March to a Million

Genre: Management Simulation

Players: 1

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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 61 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.

March to a Million originally released on mobile devices in 2017, then saw a port to Nintendo Switch in 2019, then to PlayStation 4 in 2021, to PC in 2022, and to Xbox One in 2024. And this game follows the Game Dev Story formula, having players take the role of a management agency guiding singers to stardom and fortune.

Interestingly, while most games in this style have players trying to mix-and-match ideal combinations to create a winning formula, here one element of that combination is already set firmly in place – the singer. Each singer has their own style that is best-suited to specific song topics, and you’ll need to find the best fit to ensure they can best capitalize on their own specific talent.

While this limits this portion of the game, March to a Million makes it work by making this only a part of your focus, as you need to manage your singers’ activities. Should you have them focus on performing to rake in more cash and gain a greater fan following, or should you have them expend their limited energy on training to ensure that future songs have an even greater chance at success? This different approach to management works well for this game, though I do have a few issues.

First, I’m perplexed that this game refuses to let players direct a singer to work on their next song while the current one is charting. Also, I do think this game could do more to give players options for expansion and customizing performers and improving their talents.

As I mentioned above, this game makes use of Kairosoft’s signature presentation style using simple retro-styled pixel art visuals, paired with repetitive and annoying chiptune music and sound effects. Apart from the irritating 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 liked March to a Million, and much like The Manga Works before it, I think Kairosoft managed to make some clever choices here to ensure that even though this game revisits one of their oft-repeated formulas, it still does so in a way that feels refreshing and unique, and that works well for its topic matter. If you’re a fan of Management Simulation games that focus on character management and business management rather than building things, I think this game will be worth a look.

tl;dr – March to a Million is a Management Simulation where players take the role of a talent agency managing and guiding their singers to build up their careers. This game has a good mix of elements, and while I think it could stand to be even more varied, what’s here is enjoyable and works well. Fans of this genre looking for a relatively simple game with a focus on management instead of building should give this one a look.

Grade: B

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