Theme Hospital
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Theme Hospital | |
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| Developer(s) | Bullfrog Productions |
| Publisher(s) | Electronic Arts |
| Release date(s) | 1997 |
| Genre(s) | Strategy |
| Mode(s) | Single player, Multiplayer |
| Rating(s) | ESRB: E (Everyone) ELSPA: 3+ OFLC: G |
| Platform(s) | PC (MS-DOS, Windows), PlayStation |
| Media | 1 CD-ROM |
| System requirements | Pentium 75MHz processor, 8MB RAM (16MB if played on Windows XP), 1MB graphics card, 55MB hard drive space |
| Input | Keyboard, Mouse, Controller |
Theme Hospital is a simulation computer game developed by Bullfrog Productions and published by Electronic Arts in 1997, in which the player designs and operates a hospital. Like most of Bullfrog's games, Theme Hospital is permeated by an eccentric sense of humor. The game is the thematic successor to Theme Park, a game also produced by Bullfrog.
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[edit] General information
The game is set in a hospital, and requires the player to build an environment which will attract patients with different complaints, illnesses, emergencies, and diseases. The game has a somewhat dark sense of humor, which is similar to that of Theme Park in many ways. The player has no direct control over the patients that wander the hospital, although gameplay largely centers on influencing their actions in one way or another. The player does, however, have the ability to pick up any staff member in the building and move them to a different area (to speed up their movement from place to place) and to expel any patients from the hospital (if they are being a nuisance or causing rowdiness).
Each level consists of an empty hospital to plan and design, with set goals in the fields of financial attainment, patients cured, percent of patients cured, and hospital value. Holding negative funds or allowing sufficient patients to die will bring about losing requirements. When the goals have been met the player has the option to move on to a new, more elaborate hospital with tougher winning conditions and more diseases present. The final level in the game, 'Battenburg' consists of an enormous yet somewhat awkward hospital with all the diseases and rooms in the game present, all disasters frequent and very high winning requirements.
[edit] Gameplay
The game revolves around buying and placing rooms (or facilities) in a hospital, and hiring doctors, nurses, site managers/handymen and receptionists to operate it. Some rooms are fundamentally required for the running of the hospital, such as GP's offices, Staff Rooms, and Toilets, while others provide optional services (such as General Diagnosis rooms, Scanner Rooms and X-Rays).
Patients are attracted to the hospital, in part, by the reputation of the hospital and the cost of treatment there. They arrive with a number of amusing fictional illnesses which must be cured to earn money and achieve targets set by the game. Rooms and equipment to treat diseases such as Bloaty Head, Slack Tongue, Heaped Piles, Uncommon Cold and The Squits must be researched before they can be placed in the hospital. Advanced levels in the game feature epidemics where the player must try to stop a disease infecting other patients by curing infected patients and vaccinating others. Medical emergencies also take place, where several patients must be cured within a specified time limit, and earthquakes occur which damage equipment.
[edit] Staff
The success of any hospital lies in hiring well-trained staff. Staff are separated into four categories of expertise: Doctor, Nurse, Site Manager/Handyman, and Receptionist. Doctors usually demand higher wages than the other three occupations, and also serve a much larger role. Staff are affected both by tiredness and warmth, which must be cared for if the staff are to remain content. Use of staff rooms allows staff to be rested, which can be furnished with a number of relaxing and entertaining devices. Placing a suitable number of radiators in rooms allows staff to be kept warm. Having the staff overworked often results in the staff threatening to quit without a raise.
[edit] Doctor
Dressed in white lab-coats and equipped with stethoscopes, doctors make up the backbone of the hospital's medical staff, as they are required for diagnosing and treating patients. Depending on the skill level (referred to as ability) of a doctor, he can be an aspiring "Junior", a developed "Doctor", or a veteran "Consultant". Doctors also have an 'attention to detail' rating, measuring the speed at which the doctor responds to calls to another room.
In addition to the standard ability to diagnose and treat general patients, some doctors hold degrees that give them a wider range of treatment abilities. These consist of the surgical degree, psychiatric degree and research degree, allowing the doctor to work in the operating theater, psychiatry room and research laboratory respectively.
Training rooms allow Consultant doctors to pass on their knowledge and skills to lower-level doctors. Gradually, doctors in training see a rise in their skill level, and possibly even gain a degree, if their instructor happens to hold a degree.
- Researcher
- Researchers can work in the Research Facilities, conducting research on how to cure patients with currently-incurable diseases. Researchers also contribute to the development of new treatments and diagnosis, as well as improving existing treatments. They also are the only doctors able to work in the DNA Fixer Room for curing patients with Alien DNA.
- Psychiatrist
- A psychiatrist can work in the Psychiatry room, diagnosing and treating patients exhibiting mental illnesses that cannot be cured by drugs or surgery.
- Surgeon
- Surgeons work in pairs in the Operating Theater, swapping their standard white doctor's outfit for scrubs, and performing operations on patients that need to go under the knife as part of their treatment.
[edit] Nurse
Dressed in a standard white nurse's outfit, complete with hat, nurses operate treatment rooms that do not require the skill or attention of doctors. Nurses are usually found in a Pharmacy, Fracture Clinic, or Ward.
[edit] Site Manager/Handyman
Patrolling the halls of the hospital, Site Managers/Handymen are vital to the upkeep of a hospital. Concealed within their long brown coats are watering cans for watering plants, mops for cleaning up messes, and even a sledgehammer, blowtorch and welder's mask for repairing damaged machinery.
[edit] Receptionist
Though not as busy as doctors may be, receptionists are the first people that patients entering the hospital will seek out, and so a skilled receptionist will helpfully direct the patient to where the patient needs to go to be diagnosed and treated.
[edit] Rooms
In Theme Hospital, there are many rooms that can be available, some that need to be researched or some that are unable to researched on certain levels:
- Diagnosis
- G.P.'s Office
- General Diagnosis
- Ward
- Psychiatric
- Cardiogram
- X-Ray
- Scanner
- Blood Machine
- Ultra Scanner
- Treatment
- Ward
- Psychiatric
- Pharmacy
- Operating Theatre
- Clinics
- Inflation
- Hair Restoration
- Slack Tongue Clinic
- Fracture Clinic
- Decontamination
- Electrolysis
- DNA Fixer
- Jelly Vat
- Facilities
- Toilets
- Staff Room
- Research Department
- Training
[edit] Diseases
In Theme Hospital many of the illnesses are based around real illnesses with an amusing twist. Some also make the patients very distinctive and rather amusing to watch:
- 3rd Degree Sideburns
- Alien DNA
- Baldness
- Bloaty Head
- Broken Heart
- Broken Wind
- Chronic Nosehair
- Corrugated Ankles
- Discrete Itching
- Fake Blood
- Fractured Bones
- Gastric Ejections
- Golf Stones
- Gut Rot
- Hairyitis
- Heaped Piles
- Infectious Laughter
- Invisibility
- Iron Lungs
- Jellyitis
- Kidney Beans
- King Complex
- Pregnancy (Patch required)
- Ruptured Nodules
- Serious Radiation
- Slack Tongue
- Sleeping Illness
- Spare Ribs
- Sweaty Palms
- The Squits
- Transparency
- TV Personality
- Uncommon Cold
- Unexpected Swelling
[edit] Awards
Awards are presented to the player at the end of every year. Examples of awards include: selling more soft drinks than your competitors, shooting lots of rats, and more difficult tasks such as not killing any patients, or scoring consistently highly in health inspections. Awards provide a financial reward, which varies depending on difficulty, and can improve the reputation of a hospital.
[edit] Trivia
If at least 10 rats are shot then there is a bonus level where you can kill as many rats as you can in a certain time limit.
There are many cheats for the game, and when these are applied the receptionist states over PA "The hospital administrator is cheating!" or "Warning! A cheat is running the hospital!" repeatedly and shrilly.
The opposing hospitals in the game - including Deep Thought, HAL, Holly and Multivac - are all names of well-known computers from fiction. Deep Thought comes from Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Multivac is from a number of Isaac Asimov's works, Holly is the computer in the British sitcom Red Dwarf and HAL is from Arthur C. Clarke's 2001: A Space Odyssey.
The game contains many references to Bullfrog which could be seen as self-referential humour:
- In the opening sequence
- The patient in the waiting room is "Horny" (the Horned Reaper, the anti-hero from the Dungeon Keeper series)
- Another patient may be a character from Bullfrog's Syndicate game
- The doctor relaxing in his room is playing Dungeon Keeper
- On the surgeon's screen, the option to perform surgery or play Populous are displayed.
- In Receptionists' announcements
- "Look out for other Bullfrog products!"
- In staff descriptions
- "Plays Theme Park a lot. A potential liability."
The Receptionists, as well as informing of the presence of VIPs, epidemics and earthquakes, also occasionally dispatch such useful messages as "Dr. Jekyll to Psychiatry, please" and "today's special offer: half-price hair replacement!"
The only voice actress in the game (for the receptionist) is Rebecca Green.
[edit] External links
- Theme Hospital at MobyGames
- Theme Hospital Clinic - strategies and general information about the game.
- Cheats for the PC version, listed at CheatsCodesGuides.com
- Downloads, including the Pregnancy patch and a save-game editor
- Theme Hospital at GameSpot
