The making of a modern pharma blockbuster
pharmafile | September 11, 2015 | Feature | Medical Communications | Big Pharma, Twice Circled, computer game
The pharma industry divides opinions on its morality, but what has always stood out is the fact that in this business, profit is king.
I do not envy pharma executives – who are answerable to eager shareholders and investors none-too-keen on a disappointing set of financial results – but I am nonetheless curious about their work, the pressures they come under, and the industry’s ethics.
So I see the new strategy game ‘Big Pharma’, from independent computer game developer Twice Circled, as a chance to get a more light-hearted feel for that world. I can learn from the safety of my own home, without having to worry about my job security or any crippling lawsuits that might come my way from poisoning my customers.
For a sense of what the game is all about, think The Sims, but in the pharma world. Your goal is to import compounds, discover their active ingredients, create the right concentrations and mixtures – and then of course sell the optimised pills for maximum profit.
Firing up the colourful game for the first time, you have your hand held nicely through a tutorial that serves as a good introduction to the mechanics of the factory and production line.
Accompanied by some very pleasing animations and sound effects (not to mention an official soundtrack), I was quickly able to arrange the machinery and conveyor belts in the right order to produce my new company’s first drug – I chose a headache cure – and also to name it, which is a fun touch.
Like their real life counterparts, these virtual pills have benefits but also side effects, and the job of the God-like player/pharma executive is to use all of the tools in the company’s arsenal to get the balance just right: maximising the positive effects and minimising the negative.
The gameplay is fairly simple, but rewarding; once you get a feel for creating drugs, it is really a question of upscaling the production and reinvesting the money into larger factories and better technologies to create new and more lucrative cures. It is satisfying to watch your virtual drug empire grow and the profits alongside it, while rival firms look on enviously.
But they will only do so if you get things right. The artificial intelligence pharma companies generated by the computer game are also constantly working on their own competing products to your drug blockbusters. If they do a better job of it, your sales will fall. The fact that you have to constantly adapt to their moves keeps the game challenging and adds incentive to keep playing.
In a standard game, random ‘real-world’ events also pop up from time to time which affect the price of your products. For example, if a flu epidemic breaks out, you will be very much in the money if you have a flu treatment in your portfolio. If not, might you be wiser to invest in creating one fast?
Extra depth is added by the ‘scenarios’ modes, which offer gameplay handicaps, such as starting the game in huge debt or with production line limitations. If you want a slightly less difficult challenge, you may go the other way and start with unlimited funds or infinite factory space.
Big Pharma is very welcoming to the modder community, and programming and game development enthusiasts, and should add real replay value long-term with extra content. The website carries an extensive tutorial to get the most out of this. It is also clear that the developer is committed to ironing out the few UI bugs that remain and engaging with the players.
If you have enjoyed business simulators and strategy games in the past, there is much to recommend here, and much to admire in the fact that it was achieved by the smallest of small teams.
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