Picture from Amazon.de; I cut out the white bars and resized it a little
"Hola, Presidente! You are back? I almost doubted that you would ever return, given that your last try at ruling an island did not turn out too good. You know, you simply lacked the power necessary to rule, in one way or another. But do not despair, I can offer you a supreme package of Absolute Power for a low price of just 6000 tons of Bananas, payable in 1 year. A good deal, isn't it? What, your island is unsuitable for bananas? My bad, I guess you will have to cope with it somehow." Salvadore Cantillado, E.V.I.L. Corporation, Fruitas Ltd. Division
Well, back we are on Tropico it seems. Given the generally positive feedback to my original review of Tropico 3 (which can be found here) and the apparent interest in the series around here, I have decided on reviewing the new addon for T3 just as well.
General Information
As you might already know, the basic premise of the Tropico series is that of the player dictatorially controlling the namesake backwater island nation, trying to build up the island's economy to make profits, as well as investing the money earned that way into infrastructure, habitational buildings, public services etc. Absolute Power, as an addon, naturally does not change the general idea of the game in any way, but it does add bits and pieces all over the game, expanding it by quite a lot of details. The important thing to note is that AP is a dependent addon - you cannot play it without the original game Tropico 3 (unlike some other examples like the addons for Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War. For the same reason, the system requirements are the same as with the original game - if that one runs on your system, so will Absolute Power.
In times of an ever-increasing severity of DRM and copy protection systems, AP (and the basic game, of course), belongs to the category that basically says "I don't care about that rubbish" - you have a key and that's it. You can install it as often as you want and on as many different systems as you want and you do not have to have an online connection running. You can even run the game without disc by default. The game will automatically try to connect to the online service on first launch, but that is irrelevant for actually playing the game. While a very important factor for any potential player of the game (for me personally, the lack of extensive DRM/CP systems is the first and foremost factor I consider), it does not normally have an effect on the quality of the game itself, so as much as I would like to add some bonus points here, I will not.
Now, on to the actual scoring of the game. As Absolute Power is a dependent addon, grading it seperately is rather pointless in my opinion. That is why I am going to look for the improvements that it has brought to the original game, instead. So do not be surprised if I keep some sections quite short - that simply indicates that the previous quality from Tropico 3 is consistently kept up throughout the addon as well.
Graphics
Needless to say, Absolute Power retains the graphics engine from Tropico 3. As I already mentioned in my review of T3, the overall graphical quality is not at the top of what is currently possible (i.e. Crysis) but still comparable to other city builder/economy games.
Models Absolute Power introduces several new buildings into the game, and they obviously need new models as well. The quality is kept on the same high level of the original buildings. Where I slightly critized T3 for its lack of eye candy with most buildings, I can, for some part, say that some of the new buildings are provided with enough candy to last a shortage of chocolade for quite some time.
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
I want to make it absolutely clear that, apart from sugar, there is no ingredient for chocolade inside the game at all. And no, there are no cookies, either. And contrary to popular belief, chocolade and cookies are not part of, nor are they important for, attaining absolute power.
The new Primary School has a playground for the children attached to it, while the landfill is (obviously) scattered with waste containers and bags of trash, just to name 2 examples. On the other hand, you have the new "mega candy" buildings that come entirely by themselves and without too much extra candy included in it. It certainly is an improvement over the original buildings, but there could have been a bit more. And the developers could also have gone and change some more of the original buildings as they have done with the palace (which has received 3 buildable upgrades that also change the visual look of it; admittedly, the developers did re-use existing eye candy for this).
Textures The textures remain at the same very high quality from T3. For example, the pile of trash on the new landfill looks like... well... a pile of trash; even the best texture quality would probably not change that a lot. Generally said, where T3 was very good already, AP adds more of the same quality for the new elements of the game.
Graphical Feedback Sadly, I have to pull out my point of criticism from the original review here, again: Absolute Power does not add a lot in terms of graphical feedback at all. If you issue the new "National Holiday" edict, you will get a bit of a fireworks display over a large area around your palace, but that is about it. Some of the buildings show their activity through moving bits and pieces here or there, but you generally cannot judge their current efficiency. The new wind power plants, for example, always have the same turning speed, regardless of where you place them and how much energy they produce. And you will still not see a parade if you issue a mardi gras edict...
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Three screenshots, all taken at 1280x1024 at near-maximum settings (I rescaled it to 800x640 for the forums)
Screenshot 1: A general overview over a highly developed island with a centralized living area and industry close by at the coast and the farmland spread around the rest of the city. There also is a military complex just through the "mountain pass". For the T3 players among you: There should be 5 of the new buildings in this screen if I counted correctly...
Screenshot 2: One of the new "mega eye candy" buildings, a golden statue of El Presidente. If you want to exchange higher upkeep for increased effect, you can set the statue to rotate. Note that the appearance of the statue actually reflects the appearance of your current character. If you change the look of your character from one game to another, the statue will look different as well.
Screenshot 3: A low-angle shot over the city, back towards the mountain pass. The primary school is just across the road from the palace (which has been fully upgraded), there is a wind turbine at the central lower edge of the screen (providing local power for the good old hospital) as well as a garbage dump on the central right edge.
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
Overall Graphics Score As the engine is still the same, T3-AP stays a little behind in terms of raw graphical quality, so I still have to deduct half a point for this as I did in the original review.
In terms of graphical feedback, Absolute Power has not really added a lot, either. There are a few cases where you can see the new things working in general, however, and the fireworks display for the national holiday, as weak as it turned out, is a step into the right direction. Finally, you also have a bit more graphical variety in the game now - roads, for example, are built as dirt roads and are automatically upgraded if certain "urban" buildings are built alongside them (which does not have any further effect). In order to reward the efforts done, I reduce the original penalty of 1.5 points to 1.0 points. Still, there is quite a large potential for more improvements available, especially in terms of graphical feedback.
Due to the fact that the graphics bug from the original version (fixed as of the first patch, as I added in my review later on) has not returned at all for Absolute Power, there is no reason whatsoever to take away points.
Final Graphics Score: 8.5/10
Sound As I said in the original review already, my scoring of the sound category is based on the German version of the game.
Atmosphere
Everything remains on the same high level as in Tropico 3. Whenever necessary, Absolute Power features quality sounds fitting the new parts of the game.
Speech
Concerning the general amount of speech in Absolute Power, most things remain the same as compared to T3 - most characters have a few lines to say when selected, and you will not receive voiced briefings and messages other than inside the tutorial.
With Tropico 3's radio host, Juanito, I originally critized that his messages were lacking variety and, therefore, became repetitive in the long-run. This, in and off itself, is no different in AP - you have a few more messages here or there pertaining to a few of the new options, but that is it. However, Absolute Power also gives you something else, or someone else, to be precise: A second radio host named "Betty Boom". As you might have guessed from the name already, Betty is a "little" more on the negative side where El Presidente is concerned. Running a pirate radio station, she is the one to openly voice complaints about current problems, as well as her personal doubts about whatever you are doing at the moment. Seen all by herself, Betty suffers from the exact same problem as Juanito does: Playing the game for a long period will inevitably cause the messages to repeat themselves over and over. The good thing is that you normally have both radio hosts active at the same time, so that they take turns and do not become as boring as soon. Just as was the case in the original game, you can switch the hosts off via the options menu.
Music There are no changes in terms of available music at all. This means that the music is still of a very high quality and completely fitting the theme of the game, but that it can still become repetitive relatively soon.
Overall Score
As I already said about Tropico 3, the quality of sound and music are both very good and fitting the setting of the game. While the lacking long-term variety in music and the general lack of speech remain, I can say that the lacking variety with the radio hosts has been solved for the most part. With the second host in place, it will take quite a bit longer for the radio messages to become boring; they will still become boring eventually, but it is a definite improvement over original T3. For that reason, I cut down the original deduction of 1.0 points to 0.5 points.
Final Sound Score: 9.5/10
Gameplay
Though the general gameplay has remained the same, Absolute Power has changed quite a number of things here. For instance, you have a new party in your population: The Loyalists. Loyalists are those people that are almost fanatical believers in El Presidente. They want you to construct/enact some very specific buildings/edicts, they actively want you to ignore elections etc. - basically your run-of-the-mill political zombie that every dictator dreams of forming the entire population of their country. All that is not to say that these people will not try to riot if you disregard them, though, and their demands obviously cause problems with other political groups. That said, what you could call the militancy and aggressivity of the political groups has been increased by quite a bit. To that end, the concerns of each group have been divided into major and minor concerns and some new concerns have been added. You can generally get on rather well while ignoring minor concerns for some time, but major concerns (most of them the concerns from the original game like "more housing" or "more churches") have a very noticeable effect on the opinion that a given group has about you. If any opinion ever reaches 0, there is a good chance that you will soon suffer from one of the new negative events. If the Religious people hate you, for example, you might get excommunicated, resulting in a continuous loss of respect with every person that visits a church or cathedral. And Tropican citizens are quite religious, as you might know...
With this increased militancy, you also need more methods to keep your population under control, and this is where the "absolute power" comes into play. Apart from the obvious candidates - the Loyalists - AP also adds new buildings and edicts that provide special support for the Loyalists, provide more and cheap entertainment (handily useable for tourism as well) or cater to the various needs of your population. For instance, if you simply cannot get on with a certain group in your population, you can use one of the new edicts and get rid of it entirely. However, you can issue this edict only once, and you risk that up to half of that group's supporters join the Rebels.
For all the new additions to the game (and I did not even mention half of it in this section, so as to not spoiler anything), Absolute Power still has to cope with some of the problems of the original game: Tourism (though a little more feasible due to some of the new buildings acting as cheap and effective entertainment sites) remains problematic as a main income source, as it is very expensive, but does not offer a comparatively high income rate - the industry is still miles ahead in terms of profit. And the game will become repetitive at one point if you have made it past the difficult starting phase into the phase of vast industrial profits. I do have to say, though, that - at least in the addon's campaign - it can be a lot more difficult to earn the huge profits that were possible in the original game, mainly because you have more militant political groups and more (expensive!) buildings and edicts to pay for.
Overall Gameplay Score
Tourism remains a poor choice as a way to earn your main income. Compared to the original game, however, you have some new entertainment buildings (some of which are quite cheap in the long-run), as well as some very positive effects through the new mega eye candy buildings that seriously boost tourism, rendering it more worthwhile than in the original game. I therefore reduce the original 1.5 points penalty to 1.0 points.
Since the first patch for T3, the limit for road intersections and the population limit have been increased as well, and Absolute Power seems to keep with the new limits, rendering any score reductions unnecessary here.
Final Gameplay Score: 9/10
Story Just as was the case in the original Tropico 3, Absolute Power does not actually feature a continuous storyline, but a "campaign" of single scenarios instead. I have to say, however, that the general quality of the scenarios as well as their humour value has increased quite noticeably from the original ones.
Originally, I critized quite a lot that the scenarios in T3 suffered from an imbalance in terms of how many events were used in them. This has been largely fixed, as almost all scenarios in AP have a continuous line of events happening in them. Not all of these events might have a decisive influence on the current game (a select few can affect your play style), but they nevertheless drive on the "story" behind a given scenario. One rarely encounters extended periods without events, and if you do, you generally have enough to do to set up your island or to cope with the previous event(s).
Another thing about the scenarios is that the ideas behind them are far more unique and interesting than the ones from T3. If you ever wondered what the mysterious Chupacabra might be - you will know about it in AP. Another scenario I hinted at here or there throughout the review...
The only thing left for me to criticize about the "story" is the lack of a larger, inter-connected storyline, but as I already said in my original T3 review, it is something that the game does not need to be very good, anyway. Still, one can dream... and deduct 0.5 points.
Final Story Score: 9.5/10
Overall Score
Final Graphics Score: 8.5/10
Final Sound Score: 9.5/10
Final Gameplay Score: 9/10
Final Story Score: 9.5/10
Overall Score for Tropico 3+Absolute Power:
36.5/40 -> 91.25%
Comments I have to say that Absolute Power was absolutely (no pun intended... ) worth the buy. If you like Tropico 3 and want more of and to it, I can fully recommend getting the addon. Although it does not turn T3 into a perfect game (something that will probably never exist anyway), it does add a lot to make it that much better. Personally, I liked the things they added and how they added them, as most new things were designed entirely with the title of the addon in mind - you receive a lot more power over your population, but that power is necessary as well. And if you are not careful enough, a misuse (or misplanning) of your power could just make matters worse (like trying to ban that 250 member religious group... ). The raw additions aside, I also liked the ideas that went into the scenarios - they are a lot more creative and unique than the original scenarios.
For all those people who cannot manage their curiosity, here is a short (and mostly spoiler-free) list of what is new in Absolute Power:
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
- extended tutorial, explaining some of the new features
- new 10-scenario campaign map
- 12 new buildings
- 10 new edicts
- one new faction: Loyalists
- new scoring points: megalomania
- one faction can be "profiled" -> dominant, especially active and militant
- roads start as dirt paths and "upgrade" if in an urbanized region
- 2 new character traits for the El Presidente Creator
- special negative events for when a faction hates you
- old and new faction demands, divided into major and minor demands
Feel free to comment or ask questions.
Last edited by Tankfriend; July 12, 2010 at 01:41 PM.
I was on the fence about this for a few reasons including that I don't play the game THAT much, but I do enjoy it, I didn't know how much this addon, well, added (and I never felt like finding reviews for it ).
I think, when I get the time and money I will buy it now, thanks dude
I bought Tropico 3 and this during the Steam sale. I just love it, especially in the way that Absolute Power's additions are featured in the classic campaign.
Nice review, +rep.
I played the original Tropico 3 and I adore it.
Too bad, in my country Absolute Power is not localized yet and I want it in my native language.
I think, when I get the time and money I will buy it now, thanks dude
It's only going to get cheaper from here on, you know...
Anyway, last time I checked up on the price, the German version of AP was available for around 18€ - compared to nowadays standard prices for new products (addons and DLC's included), it's pretty much dirt-cheap. Just how much are those mappacks for MW2, again?
Originally Posted by Verrückt
Nice review, +rep.
I played the original Tropico 3 and I adore it.
Too bad, in my country Absolute Power is not localized yet and I want it in my native language.
As was the case with Tropico 3 - one of the rare cases where a product is published on the German market first and foremost, and later adapted to other markets. I'm obviously quite pleased with that choice...
Last edited by Tankfriend; July 13, 2010 at 05:19 PM.
Trust me, my main city does not always look like that. It's quite a bit of cracking your head over how to rearrange a previously messy design of opportunity and need.
But here is my general take on the issue.
Spoiler Alert, click show to read:
It's actually quite simple to get a city like that in general, as long as you have the money for it. I usually "reserve" the space around the palace as the main (in most cases, only) residential area on the island. There normally is enough space available there, else I look for a wide-open space on the island that I will not need for other things like farms or mines. If you have a lot of beach terrain on your island but you know that you won't use tourism too much, that is the ideal terrain for a residential complex, because it normally is completely flat and you won't find any other uses for it, anyway.
When I've found my future residential area, I pre-plan the road and garage network (garages can be built when needed, but the roads should be built immediately; they're pretty cheap, afterall) in such a way that I have as few intersections as possible (they severely hamper traffic flow) while retaining the best possible access around the island. As a matter of fact, the screenshot I posted up there is a pretty good example of "bad" road constructing: All those mountain ranges forced me to rely on a very low number of roads into and out of the city, resulting in quite a bit of traffic problems here and there. But that was still the best position for the centralized living space model.
Anyway, once my basic traffic infrastructure is up and running, I reserve the space closest to the garages for building the most important service buildings (church/cathedral, clinic/hospital) to have the best vehicle access for those. Religious and medical services are always in high demand but don't take too much time per individual servicing, so traffic is pretty high around there. Educational buildings are important as well but don't have a constantly high traffic to them, so you can place them somewhere else. The rest basically comes down to "fill in the gaps" between the roads - build a combination of a load of high-capacity residential buildings, entertainment buildings, "advanced services" like the newspaper and then fill in any remaining gaps with eye candy. If you are up to some real planning, you can also design all of those buildings around complexes of eye candy as well.
If you lack the money to go through with the excessively expensive residential block building program that I did for that screen (which you will), you can build the cheaper and higher-capacity blocks first and gradually replace them later. The Soviet economic aid is pretty handy, reducing the price tag for both the residential blocks.
Another little tip if you lack the space or traffic capacity to cram all of your population into the main city: Build farm houses (if that is the name in the English version...; the house one quality level below the actual "house", in any case). They are cheap, fast to build, provide a good living quality and are smaller than the standard "house". Incidentally, they also perfectly fit into the gap that you normally have between farm crops and roads, they look similar in design to the farms and they don't count as "urban" buildings, keeping the roads in their dirt-road form. So for each farm, build 3 farm houses (a farm has 5 employees, a farm house can support 2 families; you're off by 1 family in the end but that slot will be filled by someone else for sure) and you are set with a decentralized living space concept. In fact, that's a highly effective method of decreasing the traffic load and space requirements for your main city (people live elsewhere and will only travel into the city for services) while not breaking with the rural look of your island's countryside. I usually use a combination of both methods for best effect.
In any case, all your planning is limited by your island's geography, so you have to make a compromise here and there to fit your city to the island. The same is true for the demands of your population, of course. The sample island from the screenshot, for example, was pretty hilly and rather uncomfortable to build a large and organized city on, but it worked out pretty well in the end - apart from the traffic problems, of course. But if you have a large and relatively flat island, it's pretty easy.
A few short tips:
- Use the rotate function to better fit your buildings into the environment. Rotating can sometimes enable you to build things where you could not without rotation.
- Use the model change function where available to create a larger variety in building looks. In case of farms, you might also be able to build one model of farm, but not the other. (there is a square and a rectangular variant)
- With the high-quality residential blocks, try to build them back to back (i.e. the non-balcony sides standing together) - it looks a bit better and appears to save a little bit of space as well.
- With eye candy, if you have a space that it appears to fit into but it doesn't, move it around slowly and carefully and try to look for a small little spot it does fit into. Also note that eye candy can sometimes be partially built unto the sidewalks of roads, probably because the model is a bit larger than the "building" itself.
Love your reviews, not to harsh(where it sounds like a junk game to play) and not to high on it(making a 2 out of 10 sound like a 5-6 out of 10)
Gonna get the add on today, should be fun, I view tourism like a challenge, they bring alot of more people, have to shell out alot of money for questionable returns. Those people go everywhere,(it seems like it) and put a strain on my city. But after the money is coming in boatloads thats the fun in late game. Trying to cope with tourism.
2010 ,2012,2014 World Series Champions: San Francisco Giants 1962, 1989, 2002
Sounds like you will love the Chupacabra scenario then. Lots of tourists and... other things around...
And you're quite right in that being successful with tourism is, in essence, a challenge, especially as it earns a lot less income than industry. But, as I said, it's improved a bit now with the new buildings and, possibly, a few bits and pieces here and there that causes them to fork out a bit more money now. That's the way it "feels", at least.
I bought it during the steam sale also, and was hopelessly addicted for 2 weeks.
ttt
Adopted son of Lord Sephiroth, Youngest sibling of Pent uP Rage, Prarara the Great, Nerwen Carnesîr, TB666 and, Boudicca. In the great Family of the Black Prince
Tropico 3: Absolute Power
Generally said, where T3 was very good already, AP adds more of the same quality for the new elements of the game.
) worth the buy. If you like Tropico 3 and want more of and to it, I can fully recommend getting the addon. Although it does not turn T3 into a perfect game (something that will probably never exist anyway), it does add a lot to make it that much better. Personally, I liked the things they added and how they added them, as most new things were designed entirely with the title of the addon in mind - you receive a lot more power over your population, but that power is necessary as well. And if you are not careful enough, a misuse (or misplanning) of your power could just make matters worse (like trying to ban that 250 member religious group...
). The raw additions aside, I also liked the ideas that went into the scenarios - they are a lot more creative and unique than the original scenarios.
).
Originally Posted by Nole4694
1962, 1989, 2002
