How to make tourism profitable in Tropico 4?

Question

I'm trying to make a living off of tourism (I just want to try it) yet every time I do, the same thing happens. I start off small with 1 tourist dock, about 4 hotels and several attractions. I scale everything up a bit (I reach 3 docks and about a dozen hotels) and I end up making a profit of 50.000$ which is good at the very start, quite very good, but I still need to scale up.

I get to the point where I have 9 docks and an airport and I still can't fill 20 hotels (whereas just a few in-game years ago I filled 12 from 3 docks). I just can't get more people to come to my island, now I make 75.000$ income but I spend 100.000$.

Crime is low, pollution is low, there are enough attractions and my tourism rating is just over 100. What could I possibly be doing wrong ? I just don't get it.

Asked by Kalec

Answer

Making money from tourism is a real pain in the game. You are better of making industry, however if you really want to do it (for an achievement or the campaign or perhaps just a bit of fun?) there are a few tips I could give you.

• IMPORTANT, before starting up any tourism, make sure you citizens are happy and you are earning a bit of money from industry or such. Without happy citizens, they can't be happy while serving tourists.

• Focus on ONE or TWO types of tourists, do not try to please all of them, it will only ruin everything (from my own experience).

• Make sure you place everything near each other, once you get an airport you do not want it to be on the other side of the island (I assume this would make sense?)

• It helps to have your workers not to far off, or if they are a bit off always have garages so they can get to their work in the hotels fast.

• Try to mess around with the costs of your hotels/entertainment structures. Are there no tourists there? Either they can't get there easy enough (garages, or lack of airport(s)/dock(s)), or it might simply be to expensive.

• Make sure you have fully staffed buildings, no staff means that they tourists can't stay there!

• Do not cut on costs for maintenance.

• Only build new hotels/attractions if those you have right now are pretty much filled up, you do not want to waste money on something that's not required!

• In the end, it's still a bad idea to do tourism if you really want to earn a lot of money in the game. Industry simply beats everything else.

Something to note you might not know about: the entertainment buildings that help both the tropico's and you have a rather strange system. The tourists will actually pay 3x more then the price it would cost your tropican's.

Answered by Ruddie

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Tropico 4 : are garages as huge/unwieldy as they were in Tropico 3?

Question

Despite doing my best with garage and traffic layout in Tropico 3, I very often hit the problem of insufficient space to place a garage in a place where it would have been useful. The garages were very large buildings in comparison to most other buildings. My considered opinion was that garages in Tropico 3 were just too big.

I'm now considering buying Tropico 4, but before I do, I would like to know whether garages in Tropico 4 are just as large/unwieldy?

Answer

I have had no trouble placing my garages. Granted, I never played Tropico 3, but I do not consider the garages in Tropico 4 to be abnormally large.

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Which buildings utilize mined resources?

Question

Can someone give a brief overview which resources can be processed into by which industry building?

I know for example that you can make jewels out of gold in the jewel factory, but what can you do with iron or salt?

Are there resources that are only good for exporting? Which resources are there that you can only get by import?

Answer

• Bauxite has no use aside from exporting as far as I've seen.
• Canneries turn coffee, fish, and pineapple into canned versions of those products.
• Cigar factories turn tobacco into cigars.
• Jewelry Factories convert gold into Jewelry and Fine Jewelry.
• Lumber Mills can convert logs into lumber. Furniture shops can turn lumber into furniture.
• Oil Refineries convert crude oil into refined oil.
• Rum Distilleries convert sugar into rum and spiced rum.
• Salt cannot be refined, but having a salt mine boosts the production of canneries and ranches.
• Weapons Factories convert iron into weapons.

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Environmentalists are annoying me, how can I silence them?

Question

I haven't been very environment-friendly and now the environmentalists are on my heels. My reputation with them is very low, especially because I cut some trees and dug for gold.

What's the best way to get back on their good side?

I tried recycling and putting up some gardens, but that doesn't really seem to be enough to make them like me again.

Are there any tricks to make environmentalists happy while still making a profit with the earth's natural resources?

Answer

Planting trees, building botanical gardens and issuing anti-pollution edicts helps.

Make sure all your applicable industries have pollution-reducing options enabled; build a garbage dump somewhere out of sight of the city but within operating reach, and have it recycle and use high temperature burners.

Praise the environmentalists during your speeches - it's a +10 bonus that doesn't cost you anything.

Try not to bulldoze areas of high natural beauty for industry sites.

Keep an eye out for subtasks from their faction; they may not always be things you /want/ to do, but it's worth hearing them out to see what they want.

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Is there a time limit to campaign levels?

Question

So far I've always managed to complete the objectives for the campaign levels, and I know there are various conditions that trigger a loss (losing an election, coup, having your palace destroyed). But what happens if I just keep playing a level without either of these things happening? Do I eventually run out of time to complete the level and have to start over from the beginning?

Answer

There is no time limit. This guy seems to agree with my own testing.

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How do I identify criminals?

Question

The "War on Crime" achievement in Tropico 4 instructs the player to arrest 10 criminals in a single mission. I figured there would be a list of criminals in the almanac, but no such luck. How do I identify a citizen as a criminal so I can arrest the correct people?

Answer

bwarner's answer tipped me off to where to look. Since criminals have "Criminal" listed as their occupation, you can find a list of them in the Residents - Job listing in the almanac under 'Criminals':

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How do I upgrade my palace?

Question

I have the "Palace Magnifique" task which requires me to purchase all palace upgrades. When I click on my palace, however, I see no upgrade button. How do I complete this task?

Answer

As it turns out, I'm not supposed to upgrade the building. I'm supposed to purchase amenities for the palace. Any building with extra amenities has icons in its manage panel that can be found on the bottom of the box:

Simply clicking the icon purchases the upgrade, provided you meet the requirements and have the cash.

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In Tropico 4, is there a way to tell a citizen where to live?

Question

One occasionally irritating problem in Tropico 4 (and 3, looking back on it) is that there seems to be no way to control who goes to live in which home; more often than not it's first-come-first serve -- and no matter that the apartment building I just put up right next to the garage by the fisheries is a much nicer place to live, three of the fishermen will stay in the tenement five miles down the road near the city center.

Is there any way to change that short of forcible evictions (causes unhappiness) or dynamiting the tenements?

Answer

No, you may be a dictator, but some decisions still belong to the citizens. In the real world, there are plenty of things that influence where someone lives other than convenience. Given time and a nice enough alternative, they may eventually move, but not without some resulting stress (unhappiness).

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Is it effective to have my opponent arrested?

Question

Some pesky citizens have started talking about elections, and many of them have already declared their intent to vote for a specific citizen rather than me. Luckily, my prison still has some space available...

Since the elections haven't started yet, would it be beneficial to have the citizen that is planning to run against me arrested? Can he still run while in jail? If not, will whoever replaces him have the same support, or will it potentially decrease due to the imprisonment and potentially having a candidate that is not as good of a match for the opposition's ideals?

Answer

Actually, it's the opposite of what you're thinking. If you arrest an opponent either before or in the elections, someone else would take his place with increased support, and the same ideals. As well, everyone who watched the arrest, and his/hers family will have decreased respect for you, meaning it will be more likely for them to vote against you. So it's not really beneficial to arrest anyone who's willing to go against you in the elections.

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How do I export goods if there's a factory consuming them?

Question

I have a few missions that need me to export pineapples and fish, but I have a cannery that takes them in to produced canned food. How do I fulfill those requests?

Answer

Well I don't know how I would prove that it was the raw resource not the processed resource being exported if I tried to outpace the factory, so I'll just suggest the most obvious solution.

Shut down the factory. It may be painful, but you should be able to shift income to other exports for a while.

As you can see, the factory has produced nothing in at least 1 year, and I'm still successfully exporting Tobacco. $11,822 worth, to be exact.

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What constitutes luxury goods?

Question

I just received an objective stating to export 500 luxury goods. However, it didn't say which of the many things I'm exporting are luxury goods (apparently none).

What constitutes luxury goods?

Answer

Luxury Goods is it's own resource. It is imported by default, but I'm not sure why since I think that it has to be sold at the mall which will then make your citizens happier. The only way to obtain Luxury Goods is to import it from China; it's impossible to produce or export, so I believe that the objective actually states to import it. (i.e. Build a mall.)

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Tropico 4: How do you level up character traits?

Question

How are traits leveled up for the Competent, Specialist, and Expert achievements?

Answer

According to the manual

All traits start at level 1 and may be improved up to level 5 by successfully completing missions and scenarios using these traits. Improving a trait either increases a positive effect granted by the trait or decreases a negative effect 10 imposed by the trait. Trait level is saved automatically. Traits can never go down a level.

So it sounds like the key is to use each trait during a successful game.

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Where can I find the manual for a Steam install of Tropico 4?

Question

I'm one of those weird people that likes to read the manual for games to see if there are features that I'm missing or don't understand. But I haven't been able to locate the manual for Tropico 4 anywhere on my machine, nor does there seem to be a link to it from the Steam store page. Is there any way for someone with a Steam install to read the manual?

Answer

There should be a "View player manual" button as you right click the game, in your steam library. And also a link to it in the game info tab, when you left click the game.

Note: as I don't have the game myself (yet). I can't give you a print screen of the game itself, but it should be in the same place.

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What happens when I connect Tropico 4 with my Facebook and Twitter accounts?

Question

There's a setting in the options panel that allows me to connect my Facebook and Twitter accounts with the game. I assume this will allow you to post about your achievements in-game. Is this correct? Does this unlock any other functionality that might be useful to gameplay?

Answer

It allows you to share short text blurbs about achievements, mission completions and some in-game events (e.g. elections) to Twitter and Facebook, and also post screenshots to Facebook.

(Note that we never auto-post; Facebook/twitter buttons appear on some dialogs, and you have to click them to post.)

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What difference does it make who my ministers are?

Question

After building a ministry, I'm allowed to pick who I want to take the various ministry positions. Each candidate has three attributes listed, with a ranking from terrible to excellent (or something like that).

What difference does my choice make? Are certain edicts more or less effective based on the attributes of the corresponding minister? There doesn't seem to be any feedback.

Answer

According to the manual:

Depending on their Leadership, Courage and Intelligence attributes, your Ministers may generate positive or negative events. A competent Minister will make your life easier while an incompetent one will force you to fire him or suffer the the consequences of his mistakes.

The in-game description of the Council of Ministers lines up with this too:

If your ministers are stupid, cowardly and all-around bad leaders, expect many gaffes, which will brighten the day of Tropico News Today.

In other words, it's more likely that ministers with higher stats will give foreign leaders impromptu rock concerts, save up for free buildings, and kill entire gangs, yielding nice bonuses; while it's more likely that ministers with lower stats will end up flying their laundry on flag poles, calling Europe a US state, and attacking foreign leaders with forks, resulting in negative effects unless you fire them.

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What happens if I blame The Powers That Be?

Question

Near the end of second scenario, "It's All Mine!", I tried to rescue those trapped by the earthquake with the Chinese drill, but the faulty drill blew up. Then I had to choose someone to blame for it. One of the options was "Blame The Powers That Be", but it didn't say what will happen if I pick that. I was intrigued by it, but scared what might happen to me. What could've happened?

Answer

I tried it tonight, and it didn't seem to have any direct effect (Maybe it's random?). However, the Chinese were very happy that I didn't blame them, and I got something like a +50 boost from them.

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Where do I mine salt?

Question

I just told CEO Keith Preston that I would export salt to him. One problem though, there don't seem to be any salt deposits. Iron, Bauxite, Gold, but no salt. Do I just mine salt anywhere?

Answer

There are salt deposits, you can only place salt mines on salt deposits. When you choose to build a salt mine (note that they are a different building from normal mines), the map will highlight the potential locations. If you do not have any, then you cannot complete the quest. See the picture for an example.

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How do I control exports?

Question

In the first scenario, I accepted an assignment from one of the factions to export some Tobacco. Everything I find and click gives me an option to import stuff, but how do I export? Is that managed automatically?

Answer

Yes, as long as you have a tobacco farm, when the tobacco is harvested and there's no cigar factory, it will automatically be hauled to the dock.

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What do these faction modifiers do?

Question

I understand that depending on how satisfied a faction is with your rule, they will grant special benefits or penalties. However, I don't understand these:

What do these modifiers mean?

Answer

In Tropico, any of the various leader characters you can play as have an individual list of perks and faction modifiers (which present various benefits).

Basically, this lets you know that Religious Tropicans inherently dislike leaders with the "Man of the People" or "Alcoholic" trait, and inherently like leaders who are "Charismatic". t

This way you can play to your leader's strengths, focusing on either the factions who inherently dislike you (so that more people like you overall) or focusing on those already friendly to you (so that they like you so much, it doesn't matter what the Religious Tropicans think!).

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What's the white grid thing in the upper-left?

Question

I've only noticed it over my logging camp and police station, but it could be over others. I can't figure out what it means.

I haven't noticed it changing any, but I haven't paid much attention to it. Does it have some meaning that I'm not getting?

Answer

That just means that currently there's an overlay of some kind that is active, for instance, if you go to the overlays menu on the bottom left and click on any of them, the graphic will change into that. The reason why its active when you click on logging camp and police station is because for the logging camp, the wood overlay is showing (telling you where is a good spot to place it) and the police overlay shows the crime rate.

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