Games Like Big Ambitions
Eight games that share a piece of Big Ambitions — one shop, a chain, a company, an economy — with Steam review scores and what each one leaves out.
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Nothing else does all of what Big Ambitions does — walk a city, run a shop, run twenty, build a factory — so the useful question is which part you want more of. Below, eight games sorted by that: one shop in first person, a chain from above, a company instead of a shop, or a whole economy. Hovgaard’s own earlier game, Startup Company, comes first.
Big Ambitions is a hybrid: a first-person life sim bolted onto a top-down tycoon. Most of the games people compare it to are one half or the other. That is not a weakness in them — it is the reason to pick one over another. Each card says which half it keeps.
Hovgaard's previous game
Startup Company
Hovgaard Games · Apr 10, 2020
The same studio, five years earlier: you build a software company from a laptop instead of a retail empire from a shop. Menus and spreadsheets where Big Ambitions has streets and shelves, but the same rags-to-riches structure and the same care for employees' demands.
- Steam reviews
- Very Positive · 81% (6,221)
- Price
- $12.99
Running one shop, in first person
Supermarket Simulator
Nokta Games · Jun 19, 2025
The closest thing to Big Ambitions' first hour stretched into a whole game: stock shelves, set prices, serve the till. There is no city, no second shop, no headquarters — it goes deep on what Big Ambitions does before you hire your first cashier.
- Steam reviews
- Very Positive · 92% (83,887)
- Price
- $19.99
TCG Card Shop Simulator
OPNeon Games · Sep 15, 2024
Same shape as Supermarket Simulator with a collecting hook: you stock cards, open packs, and price against a market that moves. A single premises rather than a city, and the game most often named alongside Big Ambitions in Steam reviews.
- Steam reviews
- Overwhelmingly Positive · 97% (49,338)
- Price
- $19.99
A chain of shops, from the top down
King of Retail
Freaking Games · Sep 14, 2022
Retail management without walking the streets: lay out stores, hire, set prices, expand into new locations. The closest match to Big Ambitions' mid-game of running several shops at once, minus the driving.
- Steam reviews
- Very Positive · 88% (3,555)
- Price
- $25.99
Building a company, not a shop
Software Inc.
Coredumping · May 1, 2015
Office-side tycoon: hire programmers and designers, ship software, manage teams across floors. If your favourite Big Ambitions building is the headquarters, this is the game that lives there.
- Steam reviews
- Very Positive · 94% (7,819)
- Price
- $22.99
Mad Games Tycoon 2
Eggcode · May 31, 2023
Studio management from 1976 onward, with the same employees-with-needs and buy-the-bigger-building loop. The business is games rather than gift shops.
- Steam reviews
- Very Positive · 94% (7,802)
- Price
- $24.99
Running a business full of people
Two Point Hospital
Two Point Studios · Aug 29, 2018
Design the building, hire the staff, keep the customers moving. Hospitals instead of shops, cartoon instead of New York, but the layout-and-staffing puzzle is the same one a Big Ambitions cinema poses.
- Steam reviews
- Very Positive · 92% (34,938)
- Price
- $29.99
An economy, not a business
Anno 1800
Ubisoft Mainz · Apr 16, 2019
City-builder scale: production chains and trade routes across an island empire. Nothing like walking into your own shop, but the closest big-name game for players who liked Big Ambitions' factories and imports more than its counters.
- Steam reviews
- Very Positive · 81% (32,244)
- Price
- $59.99
How the list was chosen
The eight were picked by how much of Big Ambitions’ loop each one shares — a shop you walk into, a chain you manage, a company you staff, an economy you supply — and filtered to games that are released and rated at least “Very Positive” on Steam. A Mixed-rated city builder and an unreleased trading sim were left out on that rule. Prices are list prices, not the discount of the week. Review scores and counts are the Steam totals on the day this page was checked — the date is in the source line — and they move.
Every link goes to Steam. There are no affiliate links on this page or anywhere on this site.
Related
- Getting started — if you came here to decide whether to buy Big Ambitions itself
- Big Ambitions roadmap — what the game will have that these do not
- Multiplayer — the one thing none of these fix either
