Addictive Japanese import, provided you can figure out the nuances and look past the very dated graphics....
So, it was with a great deal of trepidation that I forked over full price for this title last week, sans review to back up my decision. I suppose the poverty of reviews so far are either because nobody figures this game will sell all that well, so why bother, or, nobody can figure out what to say about it. So here goes:
The basic gameplay is that you have been given the opportunity to build and run your own hi-rise building. You can put offices, hotel rooms, theatres, chapels, stores, restaurants, and so on, building up floor by floor. The tenants pay for the use of their space in a variety of ways (offices pay you a monthly rent, while hotel rooms and restaurants pay off on a daily basis, if people use them). The people using your building will tell you when they want something you haven't provided (like a store or bathroom nearby), but other than that, you are relatively free to develop your building as you see fit. The Big Boss shows up once a while to do a walk-around and assign you a rating, but that doesn't seem to influence your game one way or the other.
So, the game quickly becomes a management sim, in which you look around and tweak things (add a staircase or another elevator car to keep lines from forming), putting in new floors or bigger items as money becomes available. This sort of game does not appeal to many, especially today's run-and-gun flashy action lover. As such, I would recommend trying it if you already enjoy slow-moving tycoon-style games.
On the other hand, even if you do love that sort of genre, this game still might not do it for you. Why?
Well, first of all, it is a true Japanese import, with all the crappy 2-d boxy graphics you can eat (I'm told it is a fairly accurate port of sim tower, but that was one that slipped past me...must've been busy getting married or something). Despite this, though, most of the components are relatively easy to identify, although the overall effect is not pretty. The people are micro-pixel silhouettes that resemble 80s robots, stuttering around from floor to floor, and turning purple or red when something is upsetting them. In summary, the best word to describe the graphics is....klunky.
The text is serviceably translated to english, though a few errors here and there mar things. Most of the time, though, the text is charming.
Sound is pretty much background samples of crowds, cars, and the odd Japanese phrase being spoken; nothing overly annoying, and no midi music to get on your nerves.
The thing that bugged me the most was that little help is offered in terms of details. You are led through a tutorial that gives you all the basics of building, but are left in the dark concerning most of the details of building, such as how many bathrooms per floor are recommended, or how you should be placing the stairs and elevators. Of course, a major part of tycoon style games is exactly this sort of figuring things out yourself, but I felt like most of the time I had no idea if what I was building would be appealing to the people, and if it wasn't appealing, how I could make it better. As I said earlier, The Big Cheese shows up once in a while and rates your building, but his comments are extremely sparse, considering he spends a whole day walking around 'inspecting' ("place more toilets"). No indication of where they should be placed, or how far away 'far' actually is in the building.
The only other thing that got on my nerves was the lack of scenarios. In total, you are given three buildings to play with: one tutorial, one office building, and one commercial hotel/shopping mall building. You can freely play the latter two to your heart's content, but there ar eno further goals beyond dinking around in what is essentially a badly-rendered dollhouse of a building.
So. Is this a fun game? Yes. Within a given building, there is a lot to do in terms of building and managing (you are also in charge of hiring and assigning security, janitors, maids, deciding what movie will be showing in the theatre, cleaning the toilets, etc.). Although it looks like there is little to do at first, as the game progresses, new options and building items become available (Chapels, subways, etc.). So yes, it is fun, despite the low-key pace and very dated presentaiton.
Would I recommend it to everyone? No.
The fact that it looked like some bootleg GBA title that someone hacked together on their Atari 2600 made the new-release pricetag feel a bit like a ripoff, and like I said before, it moves at quite a plodding pace. If either of these things turns you off, you will not enjoy this.
That said, I'm still playing it, and am still enjoying myself. Go figure.