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author|xiaoyao

editor|yang zhichao

it may take 20 years for a grassroots civil servant to get promoted to a full-time major, but in the game "civilization", if players work hard for a day, they will have the opportunity to rule the earth and colonize mars.

this is the basis for the long-lasting prosperity of business simulation games for decades. it turns work into a kind of "exhilarating writing".

the most popular mini-games at the moment are adopting this kind of "work-related fun" as their theme. in september, a small game from turkey - "shawarma legend" became popular in china. its related topics have been viewed more than 1.3 billion times on the short video platform.

different from the lianliankan and fruit-cutting gameplay of most mini-games, "shawarma legend" expands the subject matter into more complex areas: players play the role of a hotel manager, cooking for customers, making money to upgrade equipment, handling customer relations, etc. wait. although it is said to be a "simulation business", the operation of games such as "shawarma legend" is extremely simple, and the threshold is not much higher than "sheep".

the low-threshold gameplay core is covered with a more interesting shell, creating a group of hard-working young people who "work four jobs a day."

01 the core of xiaoxiaole, the shell of simulated management

shawarma is actually barbecue, an arabic barbecue.

it is made by putting large pieces of mutton, chicken and other meat on a vertical spit and rotating them for a long time. ——a bit like the popular turkish barbecue in china. in terms of audio-visual language, "the legend of shawarma" also adopts the arabic style, with magical music and exotic outfits, all revealing the arabic flavor.

but compared to foreign culture, what may be more attractive to chinese players is its gameplay.

the basic gameplay of "shawarma legend" is to simulate running a restaurant. the player needs to complete the customer's orders within a set time, upgrade various equipment in the store after earning profits, and also promptly stop and punish the beggars who eat the king's meal. and thieves who steal the proceeds. it is somewhat similar to "kitchen", but the setting has been upgraded from a kitchen to a restaurant, and the player has changed from a chef to a complex role more like a "manager".

but the gameplay is not complicated.clicking, sliding, and long-pressing the screen are the only three actions to play this game.the only requirements for playing this game well are speed and accuracy.

judging from the relevant content currently posted on social platforms, female college students are an important group for this game. they stayed up late to play, and they had to play in class. when faced with a situation where one person was too busy to handle the task, they had to find someone to help them overcome the obstacles, and they suddenly turned this single-player game into a multi-player game. but because the gameplay is simple, even if cooperation and division of labor are required, it will not lead to the end of friendships and breakups like in "house kitchen".

on the internet, it has become a daily "job" for female college students on their tablets, together with business games such as "papa's pizza", "plane chef", and "the breakfast shop downstairs". some people have to "work four jobs" every day: making breakfast in the morning, making pizza at noon, making pancakes in the afternoon, and working as a stewardess preparing meals on the plane at night.

what makes restaurant management simulation games so addictive is that:simple movements and non-brainy gameplay achieve a stress-relieving effect, and fast operations can bring about a burst of adrenaline, bringing instant pleasure similar to xiaoxiaole, lianliankan, and fruit cutting.——in fact, the gameplay core of "shawarma" is very similar to games like xiaoxiaole.

but outside the core, it has a "shell" of simulated operations.different from simple and direct mini-games such as xiaoxiaole and lianliankan, management mini-games have more settings in the gameplay of levels and the characters that appear. the details can make the game more interesting - just like shooting in movies, if the same story core is changed to another setting, there will always be different fun.

in terms of monetization model, the user experience of "shawarma legend" is also very good. the ways to monetize mini-games include advertising monetization, paid downloads, in-app purchases, membership recharge, etc. however, in addition to the steam version that requires paid downloading, "shawarma legend" only chooses to monetize by inserting advertisements into the game, and players can also choose to pay a certain fee to remove all advertisements. compared with previous monetization models such as "pay money to buy lives", this buyout membership model is obviously closer to large-scale games.

at present, the success of "shawarma legend" is being replicated. after "shawarma legend" became popular, its r&d company and publishing company jointly launched "the king of falafel" which is very similar in style and gameplay. ”, this game ranked second on the mac app store’s simulation game list.

02 turn work into exciting articles

there is a ridicule on social media for this kind of business simulation game: you have to play without a class.

an extreme case is: a considerable proportion of football players are players of the football game "fifa", which means that they play football at work and on the computer after get off work - which does seem a bit abnormal.

but there is a huge gap between going to work and simulating going to work.

take "the legend of shawarma" as an example,it handles the work in a cool and cultural way:when opening a restaurant in the game, real factors such as customer sources, costs, competition, level of effort, and emergencies are all erased, leaving only some insignificant and even refreshing links: click, slide, and long press to create a dish. , you can get complete benefits by meeting the needs of customers; when facing annoying customers, just punch them without saying a word, and the problem will be solved...

ultimately, the difficulties of the work are greatly omitted and simplified, leaving only the rewards.in reality, you may be a "business wizard" who closes down your store within three days of opening, but in business games, everyone can become the world's richest man.

this kind of virtual world replacing the real world is nothing new: 13 years ago, a 31-year-old man wang gang died of late-stage tuberculosis. he had been addicted to online games for 10 years. before his death, he was still thinking about his online game account: "full level level 60, i just reached level 50, just a little bit close." he finally passed away with the words "it's really interesting, you won't understand".

this is especially true for business games. in this type of game, you can be the emperor of a country, leading soldiers to conquer the north and south and unify the world. you can be the mayor of a city and have complete control over the city's planning. or you can just be a miner, mining gold and looking for treasure.

in an era of uncertainty, this simulation of reality will be more attractive than ever. in the last decade, "fighting" was the core gameplay of mainstream games, especially in the fields of mobile games and pvp terminal games. but now, more and more simulation business games are beginning to emerge.

"hundred scenes of jiangnan" launched in 2020, the number of downloads exceeded 10 million within three months of its launch, with an average daily revenue of 1.3 million; "i am the big boss" launched in 2021, its monthly revenue exceeded 100 million within five months of its launch; tencent "there is a family deep in the peach garden" released in 2023 has generated revenue of over 100 million four months after its release.

the growth rate of this type of simulation business games far exceeds that of the broader market. the "2023 china mobile game category development research report" released by gamma data shows that the revenue scale of the simulation business category in the mobile game market has increased from 1.85 billion yuan in 2018 to 6.6 billion yuan in 2022, and the user scale has increased from 2018 to 2022. will increase from 576 million to 949 million in 2022, and the number of top 150 mobile game products will increase from 4 in 2018 to 7 in 2022.

at present, business games and casual games are colliding with more sparks. in addition to the several business games mentioned above, other types of business simulation casual games such as the fairy tale-style "codename: strange journey" are also emerging and gaining popularity. the miniaturization of business games has brought a direct benefit: compared with large-scale works such as "civilization 6" and "skylines",small games like "shawarma" can attract a more high-quality user: female users.

03 female college student, a hot commodity in the gaming industry

"audition" and "qq dance" have fascinated countless female college students all night long, but from the perspective of the entire market, there are still relatively few female players.

a 2010 report by analysys pointed out that after years of continuous growth, the proportion of domestic female gamers finally exceeded 25%. the data also doesn’t take into account how long players play and how active they are – men’s average game time is certainly different from that of women.

mobile games and mini-games have changed everything.

starting from the two classic mobile games "honor of kings" and "onmyoji",female college students have become a force that cannot be ignored in the gaming market. they bring two core elements: simplicity of operation and sociability.

there are also more and more elements designed for them in the game: considering that 97% of female players only use female heroes, "league of legends" has launched more female heroes in updates; "honor of kings" has also launched many female heroes. aesthetic skins, and a limited-time free heroine skin event is launched on march 8 every year; the producer of "sheep got a sheep" felt that sheep were more popular with young women, and finally chose sheep as the protagonist of the game.

today, in the world's most profitable game "honor of kings", the number of female players has exceeded that of males. combining various public data, the male-to-female ratio in well-known mini-games can almost reach about 1:1. clearly, there is a lot of room for growth in the women's market.

source: "2022 wechat mini game growth white paper"

in addition, although women are non-mainstream players, they are not low-quality players. especially for "fast-moving consumer goods" games, they may be a higher-quality user group than men.

the current mainstream users are very "lazy". according to a 2024 report by market research agency newzoo, most players in 37 countries and regions around the world still spend most of their time playing old games. in 2022 and 2023, they will spend about 60% of their total gaming time on games that are at least six years old. chen rui, chairman of station b, also expressed a similar meaning: it’s not that the game market has become smaller or that users are inactive, but that existing users think there is no need to play homogeneous games.

but unlike these traditional gamers, female college students will try it even if there is not much difference in nature. for example, the "nuan nuan" series of games launched by paper folding game has been released for four generations so far. except for the transition from stand-alone to 2d and 3d, as well as slight changes in the plot line and costumes and props, the gameplay has not changed. however, this does not prevent them from actively trying new generation games.

in addition, female players are also "better served" in game production. in their view, it is not so important whether the production is well-made, but whether it is fun or not is the key. small games that look crude but have interesting gameplay are also acceptable to them.

such games often have a higher return on capital. taking "sheep" as an example, its founder zhang jiaxu once revealed that the game's development cost was only 500,000 yuan, the production cycle was about 3 months, and the developers were 3 people, and the final revenue exceeded 100 million yuan. although it is difficult for this type of games to give birth to game giants such as tencent, netease, blizzard, and value, in terms of return rate, they are more profitable than the giants.

from clothing, to digital products, to automobiles, women's business has always been a market with higher gross profit margins. although the current game industry is still dominated by male players, there is no reason why this objective business law should not be suitable for games. but it may still take time to achieve and verify through more "shawarma legends".