Taipan

[bruce]

God help me, I can't stop playing Taipan on my Palm Pilot.

People who haven't played it so obsessively might think the game is about buying low and selling high, or "always invest in the opium."

But they're wrong.

What this game, boys and girls, is about, is <i>the miracle of compound interest</i>. In my current game, (in which it's 1960, so I've been trading for 100 years) I have 4280 units of ship (with 163 guns) and 10000 units of warehouse. They're all currently packed full of opium (the most expensive commodity). If I get lucky and get back to Hong Kong when the price spikes, at, let's say, 120,000 per unit, I will make about 2 billion dollars. I make more than that *each month* on the interest on my Big Ass Bank Account, which currently stands at 334 billion. So, in essence, it doesn't matter any more whether or not I'm trading anything. I just sail around and let my money make more money.

It's also about "It's one against 1114! I might take 3% damage in this fight!" and "What the fuck do you mean, 586 ships <i>missed</i> me when they shot cannons at me?"

But that's not important. What is important is the compound interest. The limiting factor in this game is how long I'm willing to put up with the incredibly long and tedious fight scenes.

But I can't stop. At least not until I'm a trillionaire.

Ma Tsu This,
Bruce

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Linky-linky.

Also, presuming that wasn't it -- do you know of a PC version? The state won't let me have a Palm Pilot because they send me checks for government cheese.