The “vegetable theft craze” is making a comeback: Post-00s rise, giving rise to huge krypton-gold business

Wen| Tech planet Chen Qiaohui

Once upon a time, the game of stealing vegetables was all the rage and became a hot topic among the whole people. In 2008,”Happy Farm” developed by Shanghai Five Minutes Company was launched. The unique method of stealing vegetables instantly ignited the enthusiasm of players. However, with the rapid development of the Internet industry and the continuous introduction of game types, food stealing games have gradually faded out of people’s vision.

But what is unexpected is that today, due to the farm play of Netease’s “Danzi Party” and Tencent’s “Yuanmeng Star”, the game of stealing vegetables has ushered in a second spring among the post-00s group.

Tech Planet found that during the Spring Festival, Netease Games ‘”Egg Boy Party” and Tencent’s “Yuanmeng Star”, two of the most popular casual games among young people today, have stolen vegetables since the launch of farm games last year. The popularity of discussions on games continues to rise.

Because players can not only work hard on their own farms and experience the joy of sowing and harvesting, they can also sneak into their friends ‘farms, steal and enjoy the excitement of unearned gains. This highly socially interactive gameplay quickly spread among young people. The number of page views and participation on related topics in the QQ group, Douyin, and Xiaohongshu have reached new heights. Many post-00s players will share their experience in growing and stealing vegetables. For example, Xiaohongshu has more than 950,000 notes on how to upgrade Yuanmeng Star Farm.

Nowadays, stealing vegetables has not only become a form of entertainment, but has also become a new topic for young people’s social interactions. Every morning when you meet in the QQ group, someone will always ask, Have you stolen vegetables today? rdquo;

A craze for stealing vegetables is becoming popular among the post-00s generation.

“Stealing vegetables is sweeping the post-00s generation

What is the reason that the post-00s generation is so fascinated by the game of stealing vegetables?

Judging from the farms of “Egg Boy Party” and “Yuan Dream Star”, their novel gameplay is more in line with the tonality of today’s young people.

Take Tencent’s “Yuanmeng Star” as an example. Its farm play method, also called “Classic Farm”, perfectly reproduces the farming and vegetable stealing methods of QQ farms that were popular across the country in the PC era. Its entrance is located in the Qzone.

Illustration: Located at the entrance of QQ Classic Farm.

In Classic Farm, players can grow a variety of crops, such as wheat, cabbage, etc. Each crop has a different estimated selling price and harvest cycle, and players need to combine these factors to rationally arrange sowing plans.

For example, the estimated selling price of growing wheat is 2760 gold coins, and the harvest cycle is half that of cabbage. Planting wheat within the same 12 hours can maximize the planting value. In addition, after the sowing is successful, players can click on the kettle to water the crops, reducing the ripening time of the crops.

Illustration: “Classic Farm” interface.

In addition to growing vegetables and pastures,”Classic Farm” also adds fish ponds to play. After the farm level reaches level 40, the fish pond will be opened, and players can not only fish, but also fry fish. ldquo; The modes of frying fish and stealing vegetables are similar. Players can fry other friends ‘fish ponds to obtain high-level and exquisite fish in their fish ponds.

Illustration: Fried fish interface.

Many QQ groups have become concentrated places for discussion topics such as stealing vegetables, growing vegetables, and frying fish. Some players told Tech Planet that although the several second-dimensional, QQ members and other groups he joined were not in the same interest circle as the farm, people discussed stealing vegetables and preventing stealing vegetables every day. If it was a special farm group, there would be hundreds or thousands of discussions every day.

Moreover, new vegetable growers and thieves are constantly being born. The above-mentioned players also revealed that not only the QQ group, but also the WeChat group and the Douyin group have become discussion gathering places. As long as you go to Post Bar, QQ Channel, and Xiaohongshu to post invitation posts and strategy posts, you will be able to attract many players that day. Pay attention and create a hundred people.

Illustration: Farm groups located in QQ.

In addition to the gameplay that successfully attracts players, the social attributes of the farm are also one of the important factors that attract the post-00s generation.

Xiaolong, a post-00s player at the Danzi Party, told Tech Planet that in real life, their post-00s generation faces various pressures and their social circles are relatively fixed. In the vegetable stealing game, they can easily interact with friends and classmates to share their planting results and vegetable stealing experiences.

This kind of interaction not only increases the fun of the game, but also allows them to feel the warmth of social interaction in the game and bring them closer to each other. ldquo; Playing the game of stealing vegetables for a while during the Chinese New Year, I feel very relieved. Watching my farm become richer little by little, I feel a special sense of accomplishment. rdquo;

In addition, for some post-00s, the game of stealing vegetables also carries their nostalgia. Although they had never experienced the most popular period of the game of stealing vegetables back then, through the narration of their elders and the sharing of memories on the Internet, they were full of curiosity and yearning for that game craze. When they came into contact with today ‘s games with the game of stealing vegetables, they took this curiosity and nostalgia and devoted themselves to the game, wanting to experience the fun of the past. This nostalgia has made the game of stealing food find new resonance among the post-00s group.

Farm games have spawned million-dollar windfall businesses

Although farm games are fun, if you want to run the farm well and gather all the rare crop seeds, players will spend a lot of time and energy. For most post-00s, this is not easy, so around farm games, a series of paid service businesses have also emerged.

Farm games have become a wealth code for many people. On platforms such as idle fish, Taobao and Pinduo, search for keywords with farms such as “Yuanmeng Star” and “Danzi Party”, and you will see scripting services, training agents provided by individuals and studios. Various paid services such as replacement, and skin delivery have attracted many players to buy.

For example, Tech Planet discovered that although the price of a product called Yuanmeng Star Dream Confession Gift Box is as high as 1135 yuan, it still attracts more than 2400 visitors. In the end, 41 people purchased it, with revenue reaching 45,000 yuan. There are still dozens of gift boxes like this, and sales are all more than 10,000 yuan. It is estimated that there is a market of nearly one million yuan.

In addition, script products are even more popular. The prices of these scripts range from tens of yuan to hundreds of yuan. They may not seem to be high, but due to the large number of players buying them, the profits are considerable.

Yuanmeng Farm’s automatic assistant product launched by a company claims to be able to automatically steal vegetables, automatically fry fish, prevent stealing vegetables and frying fish, and can also sell crops, easily freeing players ‘hands. The traffic exceeded 24,000 times, 1642 people wanted it, and 700 orders were finally sold. If the minimum is 15 yuan, the income will reach at least 10000 yuan.

Different from the automated operation of scripts, agent training is carried out by real players in person. Through manual operation, it helps other players complete the tasks of growing, watering, and collecting vegetables in the game, improving the game experience, and avoiding the risk of being banned by scripts. Therefore, the farm agent training business is also very popular.

A studio that provides farm training for Danzi Party Parties said that they can handle daily, weekly and monthly services at prices of 3 yuan, 17 yuan and 30 yuan respectively. They mainly help players complete farm vegetable growing and vegetable stealing services. If you want to replace the upgrade of a certain crop, the price will be calculated separately. The studio joked that they were paid labor by virtual farmers.

In addition to these merchants and studios, some individual players have also taken a fancy to business opportunities, such as launching paid food stealing services.

A player told Tech Planet that if you want to steal the kale (no prayer version) farming field grown in his Yuanmeng Farm, you need to pay 5 yuan. The second time it will be cheaper, as long as 3 yuan, or you can charge per tree, 0.02 yuan per grain.& ldquo; The second half of last year was the most profitable. As long as you have a lot of accounts in hand, you can grow a lot of crops. Through this method of selling vegetables, it is not a problem to earn tens of thousands a month. However, now I obviously feel that many peers have joined in, and the selling price of each cash crop has reached a few cents, with the lowest price even being 0.001 yuan/grain.& rdquo;

Which one can play the Dachang Farm game well?

The strong return of farm games among the post-00s group has also brought new directions to the game industry. Among them, Tencent and Netease, as important promoters of this craze, will gain considerable opportunities.

For Tencent, the farm gameplay of “Yuanmeng Star” reproduces classics and innovates, which can successfully attract a large number of players, which not only consolidates its position in the game market, but also injects new vitality into its social ecosystem. It is reported that “Yuanmeng Star” is strengthening its linkage with social platforms such as QQ and adding seasonal gameplay to deeply explore the potential of “Yuanmeng Star” and launch more cross-platform interactive activities in an attempt to close the gap between “Egg Boy Party”.

For Netease, although the social ecology has been its long-standing shortcoming, in this craze for stealing vegetables, it chose a differentiated breakthrough path to transform farm gameplay into social glue, and rebuilt it through lightweight social + strong content drive. The user relationship chain not only ensures the user stickiness of “Egg Boy Party”, but also provides a reference for Netease to explore the direction of social interaction.

In addition, what is even more noteworthy is that farm games go far beyond the scope of the game itself.

On the positive side, the return of the game of stealing food has brought innovative inspiration to many industries. It proves that classic gameplay can still radiate strong vitality and attract a new generation of users after being modified and upgraded.

In fact, in addition to Tencent and Netease, e-commerce and payment platforms are also increasing farm play, deeply integrating them into their own business scenarios, and expanding their audience from young people to middle-aged and elderly users.

For example, Jingdong launched Dongdong Farm. Users accumulate nutrients through daily check-in, shopping and other behaviors. The fruits can be exchanged for free postal delivery home after they mature. During the epidemic, Dongdong Farm reached an underwriting cooperation with 14 origin countries for 10,000 tons of slow-moving agricultural products; Alipay’s Baba Farm opens up the green energy system of the ant forest and realizes a closed-loop game environmental protection and public welfare; Duoduo’s Duoduo Orchard combines watering mutual assistance with group discounts through social fission design, allowing users to enjoy shopping discounts and open up sales for merchants.

These farm methods cannot be underestimated in promoting business. According to Pinduoduo, in the first quarter of 2020, the daily active users of Duoduo Orchard reached more than 50 million. Driven by Duoduo Orchard, during the 2020 Agricultural Goods Festival, the number of agricultural product orders on the Pinduoduo platform exceeded 110 million, of which 70% were sold to first-tier and second-tier cities.

The return to popularity of farm games is by no means simply driven by nostalgia. In the future, whoever can deeply integrate the emotional resonance behind vegetable planting, social logic and technological innovation will have the opportunity to harvest more fruitful fruits.