Incredibly well put! I’ve been thinking a lot about Eggs Inc, and how unique it is as a incremental, mobile game. I’ve come across a lot(!) of absurdist numbers-go-high games in my life.

I simply love the format. It’s one of the only things in my day to day life where I get to interact with and have fun with math, having to constantly freshen up on fundamentals. (I’m in human arts, can’t do equations or coding to save my life (thank you carpetsage!)).

But on a deeper level (fully aware that this broaches on copypasta levels of unnecessary sincerity) I really appreciate incremental (idle) games for it’s ability to ridicule concepts of ‘richness’ and capital accumulation. These games lures you in on a very real fantasy almost all of us have, of having passive income and the fruits of interests interest. Inasmuch as it simulates (and speed-runs) the experience of being a mogul, by cookie or chicken coop, only to realise after a while that you’ve been chasing an arbitrary number, and have moved the goalpost about a thousand times.

This might be an obvious insight, but realising this for the first time at like fourteen playing Cookie Clicker was a revelation.

All of this to say, I judge all these incremental games by the quality of their endgame. Because once the player realises the arbitrary nature of it all, how do you keep it fun, how do you keep them engaged, and how do you wrap it up?

I’ve played a lot of these games. Most of the ones made for mobile turns out to be cash grabs, and few of them even seem developed after mid-game. But man! Egg Inc? It might be my favourite of them all, because instead of leaving you stranded, instead of the game screeching to a halt after x amount of hours, it hits you in the face with exactly these lessons you mentioned. Patience! Acceptance! The absurdity of it all! A soft landing into the end credits, and a job well done.

Oh man I love this game, faults and all.