Tonghuashi (童话师) tops China's iOS free chart for 3 days, then hits the monetization wall

A free-to-play cozy flower-farming and home-decoration simulation game for female casual players, developed by Foshan Shishang Dushi Network and published by 4399.

The flower-planting cozy trend that ruled WeChat mini-games will transfer to mobile: holiday timing, heavy UA, and a free-chart #1 that becomes a female casual hit.

4399, a veteran Chinese casual-games publisher, picked up Tonghuashi from Foshan Shishang Dushi Network, a studio whose predecessor was the Flash portal flash8 (founded 1999) and whose 2023 mobile simulation game Menghuan de Cheng (梦幻的城) exceeded 80M RMB in cumulative iOS and Google Play revenue (Sensor Tower, cited by QQ News (腾讯新闻)). The genre context was Wo de Huayuan Shijie (我的花园世界), a flower game from a 10-person team that reached 300M RMB in total revenue within three months, showing that female casual players would pay and inviting copycats.

Tonghuashi launched on iOS on June 18, 2026, ahead of the Dragon Boat holiday: day-one #1 on the free chart, a three-day reign, and still top 10 on June 23, above Tencent titles like Honor of Kings and Delta Force. UA ramped from small pre-launch tests to 1,000+ ad creatives on launch day and 2,000+ by June 22 (DataEye-ADX). Monetization lagged hard: it entered the iOS grossing chart only on day two at #194 and peaked at #116 (DataEye), then entered the WeChat mini-game grossing top 100 on June 25 (QQ News).

Still live, but the free-chart surge was short-lived and monetization did not follow: Sohu (搜狐) called it praised but not profitable (叫好不叫座), with players downloading but not paying. By mid-July, coverage grouped it with the female-casual wave and noted that it had once hit TapTap's new-game #1, while the mini-game side showed more commercial promise than iOS.

DianDian Data via DataEye (2026-06-24) documented day-one #1 on China's iOS free chart and a three-day reign above Honor of Kings.

430,000+ TapTap follows and a 9.0 score before launch (QQ News, Sohu) show real audience interest, not just UA.

The grossing gap, entering at #194 on day two and peaking at #116, quantifies the download-to-revenue disconnect.

4399's studio pick (flash8 lineage, 80M RMB prior hit) and holiday-timed UA ramping to 2,000+ creatives show the launch was engineered, not accidental.

WeChat mini-game grossing top 100 entry on June 25 suggests the business model fit the mini-game channel better than iOS.

UA and holiday timing can top a download chart, but a free-chart #1 with weak payment design only proves attention; monetization must be built into the loop or the spike evaporates.

As of late July 2026, Tonghuashi is still live on iOS, Android and the WeChat mini-game. Its iOS free-chart reign ended within days, falling to #7 by June 21, and iOS grossing never approached the top 100; mid-July industry coverage treated it as one more entrant in an increasingly crowded female-casual field alongside Hua Kai Shi Jian Ni (花开时见你) and the benchmark Wo de Huayuan Shijie. The mini-game version entered WeChat's grossing top 100 in late June, which is where 4399's follow-up attention reportedly shifted, but no durable hit-level status had been established by the July wrap-ups.