Is there a hard cap on how many tourists will actually visit your island? I hit about 100 and that's it. I have a tourist rating of 100 at all times, luxury hotels standing empty, plenty of attractions...

Also, I see people saying that they've built multiple tourist docks, but I don't see the point. I don't seem to get more tourists from having more docks.

Right now my island is at a population of right around 500, and it's just stuck unless I get started on exports, which I was trying to avoid for this one. Is this really the limit to tourism in this game?

I think there is perhaps a cap on the number of tourists that your island can have; I'm not sure what the limit is though; you will have the ask the developers I'm afraid.....

there are also a problem with some attractions which always seem to lose money, like the ferris wheel, the spa, the pool mostly
i tried lowering fees, making it higher, nothing works
i even tried making the ferris wheel free of charge but still it was empty most of the time
anyone else had this problem?
i dont think its possible to build an economy based on tourism alone.
which is too bad

No, the ferris wheel for me makes money. The usual suspects in tourism however don't, like you mehntioned, the pool, spa, etc. The zoo seems to make money but the casino doesn't for me.

I had read that the expansion pack dealt with this issue, however for me, many of the tourist buildings sit empty the vast majority of the time and simply lose money, but the ferris wheel doesn't seem to be one of them for me.

I'd love to see a saved game from somebody that managed to setup a pure tourism economy, with only enough of the non tourist stuff to sustain the workers for the tourist economy. It would be interesting to see if anybody has done that. I've never tried it myself.

I have to imagine that it would be a very small economy compared to the regular Tropico 3 economy that we create in the game.

(26-05-2010 02:00 PM)City Builder Wrote:  I'd love to see a saved game from somebody that managed to setup a pure tourism economy, with only enough of the non tourist stuff to sustain the workers for the tourist economy. It would be interesting to see if anybody has done that. I've never tried it myself.

I have to imagine that it would be a very small economy compared to the regular Tropico 3 economy that we create in the game.

I've tried this on multiple occasions, but in the end I basically found it untenable without at least the good old Logging Camp + Lumber Mill combination. The Slob Tourists you get early on simply don't have enough money to fuel an island's growth. You can make a sustaining situation with all of the cheap stuff; Motels, Beach Sites, Pubs, Restaurants, and Cabarets will satisfy Slobs just fine, but it's all a very fragile situation. I've never been able to make enough of a structural profit to support the leap from backwater tourist spot to luxury resort. The latter requires a backbone of educated workers to operate power plants and Urban Development banks, none of which make you money. This isn't such a big deal with an industrial economy, because you have great profits and the intermediate step of reliance on high schools. With a Tourism base you go straight from needing uneducated workers to a lot of college graduates.

(26-05-2010 02:00 PM)City Builder Wrote:  The usual suspects in tourism however don't, like you mehntioned, the pool, spa, etc. The zoo seems to make money but the casino doesn't for me.

I had read that the expansion pack dealt with this issue, however for me, many of the tourist buildings sit empty the vast majority of the time and simply lose money, but the ferris wheel doesn't seem to be one of them for me.

Oh. My. God.........The tourism issue STILL hasn't been resolved?!? The Tropico 3 community has been moaning about this issue for months! When on earth will it be fixed?!

The most succesful tourism island I've made so far had 1 Sky-scraper, 4 luxuries and 3 normal hotels. These were filled 80% of the time with the occational dips.
I had 2 more Luxury hotels at some point but really couldn't fill them regardless of how I tried to boost my tourism rating.
I don't know if its due to a solid cap, it might just be that I've reached the limit of tourists i can attract with my rating.

One thing that is bothering me is the way tourists move from attraction to attraction.
They arrive on the island, go check in to their accomodation and head out to their first attraction.
When they're done with the attraction they don't go for #2 straight away. Instead they walk about, mostly heading for a fixed spot near their hotel and then pick their second place to go to.
The troublesome thing is if, like me, you put your tourism resort area on one spot on the island and your main city for your Tropicans on another spot.
Tourists will travel from the tourism area to the city area to use the entertainment buildings, which your build for the tropicans, and then walk all the way back.
This little return trip wrecks or completely uses up their vacation time. Leaving you with a tourist that has visited only 2 or sometimes even just 1 building and then is out of time and leaves.

I'm trying to find ways to keep my tourists confined to just the tourism area.
Trying to get them to spend time in the attractions and entertainment buildings instead of hiking accross the island.
Building all my entertainment buildings in the tourism area is a bit drastic.
Maybe I should charge them for hiking accross the island instead, that'll be some nice income

You can make a profit using a tourism based economy, I happened to do so for the tourism based missions (I may have a save somewhere). Might be harder in Sandbox though. It is possible to make money using attractions such as the Pool.

I assume most people already know about tourists having preferences as to what they want to do on holiday. Last tourism mission I played I had every attraction making a tidy profit ($2,000+). Like Thunderclaw I built my tourism industry from the ground up using almost the same setup as he described in his reply. The difficult part can be improving your tourism industry to attract wealthier tourists while keeping the profits up.

I do not know if anyone else here gets the urge to build every tourist attraction on their island, but it can damage your tourism industry perhaps somewhat surprisingly. As you probably know Tourists only have a certain amount of money to spend on the island (not 100% sure if accommodation prices factors in to). You can quickly bleed a tourist dry with just one attraction if you aim to make a profit after paying upkeep and wages on the attraction.

The theory behind my latest successful tourism idea is to build only one attraction from each of the categories you can find when you select a tourist. To make money with the Pool you need tourists interested in the "Sports" category, and you must keep the Pool as the only "Sports" attraction until you can risk building another "Sports" attraction without having a detrimental effect on the visits to the Pool (which obviously means less income for the Pool).

Summary:
*Building higher quality accommodation can have a negative effect on existing accommodation. (Example: Building Hotels can drag tourists away from your Motels causing the Motels to lose income)

*Like micro-management? Keep track of the tourists coming to your island and cater to their interests. (Example: Tourists are less likely to use "Relaxation" attractions if they are not interested in the "Relaxation" category)

*At the start build only one attraction from each Interest category, exceptions may apply since pubs and restaurants can work if well planned. (Example: Tourists are interested in "Sports" so build a Pool or Sports Stadium. Building both can be a bad idea, one can leach off the other's visitors dragging both down in profits\income)

*Bringing as many tourists to your island as possible is the name of the game. The more tourists you have the more likely they are to be interested in visiting\using your existing attractions.

*Tourists are not interested in everything, usually they are only interested in a few things. (Example: Tourist A is interested in "Relaxation", "Sports", "Shopping")

*If you provide for the interests of your tourists they are more likely to enjoy their stay. (Example: A tourist with an interest in "Sports" with a weighting of 10 wants "Sports" attractions and will be more happy with their vacation if that requirement is catered to)

I hope that made some sense, and if I think of anything else I'll be sure to contribute to the discussion.

In most of my sandbox games so far, tourism took a while to get profitable, but it eventually worked. I don't think low end tourism is worth the trouble, so I usually go for high class stuff. I suck up the losses in the beginning, but after some point, night clubs, gourmet restaurants, the spa, the botanic garden work very well, all on the high end service settings. The scenic outlook is cheap and good for the occasional eco tourist. But yes, the bulk of the tourist income comes from the skyscraper hotel. With the attractions, I make sure they don't cannibalize each others' profits and don't overdo it. Building all attractions doesn't seem to work well.

(26-05-2010 03:46 PM)Sinned Wrote:  I'm trying to find ways to keep my tourists confined to just the tourism area.

I'm attempting the opposite on my most recent game, I'm trying to integrate them into the Tropican average joe city life. Other than the tourist dock, and a cheap motel, all my other tourist ammenities have been placed in the main urban city area since they have a tendancy to gravitate towards that anyway.

I read one person saying that the tourists won't use the hotels when they are placed in the city proper, however for me that doesn't seem to be the case, the 3 hotels that I have next to the palace are always full everytime that I check them. The skyrise hotel, yacht club and botanical garden started out being just on the outskirts of the city proper however with city growth it too became integrated into the city itself and still the high rise hotel is full everytime that I check it.

It still doesn't matter that the ammenities like the pool, spa, etc are all placed in the darkest green available in and around the city, the tourists just avoid them like the plague other than the usual ammenities that have always attracted the tourists to them still.

But it actually works out okay and I suppose I could simply stop placing those tourist ammenities that they refuse to visit, other than I think they might affect tourist ratings so if they are not there regardless that they sit empty, tourist ratings might just plummit to the bottom for all I know.

From memory only, buildings that have always worked and still work with AP:
Botanical Gardens
Enclave (to some degree)
Gourmet restaurant
pub
nightclub
restaurant (to some degree)
Zoo

and now
same as above plus
Ferris wheel
Marina (to some degree)

That's from memory though and my memory has a tendancy to sometimes have faults in it.

You could offer improved transport to your entertainment buildings via roads and garages. But you do not have to move all your entertainment buildings to your tourism district(s). In all likelihood you may have to build a second entertainment district in your tourism district(s) that satisfies the needs\interests of your tourists. From my observations quite a few tourists can be highly interested in "Eating Out" and "Drinking". Which means that interested tourists will likely visit those buildings first, second or third (depending on if it has a star besides it and the weighting of it, or so I believe at the moment). Luckily as far as "Eating Out" and "Drinking" are concerned those interests can be satisfied with a pub and restaurant (Regular or Gourmet).

Photographic proof that the Pool can make money, lifetime profit of $15,379:

(26-05-2010 05:06 PM)City Builder Wrote:  From memory only, buildings that have always worked and still work with AP:
Botanical Gardens
Enclave (to some degree)
Gourmet restaurant
pub
nightclub
restaurant (to some degree)
Zoo

I find that if you build a couple of sports stadiums with the 'let the taps flow' option enabled, and the fee set at 10 or 12 dollars, then the money will pour in from both the tourists and upper class tropicans. The sports stadiums can be the most lucrative source of revenue on a tourism-based island.

(26-05-2010 05:45 PM)BlackXcalibur Wrote:  I find that if you build a couple of sports stadiums with the 'let the taps flow' option enabled, and the fee set at 10 or 12 dollars, then the money will pour in from both the tourists and upper class tropicans. The sports stadiums can be the most lucrative source of revenue on a tourism-based island.

"let the taps flow" is even better if you've outlawed the religious faction (which eliminates the downside).

(26-05-2010 06:35 PM)ThunderClaw Wrote:  

(26-05-2010 05:45 PM)BlackXcalibur Wrote:  I find that if you build a couple of sports stadiums with the 'let the taps flow' option enabled, and the fee set at 10 or 12 dollars, then the money will pour in from both the tourists and upper class tropicans. The sports stadiums can be the most lucrative source of revenue on a tourism-based island.

"let the taps flow" is even better if you've outlawed the religious faction (which eliminates the downside).

I can't outlaw the religious faction, because Absolute Power hasn't been released in the U.K. yet!

i hate tourism because it never works the way it should.

period.

although it is a tiny bit better with AP -

(27-05-2010 08:36 AM)xflashx Wrote:  i hate tourism because it never works the way it should.

period.

although it is a tiny bit better with AP -

That is true, the tourism system is only marginally better with Absolute Power, because the main problem of tourists not visiting attractions still hasn't been fixed........

Well thats it for me. Im not buying the exp until you actually can make a tourist based economy. I have never ever haved more then 90tourist visiting my island and if you cant get more then you wont never make a huge profit of entertaiment and attraction.

Please read this Thred; This was from the vanilla tropico.

http://forum.kalypsomedia.com/showthread...4#pid40354

It's ridiculously easy to keep the tourism rating pegged at 100 just by using the occasional edict, but it doesn't do any good. Also, has anyone else noticed that there's no real need for an airport in AP? I'm getting as many tourists with the port as I was before with both, but there still seems to be some sort of soft cap.

(28-05-2010 06:47 PM)bmtphoenix Wrote:  Also, has anyone else noticed that there's no real need for an airport in AP?

I've generally decided to get rid of the damn thing too.

Hey Guys

http://forum.kalypsomedia.com/showthread.php?tid=5039

I made a post that gives a little bit of an idea how to give you guys more money when trying to muck around with depending on tourism as your main source of revenue.

Hope it helps you guys a little bit more with your tourism problem.

Respect
ElCuong

(22-06-2010 03:03 PM)Sent by Royalty Wrote:  Hope it helps you guys a little bit more with your tourism problem.

This does not really address the problems people are reporting. Even with your fully realized tourism industry that you show, you are still pulling in 42k profit per year, in 1998. The problem here is that a two canneries can produce that with only a coffee farm to support it, requiring much less space, headache, handling, support, while also being available much sooner to boot. The tourism industry, as it stands now, doesn't even hold a candle to the most basic of industry moves. A lumber mill alone can out-earn a luxury hotel or a cluster of 5 beach villas easily with a proper supply line - and forget them keeping up with something higher class, like an oil refinery, furniture factory, cannery with flash-freezer, jewelry factory, or, god forbid, rum distillery with flavoring machinery (even without Booze Baron activated). The 100 tourist cap with the relatively fixed (and shockingly low) spending limits that even high class tourists have makes tourism pointless when you compare it to industry. Yes, you could have a skyscraper hotel, luxury hotels near it, beach villas, and lots of well-staffed attractions...

..or you could just plant a coffee farm, build a cannery, and install a flash-freezer. Maybe build a Teamster office specially for the pair. Oh, and maybe throw a fisherman's wharf down nearby to make sure there's a constant supply of things to do. You know, if you wanted to. Just options.

(22-06-2010 03:03 PM)Sent by Royalty Wrote:  Hey Guys

http://forum.kalypsomedia.com/showthread.php?tid=5039

I made a post that gives a little bit of an idea how to give you guys more money when trying to muck around with depending on tourism as your main source of revenue.

Hope it helps you guys a little bit more with your tourism problem.

Respect
ElCuong

The main problem with Tourism isn't the overall profit it is making - it is just the fact that attractions are bugged (don't get used by tourists even if you set the fee to 0$)

(26-06-2010 09:11 AM)Rebel-Yell Wrote:  The main problem with Tourism isn't the overall profit it is making - it is just the fact that attractions are bugged (don't get used by tourists even if you set the fee to 0$)

Bugged or not, putting the fee at $0 would be pointless since the tropicans and tourists arn't programmed to care what price the attraction is so long as they can afford it. The tourists have a spending limit of $30 and you have two resturants but one has a fee of $30 and the other is $0 they will still always choose the one with the higher service rating even if its the $30 one, (inless of course its full).

(26-06-2010 01:45 PM)Vimpster Wrote:  Bugged or not, putting the fee at $0 would be pointless since the tropicans and tourists arn't programmed to care what price the attraction is so long as they can afford it. The tourists have a spending limit of $30 and you have two resturants but one has a fee of $30 and the other is $0 they will still always choose the one with the higher service rating even if its the $30 one, (inless of course its full).

I'm aware that 0$ doesn't make an attraction more interesting then 30$ for someone who can afford to pay 30$. Charging 0$ fee is just the best way to ensure that no one is hindered by too high fees to use a building. My point is that tourists for some reason prefer the places your Tropicans go over the pure tourist attractions and they seem to do that regardless of the prices you charge or the SQ those buildings offer.

(26-06-2010 07:47 PM)Rebel-Yell Wrote:  

(26-06-2010 01:45 PM)Vimpster Wrote:  Bugged or not, putting the fee at $0 would be pointless since the tropicans and tourists arn't programmed to care what price the attraction is so long as they can afford it. The tourists have a spending limit of $30 and you have two resturants but one has a fee of $30 and the other is $0 they will still always choose the one with the higher service rating even if its the $30 one, (inless of course its full).

I'm aware that 0$ doesn't make an attraction more interesting then 30$ for someone who can afford to pay 30$. Charging 0$ fee is just the best way to ensure that no one is hindered by too high fees to use a building. My point is that tourists for some reason prefer the places your Tropicans go over the pure tourist attractions and they seem to do that regardless of the prices you charge or the SQ those buildings offer.

I see. I obviously missunderstood. As for them prefering the tropicans entertainment buildings over the tourist attractions, I can't say I have noticed this myself. I do deffinitly see them use tourist attractions such as the beach, the pool, the scenic outlook and others. But it is possible that they go to the tropican entertainment places more often. I'll try to keep a closer look at that. I suppose one explanation would be the fact that many of the entertainment types that are sought by the tourists, such as eating out, drinking, gambeling and cabarets can't be satisfyed by any of the tourist only attractions, which seem to only focus on relaxing and sight seeing and such.

(26-05-2010 02:00 PM)City Builder Wrote:  I'd love to see a saved game from somebody that managed to setup a pure tourism economy, with only enough of the non tourist stuff to sustain the workers for the tourist economy. It would be interesting to see if anybody has done that. I've never tried it myself.

Does no industry other than a single cigar factory count? I tried going full toursist with nothing, but i found it took way to long to get my island needs. Just a single cigar factory gave me enough money to grow basic needs like hospitoll, radio station, schools, appartments and the like. i also had 2 corn farms and 2 cattle ranches to feed the population.

By the end of the game, well about 1985, it was the get 600 tourists to your island senaroi and thats about where i did it. I had almost 300 people, and 200-300k in the bank and it was growing every year., I even had 2 banks set to swiss bank, id of probably had half a mill banked by 2000 if i had kept going..

i dont have a save, so you will just have to take my word.. But i plan on replaying the senario again. it was accually one of the more enjoyable ones i played.

I NEVER ever even build attraction's except what I need to keep my tourism rating high. This is mainly done through edict though.

Your money come from hotels! Build many many hotels.

The beach one, can't remember what their called. It doesn't matter what the tourists do on your island as long as their there. ALL your money comes from the hotels.

Build a hundred.. Build a thousand and as long as you set El Presedente's traits as pro tourism (Hotel Corporate Buyout, Well Traveled Etc.) then the tourists will come. I can ALWAYS fill EVERY hotel on my island no matter how many I have.

I only have like 3 attractions (counting pub/resturant) and I make 50,000+ off tourism easy.

Best I have ever made was 100,000 a year off tourism

But my tourist island usally also have some industry or other just to get it started and get the Tropicans educated and into houses