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Big Pharma

Big Pharma takes the cake when it comes to puzzle games that can both be therapeutic to watch, while being the right level of infuriatingly difficult to make you come back for more. If you are a fan of sizzle games, you owe it to yourself to take a look.
Big Pharma Game Cover
74%Game Brain Score
gameplay, story
grinding, stability
78% User Score Based on 1,310 reviews
Critic Score 70%Based on 7 reviews

Platforms

Nintendo SwitchLinuxXbox Series X|SPCGog ComMac OSPlaystation 4Xbox OneXboxWindowsPlayStation
Big Pharma Game Cover

About

Big Pharma is a single player strategy game with a business theme. It was developed by Twice Circled and was released on August 27, 2015. It received mostly positive reviews from both critics and players.

"Big Pharma" is a business simulation game where you run your own pharmaceutical company, researching and developing drugs to cure diseases while balancing profit and ethics. Start with basic equipment and grow your company by discovering new ingredients and technology, while fending off competition from rival corporations. The game explores the challenging moral dilemmas of the pharmaceutical industry.

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78%
Audience ScoreBased on 1,310 reviews
gameplay64 positive mentions
grinding23 negative mentions

  • The game offers a unique blend of puzzle-solving and business simulation, making it engaging and addictive.
  • The graphics are visually appealing and the user interface is well-designed, enhancing the overall experience.
  • There is a good variety of scenarios and challenges that keep the gameplay fresh and interesting.
  • The game can become repetitive after a while, as many scenarios feel similar and the core mechanics do not change significantly.
  • The tutorial is lengthy and can be confusing, making it difficult for new players to grasp the mechanics quickly.
  • The AI competitors are not very challenging and can feel more like a nuisance than a real threat to gameplay.
  • gameplay
    201 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The gameplay of the game has received mixed reviews, with many players noting its repetitive nature and lack of depth despite an interesting premise centered around drug production. While some appreciate the intricate mechanics and puzzle-solving aspects, others find the core gameplay loop monotonous and disconnected from the theme. Overall, the game offers a blend of strategy and management elements, but its execution leaves room for improvement, particularly in terms of content and player engagement.

    • “The core gameplay involves placing machines to adjust the concentration of ingredients to maximize cure strength and dodge side effects.”
    • “The intricate mechanics, from optimizing production lines to resource management, keep players engaged.”
    • “Designing and optimizing your factory is a fun experience, and the game does a good job of introducing new mechanics at a steady pace.”
    • “The less interesting bits are the constant scratching your head to painfully combine the same drugs over and over again in repeated playthroughs, as despite the varied scenarios, the base mechanics never change.”
    • “Unfortunately, the game's mechanics are incredibly limited, leaving little room for exploration and a lack of player agency overall.”
    • “I bought this since I thought it might be fun, but it is not - there is no real challenge to the gameplay.”
  • story
    110 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's story aspect is largely criticized for its lack of a cohesive narrative or engaging campaign, with most content revolving around repetitive mission objectives that often feel similar. Players note that while there are numerous missions and challenges, they lack variety and depth, leading to a sense of monotony over time. Overall, the absence of a meaningful storyline detracts from the experience, making it more of a management simulation than a narrative-driven game.

    • “I thought really highly of this game, with a lot of replayability when working through the story scenarios.”
    • “The game's main story mode has a really great variety of challenges to play through.”
    • “You're allowed to set your own pace and customize your challenge through a wide variety of options, missions, and randomization of ingredients.”
    • “It's a little sandboxy with kind of meaningless challenges and no story, which is not the type of game I usually go for, but I quite like the gameplay, so I've played for many hours despite that.”
    • “The humour of classics like Theme Hospital is ditched in favour of a quasi-realism that doesn't really hit the mark, whilst a complete lack of story or characters ensures the game has as little heart as the big pharma companies it emulates.”
    • “There is no story mode/campaign but rather many scenarios that require you to reach a certain objective (like a target revenue) within a time limit.”
  • graphics
    94 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The graphics of the game are generally described as simple yet charming, featuring a colorful, cartoony art style that suits its factory simulation theme. While some players find the visuals lacking or dull, many appreciate the clean and functional design that allows for smooth performance on lower-end machines. Overall, the graphics are considered adequate for the game's purpose, enhancing the experience without being the main focus.

    • “The art style is gorgeous, to say the least.”
    • “Big Pharma’s simple, colorful, cartoony graphical style works really well.”
    • “Graphically it looks great - it's not your fancy 3D artwork that you might find elsewhere, but the simplistic graphics fit really well and mean you can run it on lower-end machines as well.”
    • “Some players find the visuals lacking, impacting the overall experience.”
    • “The graphics and sound are basic and don't make me want to really look at what's going on.”
    • “Music and graphics are poor for today's games, but I would have easily forgiven based on a cheaper price if it had great gameplay.”
  • replayability
    59 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's replayability is generally viewed as high, thanks to features like random ingredient generation, customizable challenges, and a sandbox mode that encourages experimentation. While some players note that it can become repetitive after extended play, many appreciate the depth and variety offered by the game's mechanics, which can lead to numerous hours of engaging gameplay. However, a few reviews indicate that the replay value may not be as strong compared to similar titles, suggesting that while enjoyable, it may not sustain long-term interest for all players.

    • “Excellent game with awesome replayability and the ability to customize the way you get to play it.”
    • “The custom level builder and sandbox mode ensure replayability, allowing you to refine your pharmaceutical empire.”
    • “Between the randomly generated buildings, the randomly generated ingredients, the number of custom challenges with three ratings that are fairly challenging to get the best rank on, and the sheer customizability of custom games, you will find that this game is very replayable.”
    • “There simply is no replay value.”
    • “It's definitely worth picking up on sale, but the full price tag may not be justified given the game's limited replay value.”
    • “Fun for like 30 minutes, until you exhaust the tiny tech tree and realize there is 0 replayability.”
  • music
    35 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The music in the game receives mixed reviews, with some players appreciating its pleasant and atmospheric qualities, while others find it repetitive and distracting. Many suggest that the background music is decent but not memorable, often opting to turn it off in favor of their own playlists. Overall, while the soundtrack complements the game's theme, it could benefit from more variety to enhance the experience.

    • “The soundtrack is pretty good; it also makes pleasant 'lab sounds' as the machines work and as you scroll and click through the menus.”
    • “Music is great (though I wish there was more); the game is virtually without bugs in my experience, art is good, there is nothing gimmicky about this title, and it's overall a very enjoyable experience with just the right amount of challenge for a more casual game.”
    • “The music is absolutely perfect for the subject matter; the UI is one of the cleanest and most functional I've ever seen, and like most good factory-themed games, seeing your products move down conveyor belts and through wacky machines en masse is an absolute delight.”
    • “The music is your plain vanilla-flavored background beeping and bopping, which is probably what you want when you’re trying to concentrate on the finer points of chemistry and marketing.”
    • “I tend to turn the music down in games like this because it becomes more of a distraction than an enhancement, and big pharma is no different.”
    • “The main downside is the repetitive music, but this is easily fixed by turning it off and playing your own music outside the game.”
  • optimization
    25 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's optimization aspect is praised for its blend of space management and long-term strategy, offering a satisfying challenge for players who enjoy dissecting resources and building efficient production lines. While it features a steep learning curve and requires significant planning and number crunching, the rewarding feeling of achieving small optimizations keeps players engaged. Overall, it appeals to fans of puzzle and management games, though its complexity may not suit everyone.

    • “It's somewhere between management, production optimization, and puzzle.”
    • “A very comprehensive management/simulation/factory game that requires a lot of strategy, not only from a floor space perspective, but also for optimization of processes, a degree of cost/benefit analysis, workforce management, and some degree of business sense to be successful at the expert level.”
    • “It took me a while to get acclimated with all the tools and important optimization aspects to be mindful of, as I feel like it has a high learning curve, but hanging in there is more than worthwhile.”
    • “Every small optimization found is a substantial reward to the player, and as it gets more and more difficult to make your line more efficient, finding the smallest and sometimes very insignificant improvement offers a great feeling of satisfaction from your puzzle-solving prowess.”
    • “No, this is a production optimization game in the same vein as Factorio, where space and time are your limiting resources, and your goal is to build complex production lines as efficiently as possible.”
  • grinding
    24 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The grinding aspect of the game is often described as a mix of fun and frustration, with many players finding it tedious and repetitive over time. While some appreciate the complexity and challenge of micromanaging systems, others feel that the constant back-and-forth navigation and inefficient layouts detract from the overall enjoyment, leading to a sense of dissatisfaction. Ultimately, the grinding can feel like a burden rather than a rewarding experience, with many players suggesting that it becomes overly tedious as the game progresses.

    • “You'll need a second life for grinding.”
    • “Tedious, frustrating, long, boring; I don't know why I can't stop playing.”
    • “Unfortunately, interactions feel tedious: there's a lot of unnecessary moving back and forth between screens to find information I need to make decisions, but I don't find where I need them. Machine shapes make space usage feel very inefficient, which goes against my desire to optimize for fun, and leaves me dissatisfied with how any of the production lines look.”
    • “To make matters worse, building the supply chains is actually really tedious as you have to jump through the menus to research each stage of the process before you build it.”
  • humor
    17 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The humor in the game is described as a mix of silly and dark elements, with players finding amusement in the absurdity of drug creation and the naming of ingredients. While some appreciate the lighthearted approach and funny scenarios, others feel the humor falls flat, particularly in its failure to explore deeper satirical themes related to the pharmaceutical industry. Overall, the game offers a humorous take on a business simulation, though it may not satisfy those seeking more profound comedic commentary.

    • “Creating a drug that cured migraines and caused headaches made me laugh out loud a bit more than I probably should have.”
    • “Besides that, of course, the naming of the ingredients is hilarious.”
    • “Are you looking for a great puzzle game where you strain your brain to create awesome production lines, produce hilarious drugs, and constantly have to evolve to meet interesting challenges?”
    • “Not funny....”
    • “I got highly disappointed with the game - it's unfunny and offers poor explanations of the game's functions.”
  • stability
    11 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The stability of the game has received mixed reviews, with some players experiencing significant issues such as freezing, mouse cursor flickering, and overheating, leading to frustration and the need for forceful game closures. Conversely, a few users noted a lack of bugs and a polished experience, highlighting the inconsistency in stability across different systems and updates. Overall, while some players find the game relatively stable, many report it as a "buggy mess" that detracts from the gameplay experience.

    • “Actually, the game has been bug-free the entire time I've played, which is quite something nowadays in non-finished, rushed-to-market games.”
    • “The game is very polished and free of glitches and bugs.”
    • “However, alt-tabbing out of the game occasionally freezes my entire PC, and the only way to solve that is by force closing the game, which is quite annoying.”
    • “Mouse cursor flickers like mad; I can barely play the game. Every update seems to make it even more buggy, and it's very off-putting waiting and hoping it will get fixed.”
    • “This game is still a buggy mess.”
  • monetization
    3 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The monetization aspect of the game is highlighted by its focus on market control features, such as enhanced graphics and stock management tools, which contribute to an engaging experience. However, there is a critique regarding the prioritization of advertising over research and development, suggesting a potential imbalance in the game's economic model. Overall, players find the monetization elements enjoyable and integral to the gameplay.

    • “The monetization strategy feels overly aggressive, pushing players to spend more than they should to enjoy the game.”
    • “It seems like the game is designed more to extract money from players than to provide a fair gaming experience.”
    • “The in-game purchases are not just optional; they feel necessary to progress, which ruins the overall enjoyment.”
  • emotional
    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The emotional responses to the game are largely negative, with users expressing strong disapproval and a sense of disappointment, indicating that the experience was unfulfilling or distressing. The mention of heartfelt condolences suggests a deeper emotional impact, possibly reflecting on the game's themes or content. Overall, players seem to feel a disconnect or aversion, leading to a reluctance to engage with the game again.

  • atmosphere
    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative

    The game's atmosphere is characterized by a beautifully-animated, relaxed puzzle environment complemented by a pleasant soundtrack. It effectively balances clarity and aesthetic appeal, providing players with clear goals while maintaining an uncluttered visual design.

    • “It gives you the tutorial, has a nice atmospheric soundtrack, looks good, is not cluttered, and sets some goals for you to aim for, which I like.”
    • “It's a beautifully animated game that presents a relaxed puzzle atmosphere and provides you with almost all of the information you'll need up front.”
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11h Median play time
22h Average play time
7-30h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 14 analyzed playthroughs
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Frequently Asked Questions

Big Pharma is a strategy game with business theme.

Big Pharma is available on Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S, PC, Mac OS and others.

On average players spend around 22 hours playing Big Pharma.

Big Pharma was released on August 27, 2015.

Big Pharma was developed by Twice Circled.

Big Pharma has received mostly positive reviews from both players and critics. Most players liked this game for its gameplay but disliked it for its grinding.

Big Pharma is a single player game.

Similar games include Production Line, Blueprint Tycoon, Hundred Days - Winemaking Simulator, Factory Town, Rise of Industry and others.