One of the most brainrot things I enjoy is playing candy crush. It’s one of the highest revenue games ($1b+ annually) for a reason.
There was one time in my life that I had spent too much money on a game (Animal Crossing). Maybe around $300 on in-game blind boxes, which, after looking at my credit card statement, I deeply regretted and vowed never to spend a in-game-dollar again.
I’ll go over all the ways in which candy crush tries to extract value from you
- They’ll make you click 6 things after winning or losing a level to get you addicted to the dopamine hit - then ask you to buy an in game transaction. It’s similar to when you open the Temu app or the “get your foot in the door” technique from the book how to win friends and influence people. In psychology it’s called variable reward reinforcement, usually used in gambling.
- In between batches of levels there’s maybe a 5-1 ratio of easy levels to hard/impossible/insane levels. They purposely let you win the easy levels, and then make you fail the hard one, to create friction. The only way you can win the hard levels is if you play through them 10-15 times or pay for upgrades.
- once you fail those levels they send notifications exactly at the right moment to try make you pay or level up again.
Ever since my animal crossing failure and realizing I was a npc for falling for brainrot tactics, I find joy in declining transactions and continuing to play candy crush for free. I feel a sense of fortitude to be able to decline every transaction they ask for. I do feel like it’s similar to being a founder. No money = no play. But with enough patience, fortitude, persistence, and time, you can always win 😉