Social distancing and lockdown has involved many in home improvement works like adding a new rug or changing the order of the furniture and so on. However, decorating a home is not always feasible when many are at a financial crunch due to COVID 19 pandemic. Therefore, home decoration games are an unlikely game theme, but in the pandemic it became handy. As one can decorate their virtual homes according to their desires without investing time, money, and hassle or gather ideas on how to rearrange their furniture to give their home a new look. The concept has attracted the app store by storm in recent times as more new players looking for new options in gaming to get over from the lockdown boredom.
What’s the house design game?
House design games are simulation games that have advanced graphics and it feels like decorating their own homes which are similar to playing with child’s dollhouse. The main purpose of the game is to create an attractive aesthetic design inside one’s virtual home.
In the game, a player is provided with a basic room from where one should usually start out along with options like carpets, wall coverings, couches, lamps, and so on. It depends on the player how they want to design their room with their imagination.
Why home design games are skyrocketing?
The rise of the gig economy and a seemingly impending recession – make mortgages seem even more out of reach. Personalising a house may have been a luxury in real life for mature generations of people, but for many young people tapping away at our phone screens for future design of homes may be as close as we can get. This less-than-perfect reality has spurred a meteoric rise of apps to fulfill us digitally. Interior design apps are on the rise as home ownership rates among people under 35 have fallen by 20 per cent in the last decade according to Statista report. Interior design games allow users to play and experiment with interior design – two things nearly impossible to achieve without time, effort, and money in real life.
Also home design games are appealing and they work as a form of wish fulfillment. Players might be living in a small, cluttered apartment full of mismatched furniture in a real-life, yet they are able to live out their dreams of more idealistic looking living spaces.
Types of Home Design games
There are various types of home design games are available for android and iOS devices both in freemium and premium models. First of its kind is Glu Mobile Design Home is one of the most popular interior design apps, with over 75m downloads and at least 1 million daily users. Players are given daily “challenges” of decorating different rooms, with a vast range of furniture to choose from. A player unlocks paintings, ornaments, and additional pieces of furniture in various colors and styles. Rooms are judged by other players, which players need to take into account. A high score earns a player new furniture options and more opportunities to score highly later on virtual cash and rewards are handed out daily, and can also be won based on a rating system.
Second is My Home – Design Dreams by Zenjoy which is close to 2 million downloads in Google play store has an in-game heartfelt story where a player gets to meet lots of lifelike characters in the storyline! A player gets to design from a quaint living room to a grandiose bedroom, a tiny condo to a luxurious mansion, and even a small home shop to their very own fashion showroom. Unlike Design Home this game includes match-three puzzle games to win coins, which can be utilised to decorate all kinds of rooms and houses including a backyard, a balcony, and even pools.
It is unclear how much interior design apps manage to monetize the game, or whether most of their income is made through small in-app purchases, with users upgrading their digital inventory rather than their real-life homes. However it is My Home – Design Dreams has in-game ads everywhere from crossing one level to get the desired item one has cross hurdles of ads which sometimes is bit annoying however the zeal to decorate the home for the players keep players rolling. Here is a small instance of such ad encounters:
As the housing market continues to be inaccessible for young people, home ownership will become an ever more distant fantasy – therefore the digital version of designing home is on the rise.
