The mania of managing grocery stores returns in Supermarket Mania 2, a time management game that will put your mouse click to the test as you’re tasked to run increasingly advanced stores while making sure customers end up leaving satisfied.
Nikki and company return after beating Mr. Torg’s devious robot controlled chain of supermarkets, and moves to Tinseltown, where her Uncle requires her helping hand in managing various supermarkets. Meanwhile, the dastardly Torg has his own plans for revenge as well as a few tricks up his sleeve to make things more difficult. The quirky story is told through comic book pages and serves its purpose to move the game along.
You’ll start out in a tiny market with a small amount of groceries to help get you started and learn the ropes. Every action is as simple as a click, and multiple tasks can be queued up to ensure you’re keeping everything stocked up and your costumers happy. You stock up groceries from your shopping cart, which can only hold a certain amount, until it needs to be filled up again.
Besides groceries, you will also be in charge of making milkshakes, coffee, juices, and more, which requires a few steps before they’re ready to be served. Initially you will also be in charge of mopping up and cashing people out. As you move through the story, you not only get extra help, such as a cashier, but everything from the grocery shelves, to your basket, and the various machines can be upgraded to work faster or hold more items.
The customers also come in varying flavors. Grandmas are slow and patient, whereas hyperactive little girls want everything quick, and must be monitored so they don’t knock anything over from riding on their scooter. Not only will you have to watch over children getting separated from their mothers, and delivery men waiting for their specified orders, but also thieves that want to get in on the five-finger discount, as well as Mr Torg’s saboteurs that occasionally come in and destroy your equipment. These varied customers ensure that you will have quite an amount of responsibility to ensure success and maximum profit.
The most important customers are the celebrities. Every other customer freezes in their tracks as they take snapshots, while the celebrity zooms around the store, and demands everything they want be in stock as their patience is incredibly small. This is where the powerups come in handy. Energy drinks make you move fast as everything around you slows down, a cookie plate makes everyone in the store happy and the cleaning solution makes your store shine in an instant. Utilizing these items at the correct time is crucial, if you’re shooting for the high score.
Once everything in a certain store is upgraded, and you move on to a different location, you have to start from scratch, and lose all those perks you just worked extra hard to acquire which ends up being a bit frustrating. Though this is a normal occurrence in these sort of games, some sort of bonus would have been appreciated when advancing to the next supermarket.
What Diner Dash started grew into a casual phenomenon, and Supermarket Mania 2 builds off of those foundations, while not really reinventing the genre. It’s a solid time management game that will test both your mental and finger dexterity.
