Style Savvy has never just been a dress-up game

Years passed before I realized that I am a gamer. Not because I felt any issue with the term, and not because I didn’t play games — in fact, I’d been playing games for as long as I could remember. But I never connected the dots between the games I grew up on and the newest Mario or Pokémon titles my friends played, because my games of choice revolved around fashion. It wasn’t until years later that I realized the games I grew up on had just as much merit as anything else on the market, and one franchise in particular had imprinted itself onto my psyche forever by inadvertently teaching a crash course on the capitalist underbelly of the fashion industry.

This all started with Syn Sophia’sStyle SavvyThe term “also known” Nintendo Presents: Style BoutiqueIn Europe, Wagamama Fashion: Girls Mode in Japan), which launched in Japan in 2008 before coming to America in November 2009 — just in time for my 10th birthday. How I spent my free time Style Savvy blew my young mind by fusing a standard dress-up game with a business simulator that never let me forget that fashion was a means to make as much money as possible, and players old and new saw that lesson play out over three sequel games (2012’s Fashion Trendsetters: Style-savvy, 2015’s You Can Be Fashion-Savvy, and 2017’s Styling Star: Style Savvy).

Each of the Style Savvy titles features a young girl who is embarking on her career as a fashion stylist in a fashionable boutique. Unlike the hordes of fashion games for girls with mechanics focused on fulfilling creative briefs or endlessly designing clothes, Style Savvy games center on the player’s ability to sell as many articles of clothing as possible to as many NPCs as possible. While you can tailor your boutique offerings in terms of decor and stock to your preferred style, this doesn’t stop you from getting daily visits from people across the fashion spectrum, forcing you to quickly familiarize yourself with a range of styles and spot their influence on NPCs so that you can tailor recommendations to their specific tastes. When your business expands, you can keep it stocked with a wide variety of clothing brands by visiting a wholesale marketplace. In the game, there are also built-in descriptions of style. The first one is a tutorial and the second one is a fashion dictionary. True style, according to the game’s handbook, manifests in head-to-toe looks with a balance of elements like colors, patterns, and shapes, without too many clashing pieces or unnecessary add-ons. Most importantly, the game emphasizes the importance of honoring a customer’s preferred style, and never straying far from their aesthetic.

The plot is minimal in these games. They are mainly about your quest to become an acclaimed stylist. There are also occasional side stories that involve characters you assist on their adventures by applying your style. The base game was so addictive to me when I played it as a child. Style SavvyThis was the very first time I’ve ever felt downright You will be able to see the difference in your own eyes. whenever a plot event popped up, like time spent receiving reassurance from your clients-turned-friends was time that should’ve been spent beefing up your supply of preppy skirts or punky jackets.

This game has a different approach to fashion games. Unlike other similar titles that rely heavily on dress up and design, it is more focused on tension. Style SavvyThe tension between making money and looking good never completely vanishes. This is why the game stood out to me so much when I played it for the first time. That same tension extends even to how you engage with customer requests, where efforts to find what they’re willing to wear crash up against your ability to take advantage of their request so that you can make more money. Consider this: A client may come into your store and ask for an office outfit. Now, you could satisfy this request with just two pieces if you put her in a dress and pair of shoes, and she’ll leave happy with your suggestion. But, if you put her in the dress and then layer a coat on top of it, and pair her shoes with a pair of stockings and a handbag, you’re making more money than you would’ve by matching the brief. That’s all well and good, but if you’re still a few hundred dollars below her budget, you might be inclined to throw in a layer below her dress, more accessories in the form of a hat and jewelry, and — oh, is that a pair of pants you haven’t been able to get rid of? If you’re still a few hundred dollars under her budget, why not add a layer underneath the dress, some accessories in the form of hats and jewelry, and — oh, is that a pair of pants you haven’t been able to get rid off?

In cases like these, the further you go to make a profit, the harder it becomes to keep the end result in accordance with the game’s definition of style. It’s a cardinal crime to sneak pieces that are not in line with the style preferences of customers into an outfit. As a youngster, it shocked me that the NPCs I put in such atrocities were never punished. And when I realized I could not control my greedy instincts, everything was out of hand. I probably first experimented with this technique when I was a new player struggling to make ends meet so that I could make any progress, but once you pick up on it, it’s incredibly difficult to put clients in an outfit without seeing how much money you’re missing out on while not maximizing your earnings.

Although you may not be able to tell, It is a good idea to useEnjoy the Play Style Savvy with a style-first approach, the game is designed so it’s incredibly hard to make any real progress without putting customers in hideous outfits. It’s true in every single game. In the first installment of the franchise the players are limited by the amount of space they have in their inventory and the ability to set budgets. They will refuse any outfit or item that is even $9 more expensive than what they budgeted. The first game of the series had a limited inventory and limited budget, but the later titles introduced an additional mechanic to make the gameplay harder: it was forbidden to sell the same product more than one time. Mechanics like these incentivize players to stock up on new styles more frequently, but they also encourage an emphasis on selling out their supply of one style before moving on to another — which means that selling at higher cost is the smoothest path to new story beats, game features, and new styles in clothes and furniture.

All of these limitations were at work, and I was able to convince myself that the outfits I chose to sell to customers at inflated prices are worth it. Any lingering misgivings I had about flying in the face of the game’s rules of style melted when I managed to free up space in my inventory or unlock a new facet of gameplay. When I saw someone leaving my shop in an ad hoc mess of tutus, faux fur, and legwarmers, I felt satisfied that I had hit just below their budget.

Ultimately, these mechanics coalesced into a level of difficulty that I had never seen before in a fashion game, and also shattered the vaguely glamorized ideas about fashion that I’d absorbed as a baby fashionista. After seeing the interconnectedness of fashion and commerce through a game that focused on a particular part of the industry, I was unable to look at fashion the same. I consider the time spent playing the game as an important step towards becoming more knowledgeable about the world I’ve been fascinated by my whole life.

That isn’t to say that it left me with nothing but cynicism, though. It was my Capitalism 101 course. Style SavvyProduced what I consider to be my first really fun, challenging game experience. As women and young girls continue seeking a seat at the table when it comes to discussions of gaming culture, fashion simulations like Style Savvy serve as examples of the ways that “games for girls” could be every bit as enlightening, absorbing, and downright ruthless as their male-targeted counterparts. Now that I’ve shrugged off my hangups about thinking of the fashion games I enjoyed as a valid part of gaming culture, I wear the hundreds of hours and millions of dollars I made with my little boutique like a badge of honor. It’s a good thing playing Style SavvyIf my fashion skills were to translate into the real world, would they be mutually exclusive? I’d be forcing you into the most expensive mess you’ve ever seen.