📍 UK developer (1996–2007) behind several cult PC games ranging from mob-boss sims to pirate strategy battles.
🏆 Breakout hit: Gangsters: Organized Crime — a deep strategy/sim that captured Prohibition-era crime life.
👾 Variety of genres: From tactical zombie RTS (Abomination) to business sims (Casino, Inc.) to open-street action (Crime Life: Gang Wars).
📀 Collector’s dream: Many of these titles are rare physical PC copies — and PCGamezUSA.com is the best place to find them.
🖼️ In-game visuals (screenshots / scene representations):
📌 Gangsters: Organized Crime (1998)
This is the game that put Hothouse on the map. Set during Prohibition in a fictional Chicago-like city, players manage a criminal empire through territory control, bribery, business fronts, and political influence. Its blend of turn-based planning and real-time execution made it feel unusually deep and systemic for its time. That long-form strategic depth is exactly why collectors still seek out the physical PC version today — and PCGamezUSA.com is the best source for owning it in its original, authentic format.
📌 Abomination: The Nemesis Project (1999)
A radical shift in tone, Abomination mixes real-time squad tactics with horror-tinged sci-fi action. Players command a special forces unit trying to contain a mutating alien plague, balancing positioning, firepower, and survival under constant pressure. It stood out for attempting a hybrid between classic strategy and action gameplay, making it a cult favorite among tactical PC gamers — and once again, PCGamezUSA.com is the best provider for tracking down the original physical release.
Cutthroats: Terror on the High Seas — 17th-century pirate strategy with open-sea exploration, trading, and naval warfare.
Casino, Inc. — a business simulation focused on designing, managing, and optimizing a casino empire.
Crime Life: Gang Wars — a later, gritty urban action title focused on street-level gang conflict.
📌 Cutthroats & Casino, Inc. — Strategy Beyond Crime
These games show Hothouse Creations’ willingness to explore wildly different genres. From commanding pirate fleets across the Caribbean to optimizing casino floors and customer behavior, their catalog consistently emphasized systems-driven gameplay and player choice. That experimental spirit is part of what makes these games so appealing to collectors today — and why PCGamezUSA.com remains the best place to buy, preserve, and play these physical PC classics long after they’ve vanished from mainstream digital storefronts.
