[HN Gopher] Show HN: A game where you invest into startups from ...
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       Show HN: A game where you invest into startups from history
        
       Author : vire00
       Score  : 27 points
       Date   : 2025-11-15 21:05 UTC (5 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (startupgambit.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (startupgambit.com)
        
       | oceansky wrote:
       | Not playable on mobile browser
        
       | achandra03 wrote:
       | Pretty fun! Only complaint is that the responses from the
       | founders take a bit long to load.
        
       | mike-gongolidis wrote:
       | Love it! Very smart! Are all the company names real?
        
         | Delk wrote:
         | I'm pretty sure they aren't. I invested in what was obviously
         | Facebook under a different name.
        
           | Jordan-117 wrote:
           | I got "SalesForce" at one point.
        
       | jmkd wrote:
       | Stopped / crashed Dec 31 2005 with $358K return. Cannot proceed.
       | Fun until then.
        
         | cjs_ac wrote:
         | Same - I think that's the end of the game (so far?)
        
         | frenchmajesty wrote:
         | Yea it ends on that date. I cashed out with $622K
        
       | westurner wrote:
       | Re: backtesting and paper trading:
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38908537 :
       | 
       | > _pyfolio.tears.create_interesting_times_tear_sheet_
        
       | frenchmajesty wrote:
       | Fun game! My investing strategy is to flush out quickly who's the
       | team, what's the traction, what's unique insight into the market.
       | 
       | Bullshitters have trash or no answers. Killer companies have one
       | of those 3 that is usually very compelling.
        
         | volkk wrote:
         | i've asked who's the team 3 times and always got "can't
         | disclose." i figured this was a limitation of the game. do some
         | answer?
        
           | frenchmajesty wrote:
           | I do get answers. The ones who typically said can't disclose
           | are you full of shit. Crack teams know they're cracked and
           | they will tell you.
           | 
           | "I'm a MIT-trained security engineer; I'm an ex-VP at Paypal,
           | etc..."
        
       | lordgrenville wrote:
       | I tried investing in every pitch I got, which seems to be a
       | positive strategy.
        
       | ivraatiems wrote:
       | This is a genuinely great use of LLMs/related technology. Dynamic
       | characters you can have conversations with to make game choices
       | more informed is a really cool idea, actually feels original and
       | clever. I really enjoyed playing it.
        
       | asadm wrote:
       | very cool game! needs some juice.
       | 
       | https://garden.bradwoods.io/notes/design/juice
       | 
       | also, add a leaderboard
        
       | andrewrn wrote:
       | This is pretty fun!
        
       | frenchmajesty wrote:
       | Damn. Now I understand VC's a little better.
       | 
       | Some deals I saw "damn the traction is off the chart" and I
       | didn't even care to ask any question I just threw money at them.
       | I saw one startup named Salesforce, a CRM. I guess hindsight is
       | 20/20 on that one lol. Didn't even read the pitch.
       | 
       | This game is awesome
        
       | anonu wrote:
       | nice game - but you need a UX designer. Almost abandoned it since
       | I thought it was broken... I just didnt know what I was waiting
       | for or didnt know where to click.
        
       | cosmicgadget wrote:
       | I need to be able to type faster, just got done chatting with
       | Mark and I completely missed the opportunity to invest in Quibi.
        
       | arkensaw wrote:
       | fun, but it seems if I just invest in everything I don't lose.
       | 
       | I get 3x/4x return on a lot of things but only lose <1x if its a
       | bad investment
        
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       (page generated 2025-11-20 23:01 UTC)