Many games are available for free on app stores that do promise fun gameplay without having to pay for a worthwhile experience. One of these is Animal Restaurant, a quaint cafe managing simulator where your staff are all cats and all of your customers are adorable creatures of all types. You start out as a homeless cat, without much love or care, but are then discovered by the cafe owner and employed immediately while surrounded by dependable coworkers.
The game has an easy tutorial that guides the player to learn the basic setup of what they are expected to do which is to serve customers, collect falling fish used as currency and keep the store clean for an overall happy experience. As the acting manager, players can add tables and ovens to increase their revenue along with decorations such as windows, a dessert bar and curtains over the door to increase the overall appeal of the cafe so that customers tip more.
In order to keep customer appeal going however, the game does require that players tap on a button to send out flyers to keep a steady stream of animals coming into the cafe. This can be increased by running advertisements in-game that promote the flyers for the player and cause a traffic rush to occur where all the player has to do is work on serving orders and collecting currency.
Animal Restaurant grows in demand and difficulty as the player progresses but it takes a good bit of grinding to get to that point. For players who just want to enjoy the idle experience, it’ll take days worth of time and dedication to acquire an efficient management that will run the business while the player is away. But for players who like to power through such challenges, there are available options to speed up the growing process. There are in-game purchases that can be made, but for players who wish to keep a free-to-play status, the game also runs advertisements. Lots and lots of advertisements; ads for the traffic rush, ads for collecting the tip jar to double profits and ads in person as a television-headed character appears to further promote the restaurant to bring in even more business.
While this game is well and truly fun, there are many places where ads take the place of the gameplay. If players are patient to let this game run idly for a few days, they are able to afford employees that serve as automatic functions for collecting orders and cleaning the cafe floor. But personally, I’ve found myself watching way too many ads some days and not enough of the charming 2D artstyle in order to gain some advancements. A bit tedious in nature, but the ads somehow always made it worth it to get adorable decorations and a full staff to keep the cafe busy.
How do you feel about ads in games? Let us know in the comments.
Jordan is a student studying Digital and Print Journalism at the University of North Texas. After discovering how much fun gaming journalism can be, she hopes to make a career in it once she graduates. When she isn’t writing, she enjoys playing games such as Genshin Impact, Ace Attorney, and Fire Emblem or watching Murder, She Wrote late at night on weekdays.
