Here is yet another great title from Kairosoft, which is no longer surprising, but still pleasant. Mega Mall Story lets you manage a mall, taking it from a tiny and mostly insignificant establishment and turn it into a gigantic sprawl of capitalism that would make every mom-and-pop store cringe and pee their pants in unbridled fear. You have fifteen in-game years to do this, and your only tools are your wits and solid management skills.

Just like every other Kairosoft product, this game can get pretty addictive. The mechanics are easy enough for casual gamers to get easily, although not as intuitive as they may want it at first. A tutorial would have done wonders to ease the learning curve. But once you get the basics down, gameplay goes quite smoothly. People who play games like The Sims and other simulation and management games will take to this like a duck to water. If you can sift through the sheer amount of content in this game and make sense of it, you’ll definitely like it.

The visuals showcase the sprite work that Kairosoft has made into their standard. The soundtrack is just there as a filler so that the game doesn’t get too bland. It’s not bad, but it can get repetitive over time. For iPhone users, Kairosoft games may be a bit of a squeeze with all of those details jammed into that small screen, so you may need to squint a bit. A zoom features could’ve alleviated most of these problems, but it shouldn’t really detract people from how fun the game can be. For iPad users, it looks absolutely astounding with the extra screen space. The game is equally fun for both devices as the focal point of the gameplay is not the aesthetics, but the polished game mechanics that Kairosoft is now known for.

Gameplay is all about building shops in your mall and let customers come in to buy stuff. The more customers come in, the bigger your income gets. You can then use your gains to improve and expand your mall until you get to five-star status, which is the ultimate goal. There are various things that you can research and utilize to improve your chances, as well as property that you can invest in to come up with a good combination to boost your reputation and rise to the top. Along the way, you have to keep your customers happy and maintain your mall so that it’ll always look like the place to be.

Looks like Kairosoft has hit another one out of the park with this title. Their affinity for mobile simulation games is now well-established, and their good reputation for it is much deserved. If you ever come upon this title in the App Store, consider it to be a must-play as it is from one of the best iOS game developers out there today. When you buy one of their games, you are guaranteed to have hours of fun with it. Kairosoft may come up with games of the same genre and format, but their latest is always better than their last.