Hot Springs Story 2

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. And then there’s a template that has you managing not employees but members of a sports team, something we first saw in Grand Prix Story.

Hot Springs Story 2 originally released on mobile devices in 2020, then received a port to PC and Nintendo Switch in 2022. And as you might have guessed, this game clearly follows in the footsteps of its predecessor, the original Hot Springs Story, having you manage a sort of hotel resort with natural hot springs as its signature feature.

When it comes to what’s changed since the original… not much? There are more options, more types of rooms and decorations, players need to keep track of their construction employees, whose number limits the amount of construction projects you can have at one time. And there are goals you can aim to fulfill to get bonuses. However, for the most part this is at its core the same experience, slightly tweaked and improved.

As for the presentation, this is in line with what we’re used to from Kairosoft. As I mentioned above, this game makes use of Kairosoft’s signature presentation style using simple retro-styled pixel art visuals, with some of those visuals even copy-pasted over from the first game. This is paired with bouncy synthesized music that works well enough but is largely forgettable, along with simple sound effects. For the most part, 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’m kinda’ surprised that Kairosoft chose this as a game to revisit with a direct sequel, since the original Hot Springs Story wasn’t one of their better games, and other more noteworthy games like Game Dev Story and Epic Astro Story are far more deserving of a follow-up. Even more perplexing is that they made a sequel but don’t seem to have put a lot of work into distinguishing this game from its predecessor. I suppose if this theme appeals to you, this is the better of the two games to get. But if you already own the original, I don’t think it’s worth your while to get this game and get what is mostly more of the same.

tl;dr – Hot Springs Story 2 is a Management Simulation where players manage a hot springs resort and hotel. There are minor improvements over the original Hot Springs Story, but not enough to truly distinguish this game. And the original game wasn’t one of Kairosoft’s best titles either, so it’s hard to recommend to play this marginally-improved sequel.

Grade: C+

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