Nearly there! Its been a lot of work, but finally Tropico 6 is ready for release on March 29, 2019. As owner and CEO of Kalypso Media, the hugely positive feedback from the Tropico community has been truly overwhelming for me, and I can promise you that everyone on Team Tropico will keep working hard all the way to launch and beyond in order to incorporate and realize as many of your requests as possible. Since the start of the beta last fall, weve already implemented a lot of the features and improvements youve been looking for into the game, and as a fan of El Presidente, I must say that I now consider Tropico 6 to be the best and most comprehensive game in the series. Along with the island archipelagos, world wonders, bridges and tunnels and new transport options planned from the very beginning, we have been really focusing on player feedback, improving and adding features like more extensive tool tips, better balancing, expanded hotkey and keybinding options, a completely redesigned trading menu, warfare and additional content (such as maps, buildings and edicts) over recent months. For a sandbox player like me, these quality-of-life improvements make it so much easier to build a large Caribbean state on several islands and I can even adapt the maximum population density to my hardware setup. Im continually amazed at just how complex Tropico 6 is. Every single citizen is individually simulated, and it requires a high degree of technical know-how to program the artificial intelligence behind this so that it runs smoothly on standard computers with average processors and graphics cards. I would like to give a quick shout out at this point to our partners at Intel, AMD and Nvidia, who have supported us greatly during development. But, we also have to be honest. Even though we think the game has now become very good, we will not be able to consider every single suggestion and wish before release. Weve already developed a long-term plan beyond the initial release to add new features to make Tropico 6 even better. Especially in multiplayer mode there will be many improvements like lobbies, savegames and an expanded diplomacy system. We are also working on improving the RMG map editor for endless sandbox map creation and more variety (e.g. volcanos). In addition, we are developing an in-game map editor to support user-built maps. An extended bus-route system and improved superpower options are also planned, along with many other small improvements.
One thing we unfortunately wont be able to deliver at release on March 29th is a 100% working version for Mac OS. During performance tests, we noticed that the game doesnt run smoothly enough on a few older Macs. Since I play Tropico 6 on an older MacBook Pro myself (and it does run), I have now insisted that we provide a preview version for Mac OS with all the features of the full game on Steam on launch day with the full version available soon for the Mac App Store as well. I know its not perfect, and we promised a simultaneous release on PC and Mac, but it wouldnt be fair to deliver the current version as the final Tropico 6 on Mac if it doesnt work or suffers from poor performance on a few systems, especially if they meet our specified system requirements. In just a few days, you can see our new vision of Tropico for yourself. Were all very excited but we also know that we will continue to work on the game to make it perfect. Please dont hesitate to send us your feedback and suggestions, we listen to each and every one. We wish you lots of fun on your (mis)adventures in Tropico 6, and hope you will continue to support us (and El Presidente) on our journey! Yours sincerely and thankfully, Simon Hellwig Owner and Managing Director of Kalypso Media Group