Almighty Game Designer

Chen Mo laughed, “Yep, that’s right. You must draw ten before you leave.”

Jia Peng went to the store and tapped on the ten spins button, he was even slightly nervous.

As someone with extraordinary terrible luck, Jia Peng was very anxious when it comes to drawing mechanisms like these. He usually struggled to handle luck based situations like these.

“I’m going in!”

Prepared for the worst, Jia Peng hit the draw ten button.

Chen Mo snicked. No wonder you have terrible luck. You don’t even have a ritual before drawing, not even simple prep like washing your face or hands, it’s obvious that you aren’t being sincere enough.

Swish swish swish…

There were now ten cards on the screen, as the cards were flipped over, Jia Peng had his eyes focused on their borders.

“Heavens bless me with a purple…”

Blue, blue, blue, shards…

The disappointment in Jia Peng slowly crept up, as he felt like quitting the game in the next moment. But on the second last card, he managed to draw a purple Brick card!

“Ah! Purple! I drew a purple!”

Jia Peng was about to tear up from his happiness. As someone with terrible luck, it was the first time being on the same level as Wen Lingwei in terms of luck.

“Who did you get?” asked Chang Xiuya and Wen Lingwei as they gathered around.

Jia Peng said, “Brick, the human caster.”

Weng Lingwei said, “Tsk, not bad! Turns out you’re able to draw purples too!”

“Heh heh. It’s about time that luck was on my side.”

Full of happiness, Jia Peng looked into the description for Brick and checked out his abilities.

“Blizzard? Sounds incredible, I’m gonna level him up now.”

Jia Peng also drew a bunch of useless monster cards, which he spent all to level Brick up, raising it to purple+.

“Mm, I need another Brick to get it to the next level. Guess I’ll leave it at that.”

Fully of glee, Jia Peng stared at his newly gotten card. He then adjusted his strategy and went to battle filled with hope.

The others also managed to gather enough runes to draw ten.

“I got a purple MT. Uhh.. why does it feel kind of useless?”

“Purple rouge. Feels alright, I could try out an assassinating strategy.”

“I should probably raise the attributes of my purple cards right? I’ll spend more of my resources on it then.”

Everyone managed to draw a purple card, and swapped it into their strategy full of happiness.

Chen Mo had such a big smile on his face that he couldn’t say anything.

In reality, these have been decided beforehand. The first ten draws guaranteed a decent purple character card. It didn’t matter how lucky or unlucky you were.

However, subsequent ten draws would definitely be lucked based. Although there was a certain guarantee for purple cards, it was possible to draw Ambasador, Baron Rivendare, The Mayor, or other purple monster cards which didn’t have too much value in raising.

However, once you do a certain amount of draw tens, a rare card must appear, such as Cannon Lady, or Nosuke Shinsuke.

These were all traps.

If they players didn’t get good cards from the first ten draws, the player would be more likely to quit the game. Therefore adjustments must be made to the probabilities, as well as guaranteeing a purple character card.

Afterwards, the amount of runes players will get will decrease, and the probabilities will return to normal in order for the cards to retain their values. If the players wanted better cards they’d have to top-up.

For the rich, there must be certain guarantees in place to make sure that every penny they spent would be worth it to prevent them from feeling cheated.

This was a hidden specification among Chinese card games. Of course were more headstrong and wouldn’t do that, such as Onmyoji.

Onmyoji didn’t have any guarantees in place, therefore the ability to draw SSR would be entirely up to luck. This led to account selling in the early stages of the game, amongst many other problems.

Of course, as Onmyoji was already really high quality, it had the rights to do so. Chen Mo’s current 3D art skill was still lacking compared to Onmyoji, therefore he didn’t dare be as headstrong as Onmyoji when making I Am MT.

Jia Peng had hadded Brick into his team.

The monsters in the dungeon did not stand a chance against Brick’s Blizzard. He progressed through the dungeons swiftly with the help of the others in his team.

“This feels great!”

Jia Peng won one battle after another, and every time he beat one he would receive some rewards as well as chests, task rewards and achievements. When he got stuck, he would redeem the rewards and level up his cards. Afterwards he would continue going through the levels…

“Hmm, I think I can level up again, but I don’t have enough monster cards yet. Whatever, I’ll just go through one more battle.”

Jia Peng navigated to the next level once again.

Chen Mo was looking at the expressions of everyone.

Su Jinyu was tense and unwilling to give in, but she was still playing on.

Jia Peng on the other hand seemed infected by the game, burying his head in his phone.

Wen Lingwei wasn’t trying to push through the levels, but was looking through the cards gallery, evidently she was still deciding on her team.

So far, the effects of the one two punch of Chinese card games were working well.

IP draws players into the game.

High level cards demonstrating the abilities of the cards.

Clean and simple tutorial.

Many different playstyles to rid the player from getting bored of the game.

Handing out runes to allow the player to draw good cards.

Good cards crushes dungeons allowing players to feel growth and satisfaction.

This combination of events would allow players to feel a great sense of satisfaction and allow the players to recognise the value of the in game currencies.

With the satisfaction and recognising the value of the currency, it would allow the player to continue playing on the second day, chasing for another good card.

The IP’s function in card games was most important in the first step, attracting the players. The better the IP, the more players it attracts, the more loyal they are, the more players the game will get.

As the numbers go up, profit naturally went up.

However, could the IP decide the fate of a card game? Not necessarily.

Under a circumstance with about the same attractiveness, the profit deciding second day retention, long term retention, and average spendage are all based on the quality of the game, where the IPs don’t add much to it.

Many would say that the IP was very important to the game, and would be the point of comparison to other games. What they mean was that it would be easier to differentiate yourself among the ocean of other mobile card games with an IP.

What if the card game was compared to other mobile games? In reality, without the IP, card games would still come out on top.

At the later stages of mobile card games, it eventually devolves into an AFK quest completing game, as the playstyle of the game would no longer be sufficient to keep the players’ interest, and could practically be ignored. However, with the numerical stimulus, luck based card drawing, and virtual currency makes it difficult for the player to detach themselves from the game in fear of losing it, which in turn keeps the player in the game.

Numerical stimulus: new levels every day, new rewards, upgrading main character cards, and leveling them up…

Luck based card drawing: gathered enough money to draw ten times, I’ll probably receive a good card this time…

Virtual currency: I’ve already spent hundreds in the game, the perfect strategy, you want me to quit now?

At this stage, the effects of IP were basically negligible.

These three points would keep the player attached to the game, as well as a top-up promotion which would continually entice you to pull out money.

It’s fine if you don’t take money out of your wallet. As long as you are playing, that day will arrive soon enough.