Startup Panic

Startup Panic - Live the life of a CEO

Experience the Ups and Downs of Building a Successful Tech Company

The Roots of the Simulation

Startup Panic is a unique simulation game that allows you to create and build a tech company from the ground up, with the primary goal of establishing the next big social media platform. The game was developed by the Indonesian game studio Algorocks and published by tinyBuild.

You can get Startup Panic through Steam or the Epic Games Store for PCs running Windows 8 or above, and the mobile version is available on Android and iOS devices. After a quick download, you can begin the exciting process of growing your new company.

Entering the World of Tech Startups

In Startup Panic, you pick the story up right after your character has chosen to leave the monotony of their corporate job and start a brand new business. This business will be a tech startup with aspirations of developing a successful new social media app, but you'll need to make the right decisions to achieve your company's goals.

The simulation game primarily takes place in your startup's workplace. As your startup expands, the office you manage will become more and more packed with bustling employees. To consistently improve your blossoming app and pay your workers' salaries, you need to keep the money flowing in via revenue and contract jobs.

Depending on how you play, you could exit as a billionaire or lose all your money along the way.

There's no set endpoint for Startup Panic; instead, you can keep working on your app and growing your business for as long as you want. However, the game will occasionally offer you the option to sell your startup or abandon it and return to your nine-to-five job.

Concept Rating: 4/5

A Pleasant Experience

Although Startup Panic's graphics aren't spectacular, the art style is endearing, and the color palette is warm and calming. In some ways, the design and overall aesthetics of the game's workplace setting are reminiscent of the old Pokémon games on Gameboy Color—and there's nothing wrong with that. However, the graphics are more polished and modern-looking than those retro games.

There are many interfaces you'll interact with as you navigate the game, and they've managed to pack in quite a few options, menus, and various status trackers without things looking overly cluttered. For the most part, the interfaces and pop-up menus are tidy and well-designed.

Startup Panic also features a soothing musical soundtrack, making for a calming experience. This music isn't particularly complex or prominent, but it's pleasant to listen to and serves as the perfect background accompaniment.

Graphics & Audio Rating: 4/5

Building Your Company

At your startup, you're the boss, and it's your responsibility to hire and maintain your staff, create a desirable product, and make all of the important decisions. That's the essence of Startup Panic; you spend pretty much all of your time as a tech CEO.

Usually, handling the day-to-day and big-picture operations of your fictional company is engaging and fun. There's a lot of diversity in the way you can design your app and implement new features, having to choose whether to prioritize aesthetics, technology or usability. Unfortunately, nothing comes for free in Startup Panic. If you don't maintain a steady income, you can't afford product improvements or employee salaries.

Feature Development

The best way to improve your startup's market share and bring in more revenue is to improve the product, and you can achieve that by adding features. To do so, you need to visit a special UI, which is a giant web of possible social media platform traits. These traits are concepts like instant messaging, video streaming, status posting, etc.

Every feature you want to add has a development cost, an average maintenance cost, and a figure demonstrating its value in added income. As you implement new features, your app gains a foothold in different demographics and your revenue increases. To develop these features, you need enough employees with sufficient expertise.

Spend a week training your staff, earning money, or building features... but choose wisely!

Keeping Your Office Happy

One of the cool things about Startup Panic is its commitment to realism, and that's especially evident when it comes to managing your company's employees. Your virtual employees share many similarities with real-life employees; they want fair pay, they need time to accomplish projects, and most importantly, they'll quit if they're unhappy.

To keep your startup fully staffed, you'll have to sometimes dedicate time and resources to maintaining workplace morale. Motivating your staff entails giving them vacation time, upgrading office equipment, and increasing their pay. If you don't give your employees the respect and attention they deserve, you won't have enough employees to run your business.

Expanding Your Reach

Once your app sees some growth, in-depth market research becomes essential for continuous progression. To grow your product's influence around the globe, you get to research and unlock geographic territories, so that you can market and expand the app to new demographics. This aspect of the game is impressively detailed and offers tons of choices and options to explore.

Overcoming Obstacles

While Startup Panic doesn't feature a typical antagonist, there are a few occurrences that can slow you down. For one, rival tech CEOs are constantly trying to steal your market share and put you out of business. To keep them at bay, you need to outmaneuver them by developing a better product and expertly managing your business.

The game's world is also plagued by hackers, who will compromise your app resulting in wasted money and lost market share. In addition to the realistic obstacles, you'll also be hampered by occasionally having an employee get kidnapped for ransom by pirates. Yeah, you read that right.

Gameplay Rating: 4/5

Starting Up Your Startup

Startup Panic launched in December 2020 for PC via the Epic Games Store, iOS, and Android. The management sim released on Steam on January 20, 2022, and is 10% until January 27th. Considering the depth of what the game offers, getting it for less than $20 is a bargain. The mobile version is even more affordable at $5.99 in the app stores.

An Engaging Management Simulation

If you're looking for a thrilling adventure or super-advanced graphics, you'll want to look elsewhere. However, if you are looking for a unique, deep, and engaging management simulation game, Startup Panic is a solid option.

Algorocks put tons of effort into their product, especially in areas like feature development and market research. If you want to, you can play the game 50 different times and create 50 unique apps. Although the gameplay can become boring after a while, the level of depth ensures that you'll never truly run out of things to do.

Combined with the pleasing artwork and tranquil music, the attention to detail makes Startup Panic an enjoyable and unique gaming experience.

Replay Value Rating: 4/5

Thumbs Up

• Pleasant graphics and soundtrack.
• Tons of options when it comes to adding features.
• Unique and in-depth market research option.
• Plenty of subtle humor to be found.
• Neat and well-organized interfaces.

Thumbs Down

• The gameplay gets tedious after a while.
• Some of the occasional pop-ups and occurrences can be repetitive.
• Fairly steep learning curve.

TL;DR

Startup Panic is a unique management simulation game that provides fast-paced, intelligent fun.