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Sunday, September 7, 2008
Home Sweet Home 2: Kitchens and Baths
Home Sweet Home 2: Kitchens and Baths is the second game in the Home Sweet Home series. As in the first game, it's a home decorating sim, except the focus is now kitchens and bathrooms, whereas the first one centered around living rooms.There are two phases to each level: the decorating and then the building. For decorating, you start with a room - sometimes the room has stuff in it, sometimes it's pretty bare - a budget, and what amounts to a word puzzle. The clients are never quite specific about what they want: it's always caged in a descriptive form. For example, one level will have a movie star telling you he will have 2 of his dudes over and they would bring a friend and he needs a place to chill. The player must interpret that as needing to use 5 chairs in the room to make the maximum score. The goal is to meet the customer desire, within budget. In order to move on to the build phase, a minimum customer satisfaction level must be met and all items must be placed (most levels require a minimum number of things to be built). If you can't figure out what the customer wants, there are hints available.
In the build phase, you have 3 workers (you might recognize them from HSH 1!) to help you build out the room in a specific number of days. There are power-ups, where an item will flash the worker's color. Placing the worker on that item will result in them building faster. Coffee is also available, which perks up the worker and prevents them from getting hurt (and slowing down the process). Occasionally, the workers will stop and ask for a tool that the player must find in the toolbox.
The level score is determined by the customer satisfaction (up to 1000 points), whether the player used a hint (not using a hint gives a 100 point bonus) and a build score for achieving the goal in the number of days. 3 medals are awarded: bronze, for reaching 1400 points, silver for 1700 points, and gold for 1900 points. Each level also unlocks 2 items which the player can use to decorate a bonus personal apartment.
What they did well: it's an enjoyable sim. There was never any point at which I felt stressed. Moving items from one place to another was easy, and it was nice to be able to recycle materials. The build levels were sometimes quite challenging, keeping the workers injury free, motivated, and getting all the items built. New items unlock all the time. The word puzzles are fun to decipher. Wall colors are rich and full.
What could have been better: The graphics on the level-choosing screen. It wasn't always immediately obvious which was the new level (sometimes you design rooms for the same client). I was able to make some very odd bathroom and kitchen arrangements. For example, there were some kitchens that lacked a refrigerator and/or a sink. A few bathrooms were missing a toilet. I was still able to get the gold score for that level, though. That seemed odd. Also, there was no penalty for placing items that made the customer unhappy. So a player could spend a lot of time in trial and error and still get a high score. Personally, I would've appreciated more of a challenge (i.e. sale price of placed items is half the value, etc).
Recommended for: fans of decorating shows, or Home Sweet Home
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