There was a time when, together with SimCity, Maxis made games for companies. The only one that got through and is lost, SimRefinery, has been recovered.
There was a time when Maxis put out long-standing simulators for PC. From the ubiquitous SimCity to SimAnt and SimFarm. They were so popular that he joined the series The Sims, which is rumored to be and the city management simulator they will have two movies in the somewhat distant future.
- Product type: computer game
- Platform: Windows
- It is a product of Electronic Arts
A refinery manager who has recovered from oblivion
Due to its enormous popularity, the creators of SimCity had a division that made simulation games for companies, including a game for the company. Chevron called SimRefinery. Maxis Business Simulations was founded by John Hiles, a software engineer in Monterey who was designing simulation games with a more serious approach than usual in Maxis games.
John Hiles knew how much fun the SimCity game was, and he wanted to partner with Maxis to make their financial simulations fun and accessible. Maxis Business Simulations worked on games for many other different clients, such as SimRefinery, SimEnvironment, and SimPower. But many of them were never finished.
The only one released to the public was SimHealth, a game designed to help people understand the American healthcare system. Maxis eventually parted ways with the Maxis Business Simulations division when it became too much work to keep dealing with customers, who had no idea how to make games. So they went on as an independent company, creating software like Project Challenge, a project management training game for the tech industry.
A few days ago a floppy disk containing the aforementioned SimRefinery was found, and the backup copy is already being started to upload it to the web archive.org So, in a few days or weeks we will have a new SimCity-style game created by a team heavily involved in the management series. Of course, we warn that it is very likely not fun because it is more designed to simulate in a more or less realistic way how to run a refinery and a metallurgical factory.
Source: Phil Salvador's Twitter
