How did you learn to Capitalism2?

[reto.schnaubinger]

I bought the game a while ago to get some basic "entrepreneurial" knowledge. However, to dive into the game and to learn by doing does not work. Also, there arent many tutorials on youtube. How did you learn to play Capitalism and do you have some tips / recommendations for me?

[counting]

Personally, I have known Capitalism series since the original Capitalism game decades ago. and Capitalism plus right after that, then Cap 2 later all the way to current Cap Lab. I can't say or remember exactly how I "learned" since it's such a long long time ago, but back then we have actual physical manual to read as of most games came with boxes of that time. And once I've learned the game interface, the rest is just general business sense.

If you are looking for interactive tutorials, there are actual tutorial missions in the original, Capitalism 2, and also tutorial up to 4 missions in the latest Capitalism lab post release beta version (currently 2.6.10).

As for videos, KippurCatArts did some very basic tutorials for Cap Lab, and some gameplays
http://www.youtube.com/user/KippurCatArts

EsotericRogue and WilliamMGary (the manager of Capitalismfans website) have channels that have longer videos for normal gameplays.

For Cap2, Situlgaming have an ongoing let's play for its missions
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL ... BMTlVNorHy
JellyfishOverlord has done an introduction video in the past
http://youtu.be/8Y1b2jeM3WI
The Partisan also did a let's play
http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL ... YplA2YoGzJ

Nicholas Wautier even has some videos for the old Capitalism plus
https://www.youtube.com/user/NickSentowski/videos
Also Hendrin Mckay
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... LAJXM89naJ

And finally ofc, you can always ask questions on the forum and visit http://capitalismfans.com/ to find knowledge base. Or if you like just read the .pdf manual inside the Cap 2 game folder.

[reto.schnaubinger]

Thank you. I think I will systematically check these sources on the weekend. I heard Capitalism is very realistic and is used to teach business administration at universities - do you also think the game can help one to understand business in real life (the "people" component aside)?

[counting]

Well, in reverse, if someone has been in a manager position (especially in manufacturing industries), he/she mght find Capitalism series quite interesting, sort of like a toy for high level executive

But I can not say this would be true the other way around, and MBA courses are way more complex than what the game can teach you. But it could help promoting interests in learning and practicing. And IMO probably more so for young entrepreneurs who like to have a taste of managing businesses and get a feel of having to deal with all sort of issues when a new business has started. Also the detail financial statements linking to "quasi-real" day-to-day operations, can help students understand concepts behind accounting or financial terms, instead of seeing them as pure number's game. It brings life to mostly boring charts. (although probably for more "traditional businesses" pre-2000 pre-internet industries)

But I think the most interesting prospect might be as its current name implied, a lab experiment and simulation of economy system. In academic studies, especially in computational economics, simulations are way more abstract, and obviously less fun. Although the game hardly qualifies serious study, however it does have basis from microeconomics models. And certainly generate more interesting and interactive cases than textbook lifeless examples.

[Steel]

I learned this game more than a decade ago when I was around 12 years old. This was my favourite game at that time, and when I saw this Lab expansion I immediately bought it and fell in love with the game again. I spent countless hours playing with different settings, once my character was wealthier than Bill Gates, but the best experiences came from playing against many companies wich also have a huge starting capital.

[WilliamMGary]

I had to break down and just read the manual to actually learn the game and then playing hours upon hours.