KZ Manager
| KZ Manager | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | The Missonoaris |
| Publisher(s) | N/A |
| Designer(s) | N/A |
| Engine | N/A |
| Platform(s) | C64, Amiga, DOS, Microsoft Windows |
| Release date(s) | 1990-2000 (Depends on version) |
| Genre(s) | Construction and management simulation |
| Mode(s) | Single player |
KZ Manager is a name shared by many similar resource management computer games putting the player in the role of a Nazi concentration camp "manager", where the "resources" to be managed include, depending on the version of the game, prisoners (either Jews, Turks or Gypsies), poison gas supplies, "normal" money and various equipment, as well as "public opinion" on the "productivity" of the camp.
Gameplay
The goal of the game is to keep the camp functioning by keeping the "public opinion" or other important resources and gauges over or under a certain threshold. In one version, public opinion rises when the "manager" executes a number of prisoners with Zyklon B. However, ordering said gas costs money, which can be gathered by forcing the prisoners to work.
Spending too much time without a "sufficient" number of executions makes "public satisfaction" drop, and having too few working prisoners will soon drive to a resource shortage, and closing of the camp, thus losing the game. Also, prisoners must be "purchased" by the camp's "manager", and the corpses of the deceased prisoners must be disposed of (the game describes them as "Müllberg", German for "garbage mountain " or "pile of garbage"), an operation which also has an associated cost.
Like other resource management games, this means that ultimately the goal of the game is trying to find an optimal balance and timing between expenses, income, actions and "production goals", although with a highly controversial twist.
Versions
The game has been remade several times during the 1990s, with the earliest versions being DOS, text mode games, graphical DOS versions as well as a Windows version, called "KZ manager millennium". According to a 1991 article by Linda Rohrbough , an Amiga version seems to exist as well. Gameplay and graphics of the Amiga version and its 256 color DOS port were far more advanced than in the original C64 game.