RollerCoaster Tycoon

Construction and management simulation is a type of simulation game in which players build, expand or manage fictional communities or projects with... limited resources. Strategy video games sometimes incorporate CMS aspects into their game economy, as players must manage resources while expanding their project. But pure CMS games differ from strategy games in that "the player's goal is not to defeat an enemy, but to build something within the context of an ongoing process." Games in this category are sometimes also called "management games". SimCity represents an early example of success in the genre. Other games in the genre range from city-building games like Caesar, pure business simulation games like Hollywood Mogul, and or true CMSs like Theme Park. Sometimes strategy video games such as Age of Empires combine aspects of CMSs with wargames. CMSs are often called "simulation games" for short. Although games can simulate many activities from vehicles to sports, players usually deduce the kind of simulation from the title of the game.
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Chris Sawyer is a Scottish computer game developer who is best known for designing and programming Transport Tycoon and the RollerCoaster Tycoon series. Sawyer first entered the games industry in 1983, writing games in Z80 machine code on the Memotech MTX home computer, and then the Amstrad CPC series home computer. Some of these were published by Ariolasoft, Sepulcri Scelerati and Ziggurat. The former was a rare instance of a game being... accepted by a publisher when it was already nearing completion. From 1988 to 1993, Sawyer worked on PC conversions of Amiga games and was involved in many projects, including Virus, Conqueror, Campaign, Birds of Prey, Dino Dini's Goal and Frontier: Elite II. He also contributed to the PC version Elite Plus. Sawyer's first management simulation game, Transport Tycoon, was released by Microprose in 1994 and became a classic of the tycoon series of games. A year later, he improved and extended the game, giving it the title Transport Tycoon Deluxe. Sawyer immediately sought to create a sequel.
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Hasbro Interactive was an American video game production and publishing subsidiary of Hasbro, the large game and toy company. Hasbro Interactive was formed late in 1995 in order to compete in the video game arena. Several Hasbro properties, such as Monopoly and Scrabble, had already been made into... successful video games by licensees such as Virgin Interactive. With Hasbro's game experience, video games seemed like a natural extension of the company and a good opportunity for revenue growth. Hasbro Interactive's objective was to develop and publish games based on Hasbro property and the subsidiary existed for six years. In 1997 revenues increased 145% going from USD$35 million to $86 million. Hasbro Interactive embarked on both internal and external development, and acquired some smaller video game developers and publishers such as MicroProse for $70 million and Avalon Hill for $6 million both in 1998. Hasbro acquired the rights for 300 games when it purchased Avalon Hill. With those acquisitions Hasbro Interactive revenues increased 127% in 1998 to $196 million and profits of $23 million.
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