Dictator political game

Dictator
(1983, United Kingdom)

Language: English

Dictator is a small political game developed in 1983 that were so successful that later gave the basic concept the whole genre of the games and up to this day it is still used as a model for new production.

The plot is limited to absolute minimum, so we don’t actually know how we became the dictator or any details about our country, but from day one we are put in the tight spot between our welfare and the welfare of our country. There are 8 social / political groups that we have to deal with: army, peasants, landowners, guerillas, Leftotans, secret police, Russians and Americans. Each group has popularity factor (how popular we are among them as voters) and the strength factor, because each of those groups can simply destroy our dictatorship government within one day if it will have enough strength.

And how we are dealing with them? Simply - by making decisions that are vital for them, but usually they are also vital for other, but with completely different effect. For example if we will give minimum wage to workers this will please the peasants, but will make landowners angry, if we give landowners the right to form their own security forces it will please them, but make army angry, because they will not be in total control, etc. But that’s just the political side, there is of course the economy to take care of - we have the country budget available and we have to deal with investments on one side and putting something aside for ourselves on the other (in case the nation will want to get rid of us). And also there is the secret police force that is the last border between nation and their beloved leader... so they can’t kill him.

As I said before Dictator is a very simple game, but at the same time in minimum available options it is complexed and rather tough. If you take a look at the current similar games (f.e. Tropico) it is not not only based on the same concept, it is more or less the exact copy of of Dictator rules.

Our rating

6.4 / 10

Overall rating

8 / 10

Realism

2 / 5

Story

2 / 5

Complexity

4 / 5