is a construction-oriented strategy video game that was released for the

Super Famicom The Super Nintendo Entertainment System, commonly shortened to Super Nintendo, Super NES or SNES, is a Fourth generation of video game consoles, 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan, 1991 in No ...

NEC PC-9801 The , commonly shortened to PC-98 or simply , is a lineup of Japanese 16-bit and 32-bit Personal computer, personal computers manufactured by NEC from 1982 to 2003. While based on Intel processors, it uses an in-house architecture making it inc ...

Sharp X68000 The is a home computer created by Sharp Corporation. It was first released in 1987 and sold only in Japan. The initial model has a 10 MHz Motorola 68000 CPU, 1 MB of RAM, and lacks a hard drive. The final model was released in 1993 wi ...

and

FM Towns The is a Japanese personal computer built by Fujitsu from 1989 to 1997. It started as a proprietary PC variant intended for multimedia applications and PC games, but later became more compatible with IBM PC compatibles. In 1993, the FM Towns ...

Summary

The traditional definition of a leading company is a corporation that currently dominates the "corporate wars" against their competitors. Its

employee Employment is a relationship between two party (law), parties Regulation, regulating the provision of paid Labour (human activity), labour services. Usually based on a employment contract, contract, one party, the employer, which might be a cor ...

s are considered by most people to be winning the "

rat race A rat race is a metaphor used to describe an endless, self-defeating, or pointless pursuit. The phrase is sometimes used to relate the human life to that of rats attempting to earn an ultimately pointless reward when Mortality salience, death ...

". Both versions of this game were released only in the Japanese market, but the NEC PC-9801 version has sharper

graphics Graphics () are visual images or designs on some surface, such as a wall, canvas, screen, paper, or stone, to inform, illustrate, or entertain. In contemporary usage, it includes a pictorial representation of the data, as in design and manufa ...

and the ability to use a

mouse A mouse (: mice) is a small rodent. Characteristically, mice are known to have a pointed snout, small rounded ears, a body-length scaly tail, and a high breeding rate. The best known mouse species is the common house mouse (''Mus musculus'' ...

. Instead of abstract colors (to depict control of each square of the board), buildings are used to depict a typical Japanese residential neighborhood. A

theme park An amusement park is a park that features various attractions, such as rides and games, and events for entertainment purposes. A theme park is a type of amusement park that bases its structures and attractions around a central theme, often fea ...

is shown on an island in the PC-9801 version to depict recreational opportunities while the interior of the corporate headquarters is seen in the Sharp X68000 version. The game challenges young people to create their own business empire by researching and marketing better

VHS VHS (Video Home System) is a discontinued standard for consumer-level analog video recording on tape cassettes, introduced in 1976 by JVC. It was the dominant home video format throughout the tape media period of the 1980s and 1990s. Ma ...

machines for the Japanese consumers. In both versions of the game, the player is introduced to jazzy instrumental song being played in the background while

neon Neon is a chemical element; it has symbol Ne and atomic number 10. It is the second noble gas in the periodic table. Neon is a colorless, odorless, inert monatomic gas under standard conditions, with approximately two-thirds the density of ...

pictures of various people fly across the screen. As of 2021, there has been no attempt to produce an English language version for this game either through official channels or through unofficial emulator translator groups. This game is considered to be in Japanese for the full duration of the game, making literacy skills in Japanese mandatory. Only the brand names themselves use

ASCII ASCII ( ), an acronym for American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is a character encoding standard for representing a particular set of 95 (English language focused) printable character, printable and 33 control character, control c ...

letters; all other words use the Japanese alphabet. There are only two time periods in the game and

jazz music Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, hymns, m ...

plays throughout the entire game. The player can either start in the 1970s when

VCRs A videocassette recorder (VCR) or video recorder is an electromechanical device that records analog audio and analog video from broadcast television or other AV sources and can play back the recording after rewinding. The use of a VCR to re ...

were beginning to be researched in Japan or in the

1980s File:1980s replacement montage02.PNG, 335px, From left, clockwise: The first Space Shuttle, ''Space Shuttle Columbia, Columbia'', lifts off in 1981; US president Ronald Reagan and Soviet Union, Soviet General Secretary of the Communist Party of ...

when VHS (and video cassette recorders) were beginning to come of age. Up to eight buildings can be constructed on the corporation's property to build and research new technology, but three buildings are already established at the start of the game. Each product the player manufactures has a separate profit chart. When an older model goes down in profits, the player should research and manufacture a newer one (and discontinue the older one) and make more money from willing Japanese customers. It is the job of the player to try to keep his chosen corporation profitable by creating new VHS machines while making sure that people still spend money on the ones being made. If they go down to zero or less, then the company goes

bankrupt Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the de ...

. At this point, the player loses the game. When a company goes bankrupt, a television news screen appears with the English word " DISSOLVED" on the picture caption.

References

External links

NEC PC9801 images
{{DEFAULTSORT:Leading Company 1992 video games Business simulation games FM Towns games Japan-exclusive video games Koei games Multiplayer and single-player video games NEC PC-9801 games Super Nintendo Entertainment System games Video games developed in Japan Video games set in Japan Video games set in the 1970s Video games set in the 1980s Video games set in the 1990s X68000 games