack them too high before accounting for bonuses from Metro Stations, 'Free Delivery' Fast Food Joints, et cetera; and none of the other happiness scores are particularly dependent on Wealth rating. Beyond that, it's hardly the end of the world if some relatively small part of the population isn't absolutely thrilled by your rule as long as they aren't actively rebelling against it, and even if they do start rebelling that's probably not going to immediately threaten serious damage to anything other than the tourism sector.

It might be nice to be able to ensure that Tropicans meet the income requirements for certain wealth categories regardless of workplace, but claiming that the inability to guarantee that e.g. Apiary workers will be better than Poor makes those workplaces not viable in later eras is a gross exaggeration.

Originally posted by Pfiffi:

Originally posted by Kunovega:

Poor design, they copied T5 when they made T6. What you're asking for was present in the first 4.

Ok but....they gave us so many extensions. And not one of them seems to contain anything that does the job when it would have been so easy. Instead they gave us this op trading post that makes making money even easier than before.

Tropico 5 took focus away from citizens, and oversimplified it to just buildings and building-related gimmicks. Tropico 6 was built on that same mistaken gameplay model originally, and suffers the same problems.

Which is why you can't set any actual wages and rents and fees to create your economy how you want it - only 5 preset budget choices in every buildings allowed here.

It is also why you see crazier and more immersion-breaking buildings in each DLC until the game becomes a parody of itself.

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In older games I could set exact wages how I wanted to create exactly the thing I needed. For example, I would set wages for military officers at certain high rate and adjusted rent on all mansions to be exactly 1/3 of that, ensuring that certain mansions would only be occupied by military officer families or anyone marrying into them. Then I peppered their surroundings with non stop militarist propaganda from newspapers and radio. Used this to generate a long series of loyal militarist citizens that would never launch a coup.

Or for example, have rent-free apartments for poor people without enacting free housing edict. I often let poor college students live near docks and factories in rent-free tenements, and once they got some work they would move out to actual apartments.

I like to build multiple separated settlements. In T4 in one overpopulated island, I used rents and wages to keep 'village' folks from the outskirts from ever moving into my 'city' area. Decided not to kick them out but keep them working in plantations for the time until I could build up industry. Would've loved to see paid education/healthcare and unrestricted jobs like T5 or T6 in that game for more customization.

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I like a lot of things in T5-T6 and have fun playing them, but I don't like the oversimplification of the buildings/actual in-game citizens and mechanics surrounding them.

At this point you can only hope Tropico 7 is a better game made in a bit more serious way, that brings back old features alongside improvements in newer games instead of goofy treehouses.

Originally posted by joeball123:

Originally posted by Pfiffi:

An apiary worker is making 7$ at max budget, while an herb gardener makes 27, whats that bs? Apiaries are just not viable in more advanced eras and that sucks.

How exactly are Apiaries not viable in later eras? Actual income and expenses don't matter; Tropicans can occupy any housing or use any service for which their wealth rating is high enough, and even if you cannot completely eradicate the Poor class there are plenty of options for providing at least adequate housing and services, especially in the Modern Era. Fully-upgraded max-budget Clinics on Paid Healthcare provide 97 service quality to the Poor; Funfair Piers can theoretically provide well over 100 service quality, things like Movie Theaters and Climbing Parks provide ~90 service quality on max budget before accounting for the bonus from Radio Stations with the Music All Day upgrade, and Theaters on max budget and the Improv Theater work mode provide 75 service quality to the Poor while more or less ensuring that the Intellectual faction loves your work; Tenements can get up to 75 housing quality on max budget if electrified and on the Armed Caretaker work mode while Capsule Home Clusters do about the same as long as you don't stack them too high before accounting for bonuses from Metro Stations, 'Free Delivery' Fast Food Joints, et cetera; and none of the other happiness scores are particularly dependent on Wealth rating. Beyond that, it's hardly the end of the world if some relatively small part of the population isn't absolutely thrilled by your rule as long as they aren't actively rebelling against it, and even if they do start rebelling that's probably not going to immediately threaten serious damage to anything other than the tourism sector.

It might be nice to be able to ensure that Tropicans meet the income requirements for certain wealth categories regardless of workplace, but claiming that the inability to guarantee that e.g. Apiary workers will be better than Poor makes those workplaces not viable in later eras is a gross exaggeration.

Yes, its all possible but thats not what I am going for. In modern age, I want my citizens to be as happy as possible and they just dont want to work in certain jobs anymore because the work quality is too low and the pay is less than the social allowance would give them.

Its not just about the apiaries. The fish farms, malls and other jobs are just not attractive for well educated people who could make more money by just staying unemployed. I would like them to be even happier but there is a limit and I think its pretty lame that we can raise the job quality and pay only marginally as presidente. I would even pay for a dlc if it would contain an item or edict that allows us to raise these.

Originally posted by E:

Originally posted by Pfiffi:

Ok but....they gave us so many extensions. And not one of them seems to contain anything that does the job when it would have been so easy. Instead they gave us this op trading post that makes making money even easier than before.

Tropico 5 took focus away from citizens, and oversimplified it to just buildings and building-related gimmicks. Tropico 6 was built on that same mistaken gameplay model originally, and suffers the same problems.

Which is why you can't set any actual wages and rents and fees to create your economy how you want it - only 5 preset budget choices in every buildings allowed here.

It is also why you see crazier and more immersion-breaking buildings in each DLC until the game becomes a parody of itself.

-

In older games I could set exact wages how I wanted to create exactly the thing I needed. For example, I would set wages for military officers at certain high rate and adjusted rent on all mansions to be exactly 1/3 of that, ensuring that certain mansions would only be occupied by military officer families or anyone marrying into them. Then I peppered their surroundings with non stop militarist propaganda from newspapers and radio. Used this to generate a long series of loyal militarist citizens that would never launch a coup.

Or for example, have rent-free apartments for poor people without enacting free housing edict. I often let poor college students live near docks and factories in rent-free tenements, and once they got some work they would move out to actual apartments.

I like to build multiple separated settlements. In T4 in one overpopulated island, I used rents and wages to keep 'village' folks from the outskirts from ever moving into my 'city' area. Decided not to kick them out but keep them working in plantations for the time until I could build up industry. Would've loved to see paid education/healthcare and unrestricted jobs like T5 or T6 in that game for more customization.

-

I like a lot of things in T5-T6 and have fun playing them, but I don't like the oversimplification of the buildings/actual in-game citizens and mechanics surrounding them.

At this point you can only hope Tropico 7 is a better game made in a bit more serious way, that brings back old features alongside improvements in newer games instead of goofy treehouses.

Yeah it really sounds like I should try out the older games finally. I like playing as free as possible and unnessessary restrictions like that annoy me.

Originally posted by Pfiffi:

Originally posted by E:

Tropico 5 took focus away from citizens, and oversimplified it to just buildings and building-related gimmicks. Tropico 6 was built on that same mistaken gameplay model originally, and suffers the same problems.

Which is why you can't set any actual wages and rents and fees to create your economy how you want it - only 5 preset budget choices in every buildings allowed here.

It is also why you see crazier and more immersion-breaking buildings in each DLC until the game becomes a parody of itself.

-

In older games I could set exact wages how I wanted to create exactly the thing I needed. For example, I would set wages for military officers at certain high rate and adjusted rent on all mansions to be exactly 1/3 of that, ensuring that certain mansions would only be occupied by military officer families or anyone marrying into them. Then I peppered their surroundings with non stop militarist propaganda from newspapers and radio. Used this to generate a long series of loyal militarist citizens that would never launch a coup.

Or for example, have rent-free apartments for poor people without enacting free housing edict. I often let poor college students live near docks and factories in rent-free tenements, and once they got some work they would move out to actual apartments.

I like to build multiple separated settlements. In T4 in one overpopulated island, I used rents and wages to keep 'village' folks from the outskirts from ever moving into my 'city' area. Decided not to kick them out but keep them working in plantations for the time until I could build up industry. Would've loved to see paid education/healthcare and unrestricted jobs like T5 or T6 in that game for more customization.

-

I like a lot of things in T5-T6 and have fun playing them, but I don't like the oversimplification of the buildings/actual in-game citizens and mechanics surrounding them.

At this point you can only hope Tropico 7 is a better game made in a bit more serious way, that brings back old features alongside improvements in newer games instead of goofy treehouses.

Yeah it really sounds like I should try out the older games finally. I like playing as free as possible and unnessessary restrictions like that annoy me.

1 is a dictator sim with elements of city building
2 is a reskin of the same game as a pirate king instead of a dictator

(from 2 to 3 there's also a publisher change, not just developer)

3 is a remake/reboot of 1 with a complete overhaul of the engine
4 is a parody of 3 that makes fun of itself and the genre

All 4 of them are built in the original engine by three different developer teams (poptop that made 1, frog city made 2 and Haemimont made 3, 4 and 5) expanding on the original engine and format. You (as presidente) are explained as a near-god like being (being able to control time) choosing to live as a leader and build small nations (essentially as entertainment for yourself). This isn't always made clear in every game, but it's literally the intro to the first game (where the time controls are explained, and it carries over in some of the time travel story lines). So the series has always been a bit comedic, but it leaned more into the politics, leadership and granular control and with penultimo always telling you to read your peoples thoughts to amuse yourself (since you can also read minds and see what everyone thinks, with each citizen having its own logic chain and decision making)

5 is where things changed the most, the developer that had made 3 and 4 decided they wanted to break free of the original engine and make their own, so 5 is designed from the ground up as a reboot. There's a rather lengthy article on it: "Haemimont Games’ Tropico 5 Postmortem"
https://www.haemimontgames.com/starting-from-scratch-haemimont-games-tropico-5-postmortem/

The entire style and control format changed. They also shifted from being one dictator to controlling a dynasty/family (that you recruit over time) and can swap out who is presidente if you choose to do so. (though they are all still immortal, you use the others as building managers if they aren't the current leader). While it had the most cohesive narrative story (actually carrying you through multiple islands over time and space rather than just stand alone pocket universes), it caught the most backlash for being so different.

5 could best be described as a dynasty sim with light rpg elements and city building.

And that was the last game for Haemimont in the series.

With 6 you have another new developer (Limbic) and another new engine, a reboot by an inexperienced developer that bolted together parts of 5 and 4 while having to build out all the components from the ground up on their own. It's a game built by someone filling in a check list of what they were told the game needs rather than having played the franchise and knowing how to evolve it.

6 is a city builder with a dictator theme. Functional but definitely not oriented in the same direction the series started as.

I would also note that at launch it was barely-functional, it launched (after massive delay) with tons of bugs that made playing the game a chore, months of bad patches fixed almost nothing. The developer that made 6 left the project (in what i would call an unfinished state). Luckily a new developer was put in place (Realmforge) and it's Realmforge that fixed the majority of broken systems to get it to the playable state it's in today and it's Realmforge that has maintained and expanded the majority of notable DLC for 6.

You may not like all of Realmforges design choices for the DLC, but they stepped into a very broken game that they didn't design and still managed to bring it up to a fun playable state and then just expanded on it with new ideas despite not being the original developers or having done any part of the previous games.

I find value in every game in the series, but I would recommend starting from the beginning and exhausting all the scenarios before moving up to the next one. You'll get a much broader sense of how it all evolved to where it is today.

I've enjoyed all 6 of them, but only because I fully exhausted the previous ones so I didn't feel like I was missing anything. I am probably the most nostalgic for 2 and 4 as they both offer the most distinctly different themes while retaining the older granular style.

If I play any of them today it's mostly 6, but that's because I already had thousands of hours in the previous games over the last 20+ years. (many even before I had these games on steam).

If I designed 7 there's a lot from 2 and 4 and even a little of 5 that are missing from 6 that all could be brought back and reworked. But #1 on the list is granular wage and rent controls (though I'd personally want even more than what the originals gave you, but that's a conversation for another time)

Two decades and 10,000+ hours experience with the franchise, maybe my perspective of it is a little off from the average user.

Originally posted by Pfiffi:

Yeah it really sounds like I should try out the older games finally. I like playing as free as possible and unnessessary restrictions like that annoy me.

Be mindful that older games also had their own share of unnecessary restrictions. For example jobs were heavily restricted, resulting in a lot of weird unemployment, because no men could be teachers/hotel workers or no women could be soldiers/professors for example. And you couldn't make food/education/healthcare a paid thing like in Tropico 6, or build tunnels and bridges or better solar/wind power plants for self sufficiency.

But aside from those (actually rather important) big annoyances - when it comes to overall mechanics, I still usually prefer T1-T4 mechanics.

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@Kunovega above hit the nail right on the spot.

I like newer games too, they removed restrictions and brought over improvements, but as three separate studios were involved at three separate times, each game has a different focus.

T1 was first of its kind. City building elements were few, but you had to manage your characters a bit to simulate a miniature microstate with a few lols thrown in here and there.
Your goal is to stay as long as you can and build up as big of a personal Swiss bank account as you can before bailing out, or stay on the island and take care of the people. That's it. Pretty simple and focused, but also deep enough to be fun. It is still playable IMO.

T3 was a full 3D remake of T1.

T4 is just T3 expanded, same game just updated a bit, with a lot more colour and silliness added and actual new expansions to move it ahead. But was overall still pretty grounded as a game.

T5 had a newer version of the old engine IIRC, and removed the big restrictions from older game, brought in a lot of new features and improvements (good roads and grids finally, for example), and I still think it is audio-visually the best Tropico game. But they simplified the game a bit too much, and changed some things that didn't need changing. Not to mention unfixed bugs, and silliness turned up to 11.

And it added a glorified event chain system in the form of an oversimplified 'dynasty' mechanic... which didn't really have an actual family tree or dynasty. You just get multiple 'presidente' characters instead of one, who just spawn out of nowhere from random events. And you can assign them to buildings for small bonus modifiers, or run them in elections (which doesn't affect anything), or carry them over to new games if you want. That's it, that's your dynasty system.

T6 took T5's ideas as a base but on a new/upgraded engine, removed that weird dynasty gimmick, and brought much more needed flexibility and new improvements, and removed more restrictions.

But it is a resource-based city builder, and not much else. Everything that made Tropico deep gets pushed into the background. You can still see characters and families, you can still read and pick out supposedly important people in the almanac, you can still order soldiers to shoot your rivals. It just doesn't change anything much anymore. City building comes first, and at that point I would just go play Cities Skylines 2 or something.

On top of that T6 kept a lot of problems from T5 (like the same lack of emigration control mentioned earlier). And turned the silliness up so much that it is no longer a serious game, not even a parody of what the original was. I love the multiple islands and solar plants and sea wind farms and tunnels and bridges and being able to charge people for food/health/education/religion like I always wanted and... oh wait, what is this weird airship dropping an entire Stonehenge world wonder 'stolen' from somewhere else? Where did Taj Mahal fly in from? Why are people living in treehouses? Why can I bypass the entire core gameplay systems with cheat-like wonders and gyms and wishing wells?

Then years later a new dev team were brought in and given the task of running and maintaining T6, which is what they are doing right now. They have to work with what they are given, and cannot change the core of T6 after all this time. I don't blame them.

I have lots of fun playing T5 and T6 for what they are... but it is older games that I find myself returning to, because some depth and immersion is what makes this series good.

Which is why I keep hoping T7 will finally return to depth > city building, and be taken more seriously by whoever designs it.