A game that I have always loved is Hayday. Created by the same company that brought us Clash of Clans, users begin with a barn, silo, chicken coop for 6 chickens, and wheat and have to use these mere resources to expand their farm, get new animals, new products, new decorations, and really just become the best farmer you can (i.e. fantasy). There are a couple different mechanics that go into this game. For starters, with crops, crops take different amounts of time to grow, however the longer they take to grow, the more you can sell them for in your shop. For example, every player starts with wheat which takes only 60 seconds to grow, however you can only sell 10 pieces of wheat for a max of 36 coins. This starkly contrasts with chili peppers for instance which you obtain at level 25, but take 4 hours to grow but you can sell 10 peppers for a max of 360 coins.
This is where fellowship comes along. Players can make friends with other players, and work together to buy and sell resources from one another. By selling something you are getting money which you can use to purchase more items, and by someone else buying your resources, they are gaining items they can use to potentially fill orders. This is where challenge comes in because players need to gain a certain amount of XP in order to level up and unlock new machines, animals, and crops, but once you level up you need to ensure you have enough money to buy the new items that are now available to you. Last but not least this is a game of pastime, because it takes time to level up. It is quite literally impossible to increase from level 1 to 10 in five minutes because of the mechanics put in place. It takes time for resources to grow or animals to be ready to collect, and therefore it’s a game great for someone’s past time as it doesn’t take a lot of brain power or strategy, moreso just someone willing to play for a few hours in a relatively low stress low stakes environment.
