Biz Builder Delux

Genre: Management Simulation

Players: 1

.

Review:

Without a doubt the most prolific developer and publisher of Management Simulation games on Nintendo Switch is Kairosoft, who specializes in games with a retro-style isometric pixel art style, often with the word “Story” in the title. As of this writing, Kairosoft has released 60 games on Nintendo Switch, most of them Management Simulations.

After their earlier games, Kairosoft had established a few templates for their Simulation games that later games would largely follow. Game Dev Story established a Simulation-style game more focused on managing employee time and focus, Hot Springs Story established a Simulation style in line with Theme Park Simulators where you try to cater to guests’ tastes to maximize attendance and income, and Epic Astro Story established a Simulation style akin to games like Sim City, where you’re building out a town or settlement.

Biz Builder Delux originally released on mobile devices in 2014, then saw a port to Nintendo Switch in 2020, then to PC and PlayStation 4 in 2023. And this game is the second sort of Management Simulation above, with players managing one and then later more retail stores, improving its staff and products, and gradually growing their business empire.

I’ve reviewed a lot of these Kairosoft games by this point, and despite this developer’s shortcomings and eccentricities, I thought I had gotten used to their way of doing things, but Biz Builder Delux just kept leaving me perplexed and frustrated. my staff wasn’t doing their work in a timely manner, and as per usual with Kairosoft you cannot give them tasks directly, so I tried hiring more staff… but there’s a staff limit that the game doesn’t tell you how to raise, so I just had one employee permanently on unpaid leave now. And then the game wanted me to send employees on a treasure hunt? What?

Kairosoft’s usual issues with explaining far too little to players and just directing them to refer to an unhelpful in-game guide to figure things out has rarely been such a major pain as I found it to be here, and while I suspect there might have been some fun to be had if I struggled through to try to figure this game out, I tend to take the opinion that if a game doesn’t want to try to show you how to play it, a player shouldn’t be expected to struggle to figure out how to do so on their own.

As I mentioned above, this game makes use of Kairosoft’s signature presentation style using simple retro-styled pixel art visuals, paired with repetitive chiptune music and sound effects. Apart from the forgettable, annoying synthesized music, everything about this presentation is really endearing, though by this point we’ve seen more or less the same thing in numerous other Kairosoft games.

Overall, I think Biz Builder Delux is an example of all of Kairosoft’s worst traits being brought to the surface, and while there may be a perfectly serviceable game underneath, I have little desire to find it, especially when there are plenty of other much better Management Simulation games to play, even within Kairosoft’s own catalog. I suggest you aim for one of those instead.

tl;dr – Biz Builder Delux is a Management Simulation where players manage and grow one business and eventually multiple businesses, but this game does such a poor job explaining its mechanics to the player that it’s made needlessly frustrating. You have plenty of other options in this genre, play one of those instead.

Grade: C-

^{You can support eShopperReviews on Patreon! Please click HERE to become a Sponsor!}

^{This month’s sponsors are Jamie and His Cats, Ben, Ilya Zverev, Andy Miller, Homer Simpin, Johannes, Francis Obst, Gabriel Coronado-Medina, Jared Wark, Kristoffer Wulff, and Seth Christenfeld. Thank you for helping to keep the reviews coming!}