Startup Freak - In this simulation game, you step into the shoes of an aspiring entrepreneur determined to grow a modest software startup into a multi-million dollar enterprise. The game invites you to build a skilled team from scratch, ensuring that every early hire—from technical talent to marketing maestros—fits perfectly into the unique puzzle of your company’s early days.
Crafting a standout product is a core part of the challenge. You'll need to research market trends, build innovative features, and continuously upgrade your offerings while keeping bugs and security risks at bay. Managing your global infrastructure is crucial too, as pinpointing the best hardware and optimizing server performance become essential tasks to keep your growing user base satisfied.
Strategic decisions extend beyond product development. You must identify the best sales channels and experiment with pricing models to attract and retain customers effectively. Plus, courting investors by researching, pitching, and negotiating for funding adds an extra layer of realism and intensity, simulating the high stakes of the startup world.
Finally, the game offers the excitement of designing a chic office space and planning your ultimate exit strategy. Every decision you make—from team hires to infrastructure investments—affects the final outcome, challenging you to prove whether you truly have what it takes to be a Startup Freak.
Version 1.0.0 is Now Out!
Startup Freak is finally in full release with a number of requested features, UX improvements, and bug fixes! It's been a fun and challenging journey and the game has come quite a ways from its early days on itch.io and Steam early access launch. My aim has always been to bring you an experience that's unique and different, and captures a more faithful and in-depth look at software making and software startups. But first, let's look at what's new: Features Added an "Experiment Mode" where you start with $1,000,000 so you can try out strategies at your heart's leisure. Achievements are disabled in this mode. Added 24 new investor traits. The overall products stats are now shown in the main view so you don't have to jump to the backlog. You can now disable tutorial hints in the options menu. You are now prompted to confirm when trying to overwrite a save file or load a save file. Employees' salary can now only be reduced to 50% of their market value, and they take a few sprints before quitting. This avoids getting around paying redundancy by forcing the employee to quit. Network topology graphics have been updated. Add a "Guide" button to the main menu which opens the related article in Steam community. Be sure to check it out if some of the concepts in the game are unclear. When moving to a new office, once the credited furniture have been placed you automatically exit "place mode". This avoids accidentally purchasing new items. When opening the backlog, the view is automatically restored to feature mode. Bug Fixes Fixed: clicking on an employee does not open the right tab a...
Read more in Steam