Tropico is a mix of Civilization, Dungeon Keeper, and Sim City. You are the dictator of an island nation and you control pretty much everything. Like Civ, its strength is a large collection of interconnected systems and mechanics with various, valid methods of achieving the goals it puts before you. You will balance world politics – for example, do we support the nuclear research in Iran? It will lose points with the USA/EU, but it will get us favour with Russia and Asia. Your gut may say condemn it but your thriving pineapple export business with China and Japan says you REALLY want them to continue buying pineapples from you. It’s a game that offers many short term, long term choices, and dilemmas are plentiful.
It makes everything about politics and business feel slimy, sleazy, and corrupt. It’s a game that will make the most green, environmentally conscious person scream “Ugh, stupid environmentalists, what now?” It makes gameplay out of breaking election promises.
And finally, it’s one of the few games where you can look up in the middle of a session and be startled that hours have passed, its dark now and you haven’t had lunch yet, let alone dinner.