I decided to jumble tonight up a little, play a game – then work!

Anyway, my game of choice was Tropico 3, I’ve always been a fan of city building games, but never had a chance to try out any of the Tropico series, so why not dive straight in with the latest installment??

Well what can I say about it, it’s GREAT. The missions are actually really fun, complete the first mission (which is challenging enough!) and unlock 3 more, complete them, unlock more – etc. etc. The gameplay’s simple in essence yet rather challening at the core… The first mission’s kindof a breeze compared to the rest, what with rebellions, power management, the US threatening you, your armies rebelling, people sending lots of inhabitants your way and having to cope with housing.

If you think this game’s anything like your normal city builder where you can setup a power grid, road network and residential/industrial zones – you would be wrong. Sim City has the occassional natural disaster, sure, but in Tropico 3, it’s constant pounding of events that are happening at random intervals. Anything from expeditions that go missing and force you to make a choice of what to do to keep relations with the US/USSR, to the random creation of rebels just because they’re not happy with a few things.

I actually found it pretty hard to be able to keep a stable balance between the island’s main revenue, wages, tax, rent, charges in bars etc etc that kept everything in order and kept some money in the treasury. All in all it’s quite a complex game but with very fun gameplay, and I can’t stress that enough.

If you like city builders, stategy games and games that make you think slightly beyond those 2 combined – Tropico 3 is the game for you.

I’ll give it a 4.5/5 stars (not that I plan on reviewing many more games..) and recommend that you get it when it’s released