In a few hours, the armies of Europe will fall thanks to your strategic alliance forged with Asia. On the other hand, a cooking recipe is about to be mastered after the tenth attempt, and an hour spent gathering all the ingredients. Another play session will have you deliver pizzas to 10 customers in record time – all without unfortunate accident.

They say reality is stranger than fiction, and this is one of the foundations of the simulation genre in gaming. Sim games span far and wide, transforming many real-life activities that are considered too wild or too boring into fun-filled hours worth spent. What makes these kinds of games appeal to many players are as follows:

1. Open-Ended

Most games from other genres have linear goals. You’ve seen too many “defeat the level boss”, “solve X puzzle in Y turns”, and “gather Z components”. Once that objective is met, there goes a stage, or a round, or the game itself. Simulation games let you go beyond the main objective and get more achievements for personal gain, much like the well-respected Sid Meier’s Civilization. Having your kind of fun is expressed better when not only you’re done with what you’re supposed to do, but you also get to go farther than needed.

2. Flexible

As in life, there’s more than one way to approach and resolve issues. Simulation titles often present you with a myriad of methods you can try out to complete tasks. There are no win conditions to hamper your creativity in devising the best route to victory. Sim games achieve either by introducing mechanics that make tasks easier when you get the hang of it, or through a degree of flexibility. A stunning example of this is 4WD Off-Road Driving Sim. This driving game lets you get to the endpoint without getting stuck on a single way of doing it.

3. Routine

Repetition is relative to each gamer. Some are turned off when they see grinding aspects in games, and some find long slogs a rewarding experience. Simulation titles make play cycles one of their interesting elements. There’s that soothing feeling of successfully finishing a routine without any hiccups, and that you are ready to take on longer and more intensive tasks. This is the usual case for many agriculture sims, like the Farming Simulator franchise.

4. Rewarding

Succeeding in doing multiple tasks in an open world is a rewarding experience that no leaderboard or power level could equate. Rather than follow a given set of winning conditions, simulation players are able to define what is a win and that gives them a sense of control on what they want to achieve. There are hardcore completionists who want every secret uncovered, yet there are others who prefer finishing the main objective and moving on to the next challenge.

5. Realistic

Some of us have dream careers and what-if professions, and the closest we could get to getting a feel for it is through games. While there are expected exaggerations and fluff, these titles make a wonderful getaway from the lives that we perform outside of gaming. Apart from career sims, there are a ton of other games that put us in the shoes of professions that are otherwise hard to attain in real life. There’s always a sense of excitement that when we drift away from reality once in a while.

This wraps the list of what makes simulation games appeal to many players like those published on Coonster. Do you think there are more reasons why?