After "Jade Gambling" unexpectedly went viral, it shot up to the top 10 on the bestseller list.

“One cut can leave you penniless, another can make you rich; one cut means living in rags, another means living in a mansion.” This saying perfectly captures the frenzy and risk of jadeite gambling.

Thanks in part to the thrill of taking risks and reaping rewards to the extreme, content related to jade stone gambling has remained consistently popular online. It has not only become a regular feature in various films and TV shows but has also emerged as an enduringly popular theme in the gaming market.

Recently, Tea House noticed that two highly similar “jade stone gambling” mini-games have surged into the top 5 of Douyin’s mini-game trending charts. They are *Easy Peasy* from JinYou Interactive Entertainment and *Crazy Shopping Spree* from Chengdu Yitiao Link Technology.Among them, *Easy Peasy* has already climbed to No. 1 on the trending chart and No. 7 on the top-grossing chart.

In addition, other similar titles from ChiCheng Network, such as *Top Operation*, are also racing up the charts.

01

The Prototype Behind the Unexpected Viral Hit

These games share a high degree of similarity in gameplay and content, as they all stem from the same prototype: an indie game that suddenly went viral called *Jade Scratch* (originally titled *Jade Stone Scratch*).

The game was developed by Insomnia Games Studio in Shijiazhuang. According to the development team’s posts on social media, they created the game while participating in BooomJam, and initially uploaded only a demo to the Jike platform. Unexpectedly, it was discovered by a group of streamers and quickly went viral through live streams in May.

Upon noticing the surge in interest, they quickly launched a pre-registration page on the mobile gaming platform TapTap and went live with a store page on Steam. Within just one day of the Steam page going live, it had already been added to over 1,000 wishlists. The comments section of the official post was also flooded with players urging the developers to release the game.

However, the mini-game development teams were even quicker off the mark.Following the massive success of *Jade Scratch-Off*, a flood of similar “jade gambling” mini-games hit the market. Riding this wave of popularity, two titles—*Easy Pickings* and *Crazy Shopping Spree*—shot straight into the top five of the platform’s trending charts.

02

The core gameplay that maximizes the show’s entertainment value

In terms of content, these two mini-games are essentially identical to the original prototype, featuring the same stages: buying stones, mining, processing, and setting up a stall.

Upon entering the game, players will receive a starting amount of funds, which they can use to purchase various raw materials in the market.

Players can then open a window to view the interior of the stone and receive a real-time valuation of the rough gem. This is the core of the game: the stone’s interior is a complete mystery. If a single cut reveals a desirable color, the stone’s value skyrockets; if it reveals cracks or impurities, the value plummets.

The same rock, about 5 seconds apart

As a result, players are very likely to find themselves raking in huge profits on their first swing, only to suffer massive losses on the next.This extreme randomness and drama naturally generate a powerful entertainment effect. Especially for streamers and video creators, this gameplay is practically a natural traffic magnet—whether it’s mind-blowing luck or an instant crash, it instantly ignites the audience’s emotions, drawing large crowds to watch and interact.

A large number of popular videos with over 10,000 likes have appeared on TikTok

This surge in content popularity will, in turn, benefit the game itself by driving significant player engagement and download conversions.

Furthermore, during the stone-cutting process, players can sell their items at any time as soon as a buyer makes an offer, receiving the corresponding proceeds immediately. Of course, they can also choose to remove all the outer layers and, through design and shaping, craft the rough stones into various types of jewelry or decorative items before selling them.

Shaping the rough stone is the stage of the game that offers the most room for creativity. Even with a rough stone that isn’t particularly impressive to begin with, players can still pull off a last-minute turnaround in their earnings if they use different shapes in their design to skillfully work around cracks and impurities.

By the second day, all rough stones have been processed into jade products ready for sale in the store. Customers will begin to arrive and place bids, and once a sale is made, you’ll earn a profit.

During this process, customers’ bids do not necessarily match market valuations exactly. Players can compare bids from different customers and choose the most advantageous moment to sell, thereby maximizing their profits. This “price comparison” element, which mirrors real-life scenarios, adds a great deal of fun to the game.

03

Clever monetization points

In these “jade stone gambling” simulation games, the amount of money is the most critical factor; it serves as both a measure of the stone’s value and the basis for calculating profits and losses.

As a result, right from the start, the game’s main interface clearly displays the player’s current balance and the daily “rent” that must be paid. Accumulating wealth through jade gambling and quickly earning more money becomes the primary motivation driving players to continue playing.

After entering the mini-game market, the development team quickly identified “amount” as a key metric and, capitalizing on players’ core desire to “make money,” successfully built a monetization system.

Specifically, the two mini-games currently vying for the top spots both rely on a purely ad-based monetization model. In addition to pop-up ads, their rewarded video placements overlap significantly, primarily concentrated in the following three locations:

Get a free raw gem: Players can watch an ad every day to receive one free raw gem. This not only lowers the barrier to entry but also leverages the “low-cost entry” mindset to encourage players to actively watch ads.

Auction Sale: During the stone-opening process, players can watch an ad at any time to enter the auction, compete for the opportunity to buy at a higher price, and cash out at a premium. Furthermore, when two buyers bid simultaneously, players who wish to sell the stone to the higher bidder must watch an additional ad.This design cleverly leverages players’ “sunk cost” psychology—since they’ve already watched an ad once, they might as well watch it again to secure a better price, thereby further amplifying the monetization value of each individual user.

Expand Your Store and Attract More Customers: During the sales process, players can watch ads to expand their store and increase customer foot traffic, thereby boosting the likelihood of high-value sales and overall revenue.

It is clear that these ad placements are not forced but are cleverly integrated into the player’s key decision-making moments.At moments when players are “short on funds and want to take a gamble,” “want to cash out at a high point,” or “want to sell for a higher price,” the ads offer a convenient “shortcut” option. This approach preserves the integrity of the gaming experience while effectively incentivizing players to engage with the ads voluntarily, thereby maximizing monetization efficiency.

END

Overall, the sudden emergence of a viral hit like *Jade Scratch* on the Douyin content battlefield serves as a test of efficiency for mini-game development teams.Amid this wave of popularity, it is only natural for one or more development teams to respond swiftly, seize the market window, leverage the original game’s traffic momentum, and rapidly build a user base while monetizing their efforts.

While speed is certainly important, it is endurance that truly counts. At present, these “remake” titles generally suffer from overly simplistic core gameplay, which makes it highly likely that they will lack the momentum needed for long-term operation.

Therefore, for future products, simply relying on remakes may no longer be a viable path. Moving forward, only those that identify unique points of differentiation and create products that offer their own interpretation and innovation in the core experience will have a chance to truly stand out—and retain players even after the initial surge of interest has subsided.