Bathhouse management in Onsen Master is fun, but needs more radish demons

Freitag, 25. September 2020

Bathhouse management in Onsen Master is fun, but needs more radish demons

A screenshot of Onsen Master which shows customers queuing outside your store. Four hot springs emit different coloured steam, puddles litter the floor, and your character hurriedly mixes ingredients in the centre.

Featured as part of the Game Devs of Color Expo and its Gradient Convergence showcase on Steam, Onsen Master’s Ghibli aesthetics caught my eye immediately. It’s a “hot spring customer management” game where you ditch the whole ‘service with a smile’ schtick and drag your customers with speed and aggression into hot spring baths you’ve prepared especially for them.

Other duties include making sure they’re cleaned between uses, that you’ve mixed the right ingredients, and you’re keeping spillages to a minimum. It’s a tough gig! And the more I ran my onsen in the demo build, the more I felt a seldom used part of my brain expanding. Is this – am I multitasking?

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