Info about Hot Springs Story 2:

Official game description:
Next Kairogames
===============
Coming soon  
About the Game
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What lies beyond the bath curtain? A "hot" new entry into the hotel sim genre!  
Features new baths exclusive to the sequel. Furnish your resort with Cauldron Baths, Footbaths, Open-Air Baths, and more. Create and customize your own world-famous hot springs resort.  
Entertain visitors with tons of facilities, including Ping Pong Tables, Stores, and Oil Drum Baths. Don't forget to provide first-class local cuisine! Thrill foodie guests with everything from humble Ramen Stalls to fancy Sushi Restaurants.  
Give your grounds a splash of color with decorative plants and watch the seasons change throughout the year.  
Baths also have a variety of effects, like relieving fatigue or promoting smooth, glowing skin. Placing a Beautician and Chocolatier near one of these baths will help you reel in guests who want to feel pampered.  
Help develop the local area by investing in different tourist attractions. Will you promote the Soothing Forest? A bustling Amusement Park? Maybe even an all-year round Ski Slope?  
Before you know it, you'll be booking tours for all kinds of visitors, from couples and families to ninjas and supermodels! The more guests you welcome, the more popular your resort will become.  
Hit the right targets, and travel guides will start featuring you in their rankings, too. Aim for the top and become the best 5-Star hot springs resort the world has ever seen!  
Try searching for "Kairosoft" to see all of our games!!

Release date: 18 Dec, 2022

Categories: Management Simulation, Base Building, Resource Management, Economic Simulation, Character Management, Customization, Strategic Planning, Progression System


- Hardware Profile: No data
Feature extractions:
- Community Price: No data
- Playtime Metrics: No data
- Time-to-fun: No data
- Player Archetypes: No data


Below are summaries of things people say about the game per category.
Each point is assigned a weight that represents how often it is mentioned across all reviews.
What players like:
- Rich, Engaging, and Replayable Gameplay (weight 0.97): Players consistently praise the game for its extensive content, offering hundreds of hours of gameplay and high replayability. It's noted for being easy to pick up but deep enough to keep players engaged, with significant improvements over its predecessor.
- Classic Kairosoft Simulation Experience (weight 0.77): The game is recognized as a quintessential Kairosoft title, maintaining the developer's signature pixel art style and addictive management simulation gameplay. It's seen as a strong addition to their consistent catalog, offering unique innovations while retaining familiar charm.
- Significant Sequel Improvements (weight 0.67): As a sequel, the game introduces numerous enhancements and optimizations over the first generation. Key improvements include expanded content, simplified operations, new gameplay elements like research systems and group guests, and increased map scale and freedom.
- Authentic Hot Spring Management Theme (weight 0.56): The game successfully immerses players in the role of a hot spring inn owner, focusing on building and managing a Japanese-style resort. It expands on the theme with more facilities, staff, and strategic elements to attract guests and achieve the goal of becoming the best inn.
- Strategic Facility & Employee Management (weight 0.35): Core gameplay revolves around strategic layout and management of various facilities to meet customer needs and attract different guest types. The addition of an employee system with growth attributes and sightseeing tours further enriches the management depth.
- User-Friendly & Balanced Design (weight 0.31): The game is praised for its excellent balance, casual nature, and effective guidance, making it easy for new players to start. Its simple yet flexible mechanics contribute to a strong overall gaming experience.
- New Currencies and Research System (weight 0.23): The introduction of medals and research points adds new layers to the game's economy and progression. Research points are crucial for employee upgrades, developing new dishes, and promoting the inn, while medals can be used for landscaping items.
- Charming Aesthetics & Soothing Atmosphere (weight 0.18): The game's adorable pixel art style, cheerful music, and overall presentation create a relaxing and pleasant atmosphere. It's described as a soothing experience that helps players unwind.
- Enhanced Building Flexibility (weight 0.18): A major improvement is the ability to move and rotate buildings freely, without cost or unlocking. This, combined with a more subdivided grid and new building types, allows for more diverse and flexible inn layouts.
- Deep Simulation & Cultivation Elements (weight 0.15): The game offers a pure simulation management experience, enhanced by elements like staff training, job allocation, and visual charts for operational insights. It successfully blends simulation with cultivation aspects, appealing to genre enthusiasts.
- Interconnected Building Bonuses (weight 0.11): A key mechanic involves placing landscapes and facilities strategically next to buildings to increase popularity, satisfaction, and income. Completing customer requests also grants items for further development and visitor attraction.
- Expanded Facility Variety (weight 0.11): The game features a significantly increased and richer variety of facilities compared to its predecessor. Players enjoy unlocking new facilities, which are also presented with clearer and more detailed visuals.
- Strategic Growth & Achievement (weight 0.11): Inn popularity and customer satisfaction are crucial for attracting more guests and increasing their stay duration. New guest types and strategic management contribute to a strong sense of achievement as the inn expands and prospers.
- Engaging Lottery System (weight 0.1): The game includes a lottery system where players can use tickets to win various prizes, including a special grand prize. This adds an enjoyable element of chance and reward to the gameplay.
- Refined Animations and Details (weight 0.07): The game features more refined animations and small details, particularly in transaction animations. These visual enhancements contribute to a more polished and engaging experience.

Common complaints:
- Excessive Grinding & Difficulty (weight 0.9): Players find the game excessively difficult and grindy, especially compared to other Kairosoft titles. This leads to a prolonged and repetitive late-game experience, making achievement unlocking and progression feel like a chore rather than fun.
- Frustrating UI & Controls (weight 0.65): The game suffers from poor mouse adaptation and unresponsive controls, particularly during building placement and movement. Frequent pop-ups interrupt gameplay, making it impossible to leave the game idle and contributing to a frustrating user experience.
- Unsatisfying Guest Mechanics (weight 0.31): The guest satisfaction system is often confusing and feels unfair. Guests exhibit illogical behavior, such as ignoring available facilities or getting stuck on inefficient paths, making it difficult to meet their needs and progress.
- Specific Building Limitations (weight 0.18): Key buildings like hot springs and reception cannot be moved, requiring demolition and rebuilding to change their position. This inflexibility hinders layout planning and optimization.
- High Cost & Low Income (weight 0.15): Players frequently lack sufficient currency, particularly in the early game, making essential upgrades difficult. Plants are notably expensive, and hot spring facilities, despite being central to the game, provide surprisingly low satisfaction income.
- General Dislike & Comparison (weight 0.15): Some players simply did not enjoy the game, finding it less appealing than other Kairosoft titles or feeling it missed its potential. This sentiment is based on subjective taste and comparisons to previous games.
- Technical Issues & Port Quality (weight 0.14): The game suffers from critical bugs, including save file corruption and loading failures. The PC port is also criticized for poor optimization and a lack of graphical improvements, suggesting it was not well-adapted from its original platform.
- Problematic Gacha System (weight 0.13): The gacha system is criticized for its unskippable, long animations and inconvenient manual scrolling, which detracts from the gameplay experience, especially when repeated draws are necessary for progression.
- Kairo-kun Achievement Issues (weight 0.12): The Kairo-kun achievement is particularly challenging and opaque, requiring extensive grinding and specific, often unclear, conditions to satisfy, which significantly prolongs playtime and causes frustration.
- Redundant & Unclear Systems (weight 0.12): Some new systems and upgrade mechanics feel redundant or meaningless, adding complexity without enhancing gameplay. The lack of clear guidance on facility compatibility further complicates strategic planning.
- Weak Narrative & Interaction (weight 0.06): The game features a generic storyline and lacks meaningful character interactions, which can diminish player engagement and immersion, especially for those seeking a richer narrative experience.

Gameplay feedback:
- Core Kairosoft Management Loop (weight 0.72): The game is a Kairosoft hot spring inn management simulation, building upon its predecessor with similar core mechanics: earning money, expanding the inn, investing, and participating in evaluations. Players construct various hot spring facilities, guest rooms, dining halls, and shops to attract guests and become a renowned inn.
- Guest Satisfaction & Progression (weight 0.49): Players must manage popularity and other metrics to ensure guest satisfaction, which in turn increases the inn's star rating and unlocks new facilities. Different guest types have varying preferences, and meeting their demands is essential for progression and achieving high satisfaction scores for final achievements.
- Facility Placement & Compatibility (weight 0.44): A key gameplay element involves strategically placing facilities to maximize compatibility and create synergistic effects, which is crucial for smooth progression and higher-attribute areas. While most facilities can be moved, hot springs themselves cannot be relocated without demolition and rebuilding.
- Post-Game & Replayability (weight 0.27): While the game has a 10-year ending, players can continue playing indefinitely to achieve all goals. The inclusion of research points, obtained from guest facility usage, encourages replayability with new knowledge.
- New Features & Expansion (weight 0.24): The game introduces new features such as a craftsman mechanism limiting simultaneous builds, the ability to open branch stores, and new map buildings for expansion. Staff management, including upgrades and duties, and kitchen upgrades for food are also present.
- Idle Gameplay & Repetitive Elements (weight 0.16): Some players found the game could be played casually as an idle game, especially to manage numerical inflation. However, this can lead to repetitive clicking and a lack of deep, engaging elements, with some mechanisms feeling not well-thought-out.

Performance notes:
- Stable performance, no bugs (weight 0.08): Players reported a smooth experience with no bugs or crashes, even after extended playtime. The game appears to be well-optimized on PC.
- Optimization issues noted (weight 0.03): One player mentioned that the game is not well-optimized. This contrasts with other feedback, suggesting a potential inconsistency or isolated issue.

Recommendations:
- Highly Recommended for Kairosoft Fans (weight 0.51): The game is strongly recommended for existing Kairosoft fans and enthusiasts of simulation management games, particularly those who enjoy the classic Kairosoft style and presentation. Many reviewers express excitement for more Kairosoft titles.
- Classic Hot Spring Management (weight 0.27): Players who enjoy the specific theme of managing a hot spring inn will find this game appealing. It's highlighted as a classic and traditional Kairosoft experience, suitable for those who appreciate a slower pace and detailed management.
- Consider Purchasing on Sale (weight 0.17): Some players suggest that casual players or those interested in simulation management games should consider purchasing the game when it's on sale or as part of a bundle, rather than at full price.
- Pixel Management Appeal (weight 0.15): The game appeals to fans of pixel art and management games, especially those who enjoy arranging elements and observing the results. It's a good fit for players who like strategic, low-key games.
- Minor Gameplay Tips (weight 0.06): A minor suggestion is to avoid overbuilding in the early stages of the game. Additionally, one reviewer noted that the background music might be best enjoyed at a low volume.
- Good on iPad (weight 0.02): One piece of feedback, though limited, indicates that the game performs well on iPad devices.

Other player notes:
- Idle-friendly PC version (weight 0.11): The PC version of the game is well-suited for idle play, allowing players to run it in the background and occasionally interact, making it ideal for multitasking. This contrasts with the mobile version, which may require more active engagement.
- Consider bundle purchase (weight 0.04): Players recommend purchasing the game as part of a bundle, especially given the developer's typical game characteristics. This suggests a better value proposition than buying it individually.
- Nostalgia drives purchases (weight 0.04): A portion of the player base bought the game primarily due to nostalgia and fond childhood memories. This highlights the game's appeal to long-time fans or those familiar with the developer's previous titles.
- Long achievement completion (weight 0.03): It takes a significant amount of time, over thirty hours, to obtain all achievements in the game. This suggests a substantial amount of content or grind for completionists.

Emotions:
- Satisfaction (weight 0.31): Players feel satisfied due to the overall enjoyment derived from the game's quality, improvements, and engaging management simulation gameplay. This includes the pleasure of growing their inn, achieving all achievements, and appreciating the game's depth, content, and lasting appeal. The game's balance, cute graphics, and new features also contribute to a relaxing and enjoyable experience.
- Frustration (weight 0.21): Frustration stems from restrictive monetization, poor UI/UX, and unresponsive controls, particularly during building construction and movement. Players are also frustrated by frequent interruptions, difficulty satisfying customers due to rigid systems and illogical guest behavior, and the grind required for achievements or progression. Bugs, cloud save issues, and a lack of guidance further contribute to this negative emotion.
- Disappointment (weight 0.09): Disappointment arises from the perception of the game as a 'cash grab' and its failure to meet personal tastes or potential due to perceived fatal flaws. Players are let down by redundant design, formulaic gameplay, ineffective compatibility systems, and a lack of depth or freshness, especially in the late-game. Awkward controls and difficulty in satisfying guests also contribute to this feeling.
- Joy (weight 0.06): Joy is experienced through the overall enjoyment of the game, particularly the fun of running a shop and the engaging transaction animations. Players appreciate the game's simplicity, aesthetics, and the fresh experience it offers, especially after a break. The general quality and charm of Kairosoft games also contribute to this positive emotion.
- Excitement (weight 0.05): Excitement is generated by the game's appealing theme, cultural aspects, and the goal of building the strongest hot spring. Players are also excited by the extensive improvements, new features, and expanded content that make the game engaging, addictive, and time-consuming. The upgraded logic and enhanced player experience contribute to this anticipation and enthusiasm.
- Nostalgia (weight 0.04): Nostalgia is a strong emotion for players who recall Kairosoft games as part of their childhood memories or from old feature phones and early mobile days. Revisiting these classic titles evokes a sense of familiarity and fondness for past gaming experiences.
- Relaxation (weight 0.03): Players find relaxation in the game's casual, idle-like gameplay, soothing atmosphere, and chill music. The game's art style and low-key nature contribute to a healing and calm experience, allowing players to unwind while playing.
- Confusion (weight 0.03): Confusion arises from specific design choices, such as the inability to move hot springs, which is seen as an unusually severe problem compared to other Kairosoft games. Players also express confusion regarding guest satisfaction mechanics and the overall direction of the hotel's development.
- Anger (weight 0.02): Anger is triggered by critical issues such as game crashes, save corruption leading to significant loss of progress, and unskippable animations. Players also express anger when guests ignore available amenities, perceiving these as poor design choices.
- Challenge (weight 0.02): Players experience a sense of challenge due to the game being harder and tougher than expected, especially compared to its predecessor. The complex game mechanics and numerous elements contribute to a demanding gameplay experience.
- Hope (weight 0.02): Hope is expressed through desires for future improvements in the sequel, such as more character interactions. Players also hold hope for the game's potential to become the best Kairosoft title, indicating a belief in its underlying quality and future development.
- Engagement (weight 0.01): Engagement is driven by the game's core building layout mechanic and its ability to make time fly by. Players find themselves deeply engrossed in the gameplay, losing track of time due to its captivating nature.
- Appreciation (weight 0.01): Players appreciate the game's effective execution of the hot spring inn management simulation and its perceived value for money. This indicates recognition of the game's quality and the enjoyment it provides relative to its cost.
- Tedium (weight 0.01): Tedium is caused by the repetitive grinding and clicking required to achieve certain goals or achievements. This monotonous aspect of gameplay detracts from the overall enjoyment for some players.
- Annoyance (weight 0.01): Annoyance stems from distracting background music and specific bugs, such as issues with relocating hot springs. These minor but persistent issues can detract from the player's experience.
- Surprise (weight 0.01): Players are surprised by the game's replayability despite its simple graphics and small size. Unexpected effects and the management of tourism projects also contribute to this feeling of pleasant surprise.
- Anticipation (weight 0.01): Anticipation is generated by the potential for extensive playtime across multiple playthroughs. Players look forward to the longevity and depth the game offers, suggesting a desire for continued engagement.
- Dissatisfaction (weight 0.01): Dissatisfaction arises from the overall game experience, indicating a general negative sentiment without specific details. This suggests that the game did not meet general expectations or provide a fulfilling experience.
- Boredom (weight 0.01): Boredom sets in during the late-game when it becomes purely decorative, lacking meaningful progression or engaging activities. This indicates a decline in player interest as the game progresses.
- Desire (weight 0.01): Players express a desire for specific features, such as wishing for Japanese NPC names. This indicates a preference for certain cultural or aesthetic elements within the game.}