TCG Card Shop Simulator is stupid, but I can’t stop playing the Pokemon mod

Conceptually, I hate games that revolve around the idea of ​​“numbers go up.” Sure, in an RPG your level and damage increase, but the story is what keeps you committed to the experience. Wear down gear by repeating endgame raids or, God forbid, get stuck in Cookie Clicker? That sounds like hell to me. And yet here I’m thinking of the TCG Card Shop Simulator.

TCG Card Shop Simulator is the definition of “numbers go up.” You buy goods, sell them for a small markup, and use that money to gain access to new money-making opportunities, further increasing the rate at which your number increases. There are some nuances to market value fluctuations, but the basic premise remains the same from start to finish. Make a capitalism to make capitalism bigger, better and faster.

There’s no way I would buy this game, I’m not that type of person. But then I saw streamers playing along Pokémod by REDH3XO. TCG Card Shop Simulator launched on September 15th, but reached its peak (so far) number of players on October 6th, a few days after the release of Pokémod. This doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with it since the game was growing in popularity anyway, but that just happens to be the exact day I both paid for the game and finally downloaded the mod.

And the numbers are actually increasing. I played the game briefly without the mod and saw the “Tetramon” in the game, a nice set of legally separate monster cards to collect and fight. Well, you can’t fight them, but you can watch NPCs mimic a duel.

In that sense, the NPCs are hideous. I’m pretty sure they’re all store-bought assets and I’m just grateful that you don’t have to spend too much time looking at them. Instead, you can look at the cards that come with fairly simple designs, but something far more important: a price tag.

As you upgrade your store, you will gain access to more products such as: B. various card sets, deck boxes, dice, collectibles, figures and even board games. Most of these products are simply designed to boost your numbers – oh well – but the packs of cards can be opened and then sold individually. Most cards are barely worth the effort it takes to put them up for sale, but a select few cards are worth hundreds if not thousands of dollars.

Suddenly this unlocks what is essentially a gambling mini-game. You buy up booster boxes and start opening each pack one by one, hoping to score a big hit and find an NPC willing to buy them at whatever absurd price you sell them. This is realistically the quickest way to make money from the game – it’s certainly not about selling Pokémon Monopoly boards or whatever the clear legal equivalent is – it’s a slot machine.

I (Honkai Star) will rail against gacha games all day long (please keep reading our HoYoverse content), but TCG Card Shop Simulator allows me to experience all the joyful highs and devastating lows of being a die-hard TCG collector or gacha -Player to enjoy without I have to post the Tiger King meme “I’ll never recover financially from this” after the fact.

Despite being a card shop management game – one that, to be honest, isn’t as good as Recettear – the very core of TCG Card Shop Simulator is a slot machine-like chain of random draws as you move around a rare card prays. And I just can’t hate it, no matter how much I want to. It’s ugly, unpolished, and honestly feels like it needs longer in the oven, with or without a Pokémod, and I can’t stop playing.

I’ve always felt superior and appreciated the weight of my bank balance over anime waifus in mobile games, but as soon as bank balance falls out of the equation, I’m a chimp-brained loser screaming for a big number next to a picture of an anime monster.

I realize that, but I won’t stop playing because I think one good move is enough to save me from the impending bill due date.

However, if you get a good package in real life, you might end up with one of these rare and expensive Pokémon cards.