Source: PC Games – January/February 1991
“Have you ever wanted to head your own company? Are you tired of others making decisions that determine your daily fate? Or do you just want to conquer your friends in a battle of financial wit and skill?”
These are the question posed by the ad for “Big Business” or to be literal, “Big Busine$S”.
This ad comes from the January/February 1991 issue of PC Games magazine. It features a business simulation in which you can pit your corporate empire building skills against others or the computer. While it is fairly detailed it really emphasizes humor and it doesn’t have quite enough complexity to give it a lot of replayability. The graphics are good and the interface is simple to use so if you like these older games its worth trying until you have it figured out. However, once you’ve beaten the computer you will pretty much have the formula to do it every time.
Essentially, you take the roll of a CEO of a company and make business decisions in an effort to lead you past all of your competitors and of course increase shareholder value. Production, pricing, and other factors are all under your control. The game has a cartoony look and feel with a lot of humor. However, a better economic model would probably make it into a better, more replayable business simulation. But who wants that anyway?
Big Business was released by DigiTek for the Amiga, Atari ST and PC (preferably with VGA graphics). This particular ad is for the PC version and states that it will work with the IBM PC, PS-2, PS-1, 100% compatibles, and Tandy. VGA, EGA, CGA, MCGA and Tandy 16 color graphics are all possible though again, VGA will of course be the best. At a listed retail price of $49.95, it seems pretty steep for the time (or even now). It also supports AdLib, Soundblaster and Covox soundboards which no doubt give you a big improvement over the beeps you would otherwise hear while playing the game.
I’m reasonably sure that this game never has been and never will be re-released. However, it is easy enough to find on abandonware sites if you can’t find an original. Realistically, a downloaded version will be far easier to get working via DOSBox or some other emulations anyway as you don’t have to worry about having the appropriate floppy drive or potentially dealing with disk protection. This isn’t the best game in the world nor does it necessarily have the most entertaining subject matter. However, it is unique and entertaining enough to be worth a play through or few until you have figured out how to beat the computer.
Screen shots above are all from the PC/DOS (VGA) version of the game.
