Tropico is a fictional state, but one who shares many similarities with real countries from the Latin America, enough to add a special flavor to the game. It comes as no surprise that the designated leaders for your emerging democracy, are prominent figures who shaped the course of history in the last decades. You can either choose one of these characters as El Presidente or create your own custom leader, to fit your most rigorous standards.

Either way, you'll be stuck with a character who's  pluses and minuses are well balanced and their impact on the actual gameplay weights heavily. A charismatic leader will be more successful in detaining his position and win elections, even if his gambling problems and alcohol appetite are hurting the treasury badly. On the other hand a self made man or a president with an agricultural background will win the hearts of farmers and workers, but will always be derided by intellectuals.

Once you decide what kind of ruler you intend to become, the real test begins and let me just say that the tutorial is not going to clarify your mission. The set of instructions included in the short briefing, revolves more around building placement and camera handling instead of teaching you how to maximize profits and avoid bankruptcy. Useful as these information might be, the key elements that will grant success in Tropico 3 remain untouched, and the only way to learn them is by a trial and error process.

Like any respectable city simulator, this title focuses on developing a prosperous economy and the main tool for achieving this is trade. Raw materials such as tobacco, coffee, lumber or iron are good enough to bring profit in the early stages, but these goods can only carry you that far and exports must be gradually refined. Constructing cigar and furniture factory or jewelry industrial units to process the  minerals extracted from the lucrative mines is paramount, since they help you keep a constant flow of cash during late game.

Bankruptcy is lurking behind every corner, but is harder to avoid in the first months of your reign, because crops need a long time to grow, so it will take a while before the first harvest. Meanwhile you can't divert too many funds to industry because the people will starve in the absence of farms, so sooner your later the initial funds will run out. This is in fact the point where Tropico 3  starts to shine and the elements that set it apart from regular city simulators kick in.