Theme Hospital

You are a hospital administrator and through Theme Hospital's creators Bullfrog will always be synonymous with God sims--Theme Park, Populous and Dungeon Keeper being the cream of the crop--but this has got to be one of their quirkiest and most bizarre concepts so far.

You are a hospital administrator and through a number of missions have to bring order and financial solvency to a selection of healthcare establishments. You will soon find out that this is no ordinary world populated with sick people; here the patients have such diverse illnesses as Bloaty Head (a huge inflated noggin), Invisibility (you can literally see through 'em) and Hairyitus (rendering them Yeti-like).

You have to create a hospital that caters for these extreme needs, using research and some of the more unethical scientific methods at your disposal to cure as many misfits as possible with the least amount of fatalities, all the while making sure that your edifice stays clean (and hopefully rat and vomit free) and making your trustees some cash.

The scenarios get gradually harder and harder, but the variety of options and diseases also unfold during the game, making it about as addictive as a game can be without having a health warning. Original and compelling--sims don't get much better than this. --Lindon Kenilworth (Review copyright Amazon.co.uk)