I’m on the move a lot lately, so console gaming has been really tough for me. Luckily, even though this has been my bane, I’ve still found potential for gaming! I always carry my 3DS, PSP or iPod on me. And lemme tell you, the iPod is most definitely a place for gamers, even Lite Gaming.
Today we’re going to be looking into the widely popular Kairosoft’s games. This company has been developing games that have been a success everytime it hits the iTunes App Market. These guys have been around since 1996, making games for the mobile phones and PCs. Their first release on the iOS market was a game called, Game Dev Story. It first debuted in October of 2010. In no time at all, it reached the Top 10 in iOS app games.
Well, look at that. I’ve already sold over 9 Million Units on my sixth sequel to Moe-Tan.. Ahem… Anyway. Game Dev Story is a Business Simulation Game that has been highly praised by many game developers, as well as writers other than myself. The appeal has always been that the development of the games was almost completely player controlled, and the quality of the games developed was determined by who you could afford.
Good thing, Walt Sidney has my back on writing great game ideas for Moe-Tan.
The other things that were handled pretty well were the translations. They’re pretty easy to understand, and most of the time, these translations also came with hilarious results. Not that they were bad, oh no. They were Oh-So Punny.
This name was just ridiculous…
Moving on to the next game in their arsenal. We have Hot Spring Story. This was another interesting sim game, that actually started you in building a business. Literally. You ran a business that thrived on the popular Japanese theme of Hot Springs.
It was sort of like running a hotel with Hot Springs. Like Game Dev Story before it, it was completely player controlled, and this time, you didn’t have to hire anyone, but rather, you played a business where you visibly saw your clientele interacting with your business. You felt compelled to cater to them and make sure that everything was not only convenient for them, but made them spend more money.
The object of the game was to invite people to stay at your Hot Springs and have your customers stay as long as they can. The customers themselves fell into different categories. Families, Artists, Old Couples, Doting Couples, CEOs… You name it, they’re probably in there. And each of them had different tastes for when they stay at your Hot Spring. On top of catering to all of the different kinds of customers, you were also competing in magazines against other Hot Spring owners. You had to make sure that you were the best by making different combos in placing your facilities so that people visited them more frequently, and would eventually spend more money!
This game had me hooked for weeks… And this was only the tip of the iceberg on Kairosoft’s list of games. Haha.
My first Kairosoft game was actually Pocket Academy. Oh lord, that game. I couldn’t stop making all of my students get A PRUS. Otherwise, they were failures to me.
The object of this Sim game was similar to Hot Spring Story. The Formula of this game was structurally the same, but the object was a bit different in comparison to the lats game. This game now introduces the feature used in Game Dev story, a hired or collected unit. But it is now mobile, and acts based on its own personality. As implied, you now run a school and you are to raise your students into model alumni. You hire teachers and build classrooms and facilities to accomodate your students. Your students are your main source of income, as you have to pay for your facilities’ maintenance, as well as your teachers’ salaries.
Teachers could be trained and levelled up to be able to teach their students better, as well as the students themselves, so their grades will become better when they perform on their Midterms exams. Never have I been more excited for that term to come up, because I knew all of my students would be A+ students… … Or I’d whip them… … If they had that option. THEY WILL NOT FAIL ME.
Now, there are quite a few titles, so getting to all of them will be quite the task, so I’ll mention my Author’s Pick and have you decide on the titles.
Now, Kairosoft doesn’t exclusively develop for the iOS, as they also have games on the Android App market as well that were not released for iOS. I am very sad about this, and hope it is remedied soon. But the problem for Kairosoft porting their games over to the iOS market is that the coding is slightly different, and what works for Android, might cause huge bugs on iOS. But all of their releases on iOS thus far that have been ported over have worked flawlessly, so it’s only a matter of time.
With what they have released though, among them is my current favorite: Dungeon Village!
If you’re an RPG fan, and a Simulation game fan… Oh boy, you’re in for a treat. This game is both amazing, and hilarious. Weeks of fun just trying to build up my villagers to be able to fight any monster! Equip them for any situation! Venture to any platform!
The object of this game is to have an exciting and bustling town. Unfortunately, right next to your town is a field full of monsters. But alas! There is hope! Adventurers from around the world come through your town to fight off these monsters! If there’s a fight, there’s coin to be made through these adventurers.
When you establish your town, you already will have a few people sticking around. If you satisfy them by giving them new equipment or giving them spells, they’ll want to stick around and stay in your village.
Notice that Kairosoft also continues their tradition of making ridiculously noticeable shout outs to other games or people. But when these people visit, they can also fill specific jobs. You have a limited amount of jobs at first, but as your town progresses in popularity, you’ll start bringing in more people, who most likely have different jobs from the ones you already have. Once you satisfy them enough to make them stay in your village, your other villagers will be able to change into those jobs too! Likewise though, once you get these guys to stay, different and more powerful monsters start showing up. So it’s your job to make sure your villagers are well-equipped and trained to handle any situation! Make the greatest village the world has ever seen! All the monsters will cower in front of you! Make ‘em run!
So this concludes our little review of a few Kairosoft games. I hope you guys will go out and buy them too! They don’t cost much, but for what they’re worth, they are incredible games!
Here’s a list of their games so you can go out and look for them too!
Article by Sebastian “Blibbles” Visconti
