BTS World Is A Perfect Wish-Fulfillment Fantasy For Fans

Active games are a surefire way to be closer to the artists you love. Whether you’re hanging out with them backstage in-game or they're imparting opinions to you on how you could break into the showbiz industry, interacting with superstars in these games is the closest most people will ever get to their idols. Active developer Netmarble has seemingly perfected the art of giving fans the closeness and intimacy they crave with the June debut of iOS and Android title BTS World.


The free-to-play adventure lets fans come face to face with the thrilling reality of not simply hanging out with the Bangtan Males, although becoming their manager. As expected, the game has ARMYs all over the world tweeting up a storm about the trials and tribulations of daily interactions with their biases before they came with each other as BTS. Yet while it's doing a fantastic job of giving fans all over the globe the once-in-a-lifetime chance of meeting and working with the musical group with 10,000 exclusive, never-before-seen images and 100 video clips, it's key to note that these types of wish-fulfillment games have come a long way.


Musical artists have appeared in numerous titles over the years, with the Spice Girls dancing along to players' directions in 1998's Spice World and Britney Spears breaking it down on the dance floor in 2002's Britney's Dance Beat. 


These games often aren't created with the highest-quality craftsmanship in mind, yet they're meant to serve one purpose: helping fans feel as though they're getting to know their idols just a little better.


For the longest time, pop star appearances in video games were mostly relegated to assisting them with choreography or going on eccentric journeys with them, à la Michael Jackson's 1990 Sega Genesis platformer Moonwalker.


after awhile, although, these games shifted in tone (especially over the last decade) to prepare fans feel more like they were living similar lives to their preference pop stars. Immediately after developer Glu Active launched its massively successful hit Kim Kardashian: Hollywood, in 2014, which managed to gross over $1.6 million in just five days immediately after its release, more completely immersive active experiences featuring celebrities were launched in quick succession.


All of those games, inspired by Kim Kardashian: Hollywood before them, revolved around creating your own custom character who, for some reason or another, lived some order kind of ancillary life to that of the main star. You're routinely a lowly retail employee somewhere, a friend of a friend, or a pop star hopeful with a "chance encounter" that leads you down the path to stardom thanks to the benevolent acts of your preference celeb.


Plenty of tapping, mundane tasks, and melodrama later, you're on your way to becoming a star, or helping your idols on the path to superstardom — in the event you keep up with the game long enough. Frustrating free-to-play timers that gently push you to buy "energy" become increasingly prevalent as you get further into the game, leaving you with two options: either buy energy to keep playing routinely or wait for your energy timers to recharge.


Despite this, some fans are head over heels for the feeling of being "in the industry" these games supply them. Beneath the technicolor dreamworlds of pop stars like Katy Perry and Britney Spears is one unifying force that attracts fans: the chance to spend time with their preference singers, or become like them in some small way — and if that insinuates spending cash, or time, to do so, then so be it. Nicki Minaj fan and self-proclaimed Barb, Elizabeth White, mentioned that, for her, these games are about escapism.


"I'm a mom. I have three kids, and it's not this glamorous life that you visualize on TV," she told MTV News. "So 'writing raps' for Nicki and hanging out with her, seeing her compliment my outfits, and 'performing' is sort of like escaping my regular life for several minutes daily. I won't pay to play, though."


The immersive factor is real, despite the somewhat predatory practices of getting players hooked and then forcing them to wait or buy premium currency to be able to see more of the game in a reasonable quantity of time. That's not a problem localized to musical games, though — that's just active gaming in general.


Glu Active took this simple formula and spun three games out of it: the now-defunct Katy Perry Pop, Nicki Minaj: The Empire, and Britney Spears: American Dream.


But not every pop star looking to get into the agency has followed Glu Mobile’s blueprint. Once Demi Lovato turned to video games to connect with her fans, she as an alternative turned to developer Pocket Gems for a vastly different experience.


Demi Lovato: Path to Fame is based on Episode, an interactive story app that incorporates an assortment of interactive stories that play out equally to animated comic books with various decision points. It's a modern Pick Your Own Adventure wrought with a dumb quantity of drama, although it does a good job of giving players the feeling of being in their preference star's life.


Path to Fame focuses on your self-insert character's ascent to fame as you go from Demi superfan to spending time in the limelight on your own. Some fans find this option format exhilarating and fulfilling, like Lovatic Katherine Tharp.


"I like that the game isn't as focused on doing small tasks and primping like Katy Perry Pop, plus it feels more like a cartoon or a comic book that I'd pick up and read," Tharp mentioned. "You really feel like you're companions with Demi."


once you get right down to it, yet, neither Glu Active nor Pocket Gems's active experiences supply the level of intimacy of Netmarble's latest. Perhaps those games had to walk so that BTS World could run.


BTS World is a wholly different experience than anything previous developers could muster. As an alternative opposed to placing players in the shoes of a pop star hopeful, it flips the script: This time, you’re the boss in the year 2012, working to groom BTS into the international sensation they are in the year 2019 as you work to unite them, train them, and befriend each member. It's a complete 180 from what fans who generally play games like Demi Lovato: Path to Fame are used to, yet for a good reason: It adds a far better user experience.


But why is it better? In back of the countless layers of what you could actually do in the game, BTS World has a uncanny way of making you feel like you're slowly becoming the group's confidant, caretaker, and No. 1 cheerleader.


In several ways, it feels like you're jumping into the role of "parent" to these seven young boys, playing a role that requires constant interaction, social skills, as well as a firm yet guiding hand as you help them become the global stars you know they're meant to be. And that underdog narrative is a large piece of BTS's story; immediately considering that, they defied the odds in a saturated Korean music market, crossing borders and transcending language barriers, to break successive records — three No. 1 albums on the Billboard 200, a stadium tour across the U.S., A coveted efficiency on Saturday Night Live, along with a speech at the United Nations, to name a couple of.


Thus, a dizzying quantity of staged intimacy is employed to permit players to feel like they're segment of that history-making journey, and most importantly, that they were there from the group's humble beginnings.


"It's very obtainable to the casual gamer or non-gamer," mentioned Netmarble U.S. President Simon Sim. "Our game is more like a portal than video game, and we have 10,000 pictures and videos exclusive only to our game. It's different than other artists' games. We think making you a manager and making them [the members] a more popular musical group while in the story is more engaging for BTS fans."


The sort of painstaking interaction with each member, which can come in the form of phone calls, text messages, and video messages, makes for a much more captivating experience than simple animated likenesses. While you interact with Jimin by way of the text or hear Namjun's voice immediately after accepting his phone call, you truly feel as though you’ve made a connection.


In one instance, Jimin's knee is injured, and in another Namjun isn't sure about building a meeting you're asking him to come to. Any time as soon as you succeed at getting them to finally come with each other, there's a rush of adrenaline that comes from having accomplished something special. There's also the visual rewards that come with it, like the video call or image that you get as a result. It feels real, and to players, that's what matters.


"We think this very new approach is the way to amass a bigger quantity of success," mentioned Sim, who also noted that the game was more "interactive" than the visual novel genre, which BTS World reflects at a glance.


By employing these new techniques of interactivity — and intimacy — BTS World transcends the bounds of what pop star sims before it were attempting to accomplish. It accomplishes this with near-unprecedented levels of access to one of the primary bands in the world, and gives players the feeling of truly connecting with them. And at the end of the day, even should these feelings are manifested by a celluar fantasy, the game makes you feel as though you've had a hand in BTS's massive success, and that you've made a number of key companions while doing so.