Crossover: 2014

Chapter 13 How is this game popular?

In fact, apart from Lin Hui's certainty that "Life Reopening Simulator" will definitely become popular.

Most people didn't expect this hot situation at all.

What the hell?How did this game catch fire?

Although it was not expected at first, after the market has given a clear reaction.

Countless game industry practitioners are still thinking about how the game "Life Restart Simulator" became popular!

Dong Jiaqi is the game editor of Iwan League, an old game forum in China.

At first, when she saw some screenshots of "Life Restart Simulator", she felt like this?

It's just a boring low-cost word game.

Originally, she planned to criticize directly.

But with a deeper understanding, after discovering various sand sculpture mechanisms, she suddenly found it interesting.

Although there is no real "reopening of life" as the game advertises.

But she was still hopelessly "stuck" after a reboot.

This game is to restart almost a hundred lives.

It's kind of magical...

Although the game editor is not the kind who has experienced many battles, he has seen a lot of various games!

Why is she so unbearable?
Or why is this game so fascinating?
Dong Jiaqi couldn't figure it out.

I even feel a little bit of an illusion of being abandoned by the times.

To be honest, she felt that the explosion of several popular games this year was inexplicable.

This is the case with the previous "Don't Step on White Blocks"!
The rules of the game are very simple, as the name suggests, don't step on the white blocks and you're done.

This simple game has been out of control since it was launched on the App Store on April 4 this year.

Topped the list of free games in more than 40 countries and regions around the world, and ranked in the top ten in more than [-] countries or regions.

In May of this year, it also ranked first in the global game download list (iOS + Android), and the accumulated downloads of the game have exceeded 5 million in less than 3 months since its launch.

Compared with "Don't Step on White Blocks", the popularity of "Life Restart Simulator" is not an exaggeration.

It's a bit far away, let's go back to "Life Restart Simulator".

Although she doesn't quite understand the deep-level developer thinking, this does not prevent her from writing an article with empathy.

Usually, many of her articles are only from the player's perspective.

Dong Jiaqi typed the title without thinking - "The Secret of Life Reopening Simulator Explosion"

Then immediately began to write about her feelings when playing this game:
Recently, a mysterious little game called "Life Restart Simulator" has been circulating in the circle of friends...

At first glance, this little game is really amazing.It's mediocre to the extreme, with white text on a black background at the beginning, a button, no commentary, no art, no sound effects, and no advertisements.

"I don't want to stay in this garbage life for a second", so do you want to start a new life?

"Reopen immediately", then draw a talent card for your new life, use it to open, and then set the initial attributes like God's seasoning, and you can "start a new life".

Although I don't know the specific creation process of the game, I can still judge it based on my long-term experience with game producers.

It takes a long time to write the plan and draw the prototype for this game. It’s hard to say about the copywriting + table matching, but I don’t think it will take too long to get it done.

As for the core content of this program, I estimate that I can finish it in a day, after all, the "simpleness" of this game is obvious to all.

Don't get me wrong, "shabby" here is not a derogatory term.

It is this simple game that has harvested more than 400 million traffic, accumulated 5000 million players, read [-] million topics on the bib software, and discussed more than [-] times.

What is its magic?
Tell me about myself.

When I started the game for the first time, I was very cautious in drawing cards and selecting the initial attributes—after all, the initial attributes were only 20 points, and it really took some struggles to allocate them reasonably to "appearance", "intelligence", "physique" and "family background".

However, soon I stopped struggling and even chose to randomly assign initial attributes.

Because I found that even if you choose full physique, you may die at the age of 3;

Even if you draw the "1 in [-]" card, you can only marry as a wife;
Even if the IQ is only 0, it is possible to become a "technology pioneer" and change the world.

And I feel as if the designer is telling the player that it is useless for you to choose anything, and life will not develop according to the trajectory you want.

Such a design is actually quite depressing...

What to choose?Life is meaningless.

Think about it another way, is it because the designer wants to express that life is meaningless, so everyone should live their lives happily?

I have simulated a life. I was born in a rural area. I was a girl. From a little bit of growth, to taking an exam, to getting married and having children, to the death of people around me, and to the end of my own life. a fulfilling life".

It seems ordinary, but isn't that the world?

Maybe what we are simulating today is the life that someone in the world is going through.

From the game, players feel the part that overlaps with reality and experience the truth that is common to reality, which will deepen the bond between players and the game, and also allow us to look back at our lives from time to time and find new philosophies.

I saw some people on the forum say that this game cannot be called a game, only a string of codes.

Indeed, this game seems to be completely programmed, and there is no sense of actual operation at all when playing.

For some players, they still prefer to wait for games in which their fate is in their own hands.

But why is "Life Restart Simulator" still so popular?

I think it boils down to—contrast.

The designer deliberately condensed the game settings to the extreme, but the world view laid out was as rich as possible, and even mixed with many elements such as cultivating immortals.

This kind of simplicity and complexity will give players a sense of contrast.

This contrast arouses our desire to explore.

Let us put our body and mind into it unconsciously.

And when we get into it, the easter eggs with a certain connotation will bring us new surprises...

……

Next, Dong Jiaqi elaborated on many in-game details.

After that.

After feeling that the number of words in the article was almost enough, Dong Jiaqi began to finish the article:

When we look back at our lives from the game, we will find that no matter how wonderful the game is, in reality, we still have our own things to be busy.

It is true that we can keep "reopening" our lives in the game and achieve a perfect ending to escape the unsatisfactory reality, but the most important thing to manage is the life we ​​are experiencing.After all, our life is the only thing that cannot be "reopened", and we should rely on our own efforts to achieve some happy endings or no regrets.

Just as some players commented on "Life Restart Simulator": "One life is equal to ten thousand lives. For the experience of life, one life is enough."

Moments later, a decent game review is done.

After careful review several times, Dong Jiaqi clicked publish.

(End of this chapter)