Unfortunately, I didn't read the compatibility notice* prior to purchasing Tropico 3 Gold Edition and I would love for the game to work with my NVIDIA GeForce 610M.

If someone is aware of a possible workaround and would be so kind as to refer me to or provide me with a useful guide I would greatly appreciate it.

*Compatibility notice: Integrated nVidia GeForce 6-series video devices (eg. 6150 SE on nForce 430) do not meet this game's minimum requirements.

Does it suffer from bad performance or doesn't it start at all?

From this thread - http://forum.kalypsomedia.com/showthread.php?tid=2683

In the Options>Visual
1- Turn down the resolution. A high res. can be a major hit to graphics processing.
2- Turn Vsync to ON. It may work as an FPS limiter and reduce the stress on those graphics chips.

Also, it may helps to have more RAM.

Thanks a lot for the replies guys. I'm sorry about the blatant lack of information. The thing is the game doesn't start at all. Instead the screen just goes black for a second before displaying the following error message:
You need a supported DX9-compatible video card with a recent driver to play this game. Check our web site for a list of supported chipsets.
Furthermore, my desktop becomes unresponsive (showing the blue circle of eternal stagnation) and I'm forced to restart the PC.

Sweet, that did the trick! Thank you so much for your help and thorough guidance DeMignon! It was indeed necessary for me to delete that file in order for the game to run but now that the file has been recreated (and not deleted) the game runs without a problem.

So far I haven't had to change the desktop resolution (1366x768).

I have one more question though (probably a silly one but here goes...): are there any security issues I should be aware of when using the DirectX end-user redistributable?
I'm asking because it looks like it's no longer supported.

You're welcome, Lemon_Curry! I'm glad it worked. As for your question about security issues with DirectX 9, I'd say it's safe. DirectX 9 has had only a few vulnerabilities, but they got patched before and with the release that's downloadable now (the 2010 end-user redistributable). Most of it's content is still installed with the newest DirectX versions, but only a few deprecated libraries are missing. Not because they're unsafe, but Microsoft wants to push their newer solutions. That's why a lot of users have to install the old libraries to be able to run older games. There's no security issue that I know of and e.g. it's also considered safe by Secunia who are specialized on tracking vulnerabilities.

Thank you for the reassuring information as well as the explanation. So it's all thanks to the good old business practice of forced upgrade... can't say I'm surprised. Cool, I've never used their site although I'm familiar with the company. I just checked to see what it says about DirectX 9:
http://secunia.com/advisories/product/1915/?task=statistics_2014
I do trust you but would like to ask how you determine whether Secunia deems it safe. Do you simply consider the overall status as indicated by the percentage of unpatched vulnerabilities combined with the 'Moderately critical' status of the most severe one or is there a lot more to it?

Once again thanks a lot for all your most valuable assistance DeMignon.

Secunia simple doesn't show any vulnerabilities on my setup, including the old DirectX 9 components. The only thing that isn't patched with older DirectX is the DirectPlay component, which is vulnerable against DOS attacks. That isn't a big issue, as it only affects online gaming and only if the old DirectPlay component is actually used by the game. Often this isn't even the library installed on your system, but one that comes exclusively with the game (within the game's folder), no matter which DirectX you've got installed. Hence abstaining from DirectX 9 wouldn't help at all in that case. A DOS attack is simply a way of flooding your PC with network packets, to keep it occupied. If there are enough of these special packets it could cause the loss of your network connection, delays or freezes etc. But generally it's not very dangerous. Keep in mind, that the attacker has to send all the packets somehow, so either his computer is pretty occupied too or he has to use more, e.g. kidnapped PCs or pay for such "services" in the dark web. It's all in all rather cumbersome to just freeze someone's PC. The attacker also needs your IP address, has to know that you're using this special old library at the moment and maybe even have to circumvent other protective mechanisms of your router, firewall and Windows, short, he has to be somewhere close to the game you're playing, e.g. publicly hosted multi-player games using the old library and also has to put quite some effort into it. I don't even know which games could be affected, because it's not a very relevant threat. Still, you're right in digging deeper, it's a little glitch. There are also rumors about an unpatched vulnerability in all DirectX versions (9 to 11) that allows remote code execution, which would be far more dangerous. Anyway, it's rumors and if so, the only defense would be to abstain from all online games based on DirectX, till it's fixed. Actually, there have been such vulnerabilities in the past and 99% of all gamers just don't know nor were they affected by an attack. Only an offline system is a safe system, watch Battlestar Galactica ;-)

That's good to know, thanks. Wow, thanks for the detailed explanation. I'm not worried though, merely terribly curious and eager to learn more. Ha ha, I know... and I have! I watched the emotionally overwhelming final episode yesterday (no binge viewing - I was already watching the show when you posted that comment). It's almost unbearable that the journey has come to an end.