Mobile Game 3-Day Play Analysis: Tycoon Simulation Game

As of 2019-10-30: Google Play Trending Games #19

Rating: 4.8

Downloads: 10,000+

Reviews: 239

First Impressions

The art felt simpler than expected, but seeing the 4.8 rating made me curious if there was something remarkable about the content.

I was glad to discover a tycoon-style game after a long time.

Design

• At first glance, the tutorial was nowhere to be found
• Eventually found the tutorial, but the sheer volume of content made it quite uncomfortable
• This game feels thoroughly designed to encourage ad viewing. Even if that wasn't the primary intent, the ad-viewing incentive design is well-executed
• Despite having no server, the game supports in-app purchases. Deleting the game means losing all items — which might feel unfair to paying users, but this is well-explained early on
• No notable fixation on specific design elements
• During the 5-minute movie screenings, you need to sell food or collect acorns, but it never felt like you needed to leave
• Gets boring quickly
• UI is uncomfortable and UX doesn't appear well-considered

Development

• So simple that development difficulty must have been very low

Art

• Overall resources seem somewhat lacking
• Feels like a 2D game from the feature phone era
• Delivers quite a lot of content with simple resources and effects

After 3 Days of Play

• Looking at Play Store reviews, there seem to be many female users and children — the simple yet cute characters likely play a big role in capturing these audiences
• SUPERTHUMb's previous title "Animal Hot Spring" with 1M+ downloads likely contributed significantly
• Personally, I wasn't particularly engaged, but the game design appears well-targeted to its audience and well-designed to maintain user tension