Pardon me for being "that guy", but I've never really understood what was so fun about CRP. It gets boring very fast.
there's literally nothing fun about city rpg compared to most other gamemodes. Any fun people have is generated either from having a whole on the run criminal rp play out or just pretending to enjoy themselves
The game is entirely centered around the acquisition of money. Games like this ie cookie clicker constantly force your brain to release dopamine because there's no losing condition- you constantly earn money just for existing. Every time you buy a reward (education level or job) your brain thinks your making progress on the task and releases more dopamine which makes you want to unlock more rewards. Even when killing players and taking their money you get the same effect. This is basically the same stuff gambling uses which is the promise that you'll always be winning, even when you lose. Candy crush offers boosters which increase your odds of winning slightly but you can still easily fail all the levels- it's the thought that you are better than before that hooks players.
This breaks the core principle of fun in game design which naturally includes 3 phases: learn, challenge, reward. You learn a new mechanic, use that to overcome a challenge, and recieve a reward. These three combined make up the ludemes of all video games. City RPG, cookie clicker, infinite miner, gambling, etc all skip the first two and use the last one which is reward. It saves them time because they don't have to make new mechanics or challenges to face, they just have to supply players with a win in order to force their brain to release pleasure hormones
It's a false victory. You don't learn anything and you don't get a rewarding experience, therefore it's not fun and the game is not fun. The more of these games you play in your life the less dopamine your brain releases and the more you begin to realize that these games are all stuff
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