The godfather of pizza tycoons, the master of micro-management and the game that still has no worthy successor...
It starts by choosing a mode of play. And while you can 'quickstart' the game (or try to complete someone's mission), the best mode of play is the 'freemode'. After you choose the mode and difficulty, you get to pick your in-game character (exactly 100 characters to choose from), your name and the name of your pizza restaurant franchise. You can also set the amount of human players and even edit the computer characters' names and the names of their franchises.
Now it's time to start the game. First you get to choose the starting city in which you will begin your journey to the top (or bottom) of the pizza business. The choice (presented to you on a pizza map) is yours: Chicago, Baltimore and New York (USA); Madrid (Spain); London (UK); Paris (France); Stockholm (Sweden); Berlin (Germany); Vienna (Austria) and finally Rome (Italy).
Each city has its own layout, different sized properties, its own government (!), law enforcement and, of course, mafia. Not to mention the banks, the estate agents (from whom you rent/buy restaurants) and even the insurance companies.
Now that we've covered the basics, let's go to the restaurant. Every restaurant can be personalized to your every wish. There are 12 shops for furniture, 3 shops for ovens, 11 shops for the flooring and 5 shops for decorations and machines. After that, you have create a couple of pizzas and put them on a menu so people can order them. Creating pizzas is one of the best aspects of this game. The food is divided into 4 groups (vegetables, meat, fruit and cheese&condiments) and each piece can be cut into smaller parts. The possibilities are endless, but be careful! $50 is the max you can set for a pizza price.
Now, you still don't have anybody who works for you. You can hire cooks, waiters and a manager for each restaurant. One thing that stands out here is that every employee is one of those 92 characters that are not playing as pizza tycoons (and the game creates more employees by giving them different names and slightly different stats). Other than that, it's standard stuff. Next you buy some ingredients from the ingredient shop. You can also get a contract so the ingredients get delivered to your restaurant every morning without you (or your manager) having to buy them. There is also the option of getting a central warehouse in your city, so you can buy large amounts of ingredients and it gets delivered to your restaurants every morning.
Next stop - advertising. The choice is yours - flyers, newspaper articles, posters and even TV ads, each with their own influence on people and, more importantly, the amount of money you'll pay for them. They last for 7 days.
While you're playing you'll notice that you can challenge other 'tycoons' for a match of pizza assembly. You are given a recording of a pizza being made and you have to recreate it from scratch. If you earn more points than your competitor you win the bet. There is also a monthly competition that includes all eight of the tycoons, and only one can win.
The encounter with the mafia is inevitable. They'll either contact you for ransom money so they don't wreck your restaurants or you'll end up contacting them for a 'job on the side'. These jobs vary from simple delivery missions (which can be quite hard to master), weapons dealing, even money laundering, to the investment deals which require no work from you. They can also loan you money, but that is a small amount over a small time with a big interest rate.
There is a LOT of stuff you can do in Pizza Tycoon (it would take me ages to write everything down), and that's the reason I gave it the full 10. Not even the obvious negative sides of this game (numerical limitations, characters, lack of random employees, non-existent self-preservation of a restaurant) can scratch even a 'point one' from the score, because it's a game that keeps growing. It changes weather according to the months in-game, gives you new stuff if you play through the years, gives you a lot of money earning (and spending) possibilities and, maybe the most important reason, it gives you a sense of accomplishment. Truly a great game that still, after 14 years, doesn't have a worthy successor.