Mega Mall Story

Kairosoft is an iOS company that I actively follow to get a sense of what they are currently working on. They stick with a specific genre of games that is geared toward clinging onto you and not letting go. The type of games that drains my battery life and puts other handheld games to shame in terms of how engrossed I get into them. I was first introduced to Kairosoft with Game Dev Story and was immediately sucked into the addictive nature of running my own video game company. I yet again have become addicted to their latest sim Mega Mall Story, although I’m experiencing deja vu playing it.

Mega Mall Story puts you in charge of managing a mall and building it up to a successful business, as well as investing in areas around the mall to help bring in more shoppers. You are responsible for building shops, restaurants, decorating the mall, and planning ways to make navigating this amalgamation much easier for your consumers. It’s another menu navigator where you must juggle multiple variables to increase profits which had been the main focus for all of these sim type Kairosoft games.

You start with a small handful of stores on a couple different levels but steadily grows the more you invest into MMS. This game is great about rewarding you with new items and upgrades almost at an exhaustive level but is geared toward keeping you into the game. Your mall is basically on a big grid that expands the more your mall levels up, both horizontally or vertically. Some smaller stores might only take a block or two but bigger investments, like the cinema, can take up more blocks. You are allowed to throw up stores wherever you please but are rewarded with upgrades if you place certain stores next to each other called combos.

Each store has its own level and stocking rate. The more people use a certain store, the more it will level up and earn you more revenue. The game has a simple RPG element that comes into play when deciding on how to level up your store but doesn’t come with a risk/reward system; you end up growing regardless of what you do. I really like being bombarded with lots of information to juggle and loved watching my mall turn into a bustling area. It’s especially great when fever mode kicks in and your mall becomes flooded with frenzied shoppers.

The game retains that same cutesy art style that is present in all their other titles, which is probably why they can easily pump these games out so fast; I don’t mind at all though. The only problem with the graphics is when you zoom in on your mall all the way. Your wall gets big and forced you to scroll around to find what you are looking for. This is one problem I face with the game which is some of these stores look very similar. They are labeled with what they are but some titles can be obstructed with objects like stair cases. It only became an issue to me when I wanted to move stores or try and group certain stores together and not being able to find a store I know I bought.

Which comes to another small issue of controlling certain commands. For the most part, you are clicking through menus or just watching your money rack up, but navigating through your mall can be clunky at times. It sometimes had a hard time tracking my finger at where exactly I was wanting to place my shop. Also, the shop is blinking when you are selecting the place you want it; once you place the item, it’s still blinking on the screen. Multiple times I placed the same store right next to each other when I accidentally clicked on a blank space. I wish they would have automatically backed you out of the building mode when you placed your store. Sure, that would have been annoying if you were wanting to build multiples of the same thing but it’s a rare instance for me to build more than one of whatever item I’m using.

Getting my small criticisms out of the way, I absolutely adore this game. Kairosoft does an amazing job with their iOS titles that really make you appreciate what can be done on your multimedia device. These management sim games are perfect for almost anyone to relax and just have fun with since their isn’t much of a challenge. You work at your own pace and grow as much as you want it to grow. Mega Mall Story is $3.99 which is a little more than most iOS games but the quality really shines through the relatively cheap cost.