Love and Producer is a mobile game that lets players groom romantic relationships with a series of virtual boyfriends. In China's dating scene, where women are under enormous pressure to pair off before a certain age, the escapism offered by simulation games is drawing women in by the millions.

Although China’s online dating industry will generate over $350 million in 2014, the stigma attached to casual sex may hold it back. Understanding cultural nuances, social gaming app Pengpeng has amassed more than 300,000 users and is popular with Millennial men and women alike.

From Take That to the Beatles, boy bands are a fundamental aspect of many women’s teenage years. But as gender roles become more fluid, perhaps it’s not surprising that the promising Chinese ‘boy band’ FFC-Acrush are actually androgynous women.

In China, mobile gamers are competing over who can virtually clap the most enthusiastically for President Xi Jinping’s speech. With individualism threatening to undermine nationalism among the country’s youth, China is making the most of gamification to unite people under the state.