Games.com Blog: “PetVille drops 'Clean Bombs' into the premium store” plus 19 more |  |
- PetVille drops 'Clean Bombs' into the premium store
- Farmville Pic of the Day: I wish I had a river...
- Cafe World says "Aloha!" with island themed items and recipes
- Daily news wrap: March 4, 2010
- New FarmVille Gifts: Kensington Bench & Fancy Topiary
- Tiki Farm introduces an unlimited Storage Bin for items
- YoVille Treasure Chests Feature wins you Coins, Rares & YoCash
- FarmVille Dog: Coming Today?
- New Ninjitsu Mesh and Speed Play quicken Wild Ones' pace
- Restaurant City offers 9k coins to fans after 90k fans vote!
- Mystery Animal Crate reintroduced in FarmVille
- Major renovations in Restaurant City gameplay!
- FarmVille Unreleased Items: Mystery Bag, Motorcycle, Scooter, Checker/Dog Bowl, & Jacaranda Tree
- New YoVille Whimsical Sweets are free!
- Playdom Adopts Facebook Credits as Currency in Tiki Resort
- Bejeweled Blitz offers new prizes for March
- Restaurant City's awards fans 500 Coins and a Pumpkin!
- Playdom Acquires Super Farkle Creator Offbeat Creations
- Farmville ad brings Microsoft's Bing 400,000 new fans in one day
- Zoo Kingdom: A new zoo-themed Facebook game with video game roots
| PetVille drops 'Clean Bombs' into the premium store Posted: 04 Mar 2010 10:00 PM PST  If you're tired of all that clicking to clean up after your and your friends' pets, PetVille has the quick-fix solution -- Clean Bombs. These explosive little devices come in a pack of five and can be purchased in the Premium store for 2 PetVille dollars each. (That's not bad considering that you can earn PV cash just by playing the game). To put them to work, visit a friends' house, open your inventory, then drag a bomb into the room. After a few seconds, the bomb will explode, leaving everything squeaky clean -- pets, house, you name it. As an added bonus, using a bomb doubles the amount of coins and love points, making these WMCs (weapons of mass cleaning) the new must-have item for virtual pet owners everywhere. Now, if someone could make these for real-life, we'd happily hang up our scrubbing brushes for good. What do you think of the new clean bombs?
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| Farmville Pic of the Day: I wish I had a river... Posted: 04 Mar 2010 10:00 AM PST FarmVille is more than just an ultra-popular farming simulation -- it's a chance to express yourself artistically through unique and creative farm layouts. To that end, Games.com's FarmVille Picture of the Day features some of the most interesting and imaginative FarmVille layouts out there. Got a FarmVille pic you want to share? Send it to submit2gamescom@gmail.com. Anyone can use Farmville's built-in water objects as homes for their various waterfowl. It takes a truly patient visionary to put together dozens (if not hundreds) of blue hay bales and arrange them into a gently flowing home for their ducks and geese to nestle in. The little bridge made of fences and gray hay bales in the bottom left corner just completes the serene scene.
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| Cafe World says "Aloha!" with island themed items and recipes Posted: 04 Mar 2010 09:45 AM PST  Two new recipes can also be found in your cookbook: the Hawaiian "Loco Moco" and the Filipino "Chicken Adobo".  
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| Daily news wrap: March 4, 2010 Posted: 04 Mar 2010 09:30 AM PST  Some quick hits from the past few days that we didn't have the time or inclination to work up into full posts:Zynga accused of funneling portion of in-game Haiti relief donations: The accusations come from Brazilian blog Folha, which accuses Zynga of keeping 50% of donated funds for itself without disclosing the fact to readers. Zynga strongly denies the claim and says it was upfront about how the donations would be distributed, both before and after the earthquake. hi5 adds support for Facebook API: Basically, this means that developers can easily brings their games over from Facebook to hi5. On the one hand, this is a strong attack by hi5 on the market-leading social network, and may peel off a few big name developers. On the other hand, this is a pretty big admission of hi5's part that they need to peel off some of Facebook's developers and users if they want to survive. Game makers should focus ad dollars on social media: So says a recent report from the Blitz Agency, which found that reviews from friends were twice as influential as reviews from experts in determining game purchases. Even though only a small percentage of the survey said social networks were an important factor in their purchase decisions, the study author said these networks "really present a good opportunity for game marketers to really enable those tools and platforms that allow gamers to become influencers." New speakers announced for Virtual Currency Workshop: The Cha-Ching! Workshop at next week's Game Developers Conference will feature Digital Chocolate's Trip Hawkins, IMVU's Lee Clancy, Ohai's Susan Wu, and the Virtual Goods Summit's Charles Hudson. All will be talking about mercahndising, strategies, targeting global audiences, sustaining growth, and emerging trends in social and casual games, according to the press release.
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| New FarmVille Gifts: Kensington Bench & Fancy Topiary Posted: 04 Mar 2010 09:11 AM PST There are two new gifts we can send to our FarmVille neighbors starting today - the Kensington Bench and the Fancy Topiary, both of them looking really cute. Check them out below:
The Kensington Bench is a "regular" gift, while the Fancy Topiary (that makes me think of a Bonsai - the tiny little trees I simply adore) is a FarmVille.com exclusive. Don't forget to send these new gifts to your neighbors! This article originally appeared on Social Games Help.
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| Tiki Farm introduces an unlimited Storage Bin for items Posted: 04 Mar 2010 08:00 AM PST  
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| YoVille Treasure Chests Feature wins you Coins, Rares & YoCash Posted: 04 Mar 2010 07:33 AM PST  Treasure chests and keys with the bright colors of red, blue, and green arrived to YoVille. To get your keys, click on your friends feeds that say Mystery Keys Found. You can also buy them for 2 Yocash. You will find the keys all over your properties on YoVille. If you see a colorful ring of keys click on it and send the feed yourself to help your friends out. When you want to buy keys, set your chest on the ground in your room and click on it. A little message will pop up giving you the option to buy the key. You will also be able to send chests in the game to others as gifts and in trade, but you are not allowed to gift or send keys themselves.In those chests you can find coins, yocash and even rares. What are these rares? You will have to tell us! Make sure to send a picture of the rare items you get from the chests to admin@yvlounge.com. Official report and pictures are after the link. What did you find in your chests? Tell us in comments. We wanted to give everyone a little heads up and give you a quick tutorial on the Chest and Keys coming soon to Yoville!! Firstly, we will have 3 different matching colors sets of chest and keys Green, Blue and Red. The idea here is to get your hands on both the key and a chest of the same color to open the chest and find a prize!! Prizes will include coins, items and even a chance to receive Yocash. Let's walk through how to get your hands on these chests and keys and getting them open to get those special prizes...  How do I receive A Key? You will be able to receive a Key by clicking on your Friend's Mystery Key Feed on Facebook. Keep your eyes peeled and be one of the first to click in on this feed to receive a key! You will also be given the option to be able to purchase a specific key (Please read below for more details)  How do I post a Feed for my Friends to find a Key? To be able to post a Feed about Mystery Keys you must look for the missing set of keys. These may be found in your friend's rooms or your own rooms. Once you find a set of the Mystery Keys in the Room click on the Keys and you will be able to post a Feed by clicking Share Keys.  You will also be able to post a feed for more keys once you find a chest. To do this click on the chest from your inventory and and the option to Share Keys will be there as well.  How do I receive a Chest? You can receive a Chest by one of your Friend's sending you this item as a Free Gift or purchasing a Chest (Please read below for more details)  How Do I purchase a Chest or Key? You will be able to purchase a Key or a Chest to your matching set by clicking on either the Key or the Chest you have in color in your inventory and you will be prompted to purchase the missing piece. For instance if you only have the Red Key and you want the matching Red Mystery Chest you can click on your Red Key in your inventory and the following will pop up allowing you to Buy a Chest.  How Do I open my Chest? You can only open your chest if you have the matching Key and Chest. If you have the key and chest in the same color you can open the chest by placing it in your room and then clicking on the item or opening it by clicking on it from your inventory. We will show you how many of each item you own and once you click Open you will get a pop up message of the prize you will receive.  Well that's about all folks. We will let you know as soon as this feature is available in game. We are hoping to have this in game this week if all goes well. Good Luck Everyone and have fun hunting for those keys to open your chests!! This article originally appeared on YoVille Lounge.
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| Posted: 04 Mar 2010 07:00 AM PST  Zynga has hinted via a FarmVille Podcast that the Dog will be an interactive pet and include customizable features such as the ability to name your dog. A lot of farmers are wondering exactly how much we can expect to pay for the Dog? Many people suspect the Dog will cost farm cash. Even though there has been an overwhelming response by farmers requesting a dog, Zynga has held out releasing the FarmVille Dog. It has been the most anticipated item in FarmVille thus far, so it is not too surprising they have made us wait this long. With long waits and a build-up like this, we hope it will not disappoint! However, as FarmVille Freak Terrible Ted's altered FarmVille teaser image below depicts, with all FarmVille releases there are sure to be complaints. The teaser picture from the FarmVille loading screen shows the dog in the same colors as the Dog we've seen on the FarmVille Official Forum's Banner and FarmVille Twitter page. Hopefully we will have customizable options to pick color choices and features as well. Wouldn't it be great if the Zynga gods considered making a range of Dog breeds available in FarmVille? Many dog lovers would love the option to choose their favorite breed of Dog! What breed of Dog would you like to see in FarmVille? This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.
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| New Ninjitsu Mesh and Speed Play quicken Wild Ones' pace Posted: 04 Mar 2010 06:52 AM PST  The new Ninjitsu Mesh and Speed Play option were announced in Wild Ones this week. The two new releases hasten the ordinarily patient and strategic pace of the war game.  The new Speed Play option is a multiplayer mode where quick thinking and clutch plays are crucial to emerging victorious. While the maps, weapons, and characters remain the same, the settings have been altered. In Speed Play, disaster strikes in just one minute. A regular game won't see the water begin to rise until four minutes into the game. By then most of the animals have died and the disaster functions as a stalemate breaker in the event neither animal is willing to concede. In Speed Play, the player barely gets two turns before the water begins to rise, creating some ridiculous situations and wacky antics. In my first game of Speed Play, (pictured above) I was caught completely off guard! As you can see, I was planning on digging in to the bottom left corner and bombing grenades at my foe. Out of nowhere, the water began to rise and I wasn't able to escape! I've learned from my mistakes and now have the tips to make sure you don't suffer the same Speed Play demise:  If you're caught underwater, hold spacebar while moving left and right to swim to the surface. You can't jump out of the water, but moving to the top can often help you escape a watery grave. The Ninjitsu Mesh is a new item that increases your animal warrior's speed. The trendy and intimidating garb comes in black and white and can be found in the Wild Ones shop in the accessories section. It's available on sale for 22 Treats until March 10th.
The Ninjitsu Mesh boasts both function and form. However, the item does cost money so I would only recommend it to the most serious Wild Ones players. Go check out the new speedy modes and items on Wild Ones.
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| Restaurant City offers 9k coins to fans after 90k fans vote! Posted: 04 Mar 2010 06:20 AM PST  True to their word, Restaurant City is matching vote-for-coin and over the next 3 days, fans of their official Facebook page will be getting 3,000 coins a day for a total of 9,000 coins in all!
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| Mystery Animal Crate reintroduced in FarmVille Posted: 04 Mar 2010 04:50 AM PST  Starting today, those who didn't get the chance to grab their cool animal from the mystery animal crate will get a new (and probably final) chance to buy it and expand their farm because Zynga decided to reintroduce the Mystery Animal Crate in FarmVille.Just like before, the Mystery Animal Crate is available for just 7 days for purchase and it costs 20 FV cash. Inside it you can find any of the following limited edition FarmVille animals: - Jackalope (past prize) - Buffalo (past prize) - Ox (past prize) - Buck (past prize) - Peacock (past prize) Unfortunately nothing new from the Mystery Animal Crate, but still some really cool items! Did you get the Mystery Animal Crate in FarmVille when it was first released or are you planning to get it now? This article originally appeared on Social Games Help.
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| Major renovations in Restaurant City gameplay! Posted: 04 Mar 2010 04:45 AM PST  All these changes are helping make Restaurant City a more interactive and complex game. While it may feel like too many options, gameplay changes like this help reward hardcore players who spend the time to explore all opportunities the creators have to offer. People can continue to play as they did before, but these new features do make for a richer gaming experience. So let's take a look below at the 1) revamped gifts system, 2) Lost Wallet and Purse bonuses, 3) improved Ingredient Star Ratings, and 4) Ask Your Friends for Ingredients wall posts. 1) Revamped Gifts System:   2) Lost Wallet and Purse Bonuses:     Finally, if you're not going to get a Lost Wallet or Purse after helping out a friend's restaurant, then the game will let you know with the following message:  3) Ingredient Star Ratings:  4) Ask Your Friends for Ingredients wall posts: Going into your restaurant Menu, you'll now see an orange megaphone on the left-hand side that you can click on in order to request ingredients from your friends. A cool thing about the Ingredients Request box is that it shows you a scrollable list of all the ingredients in the game using mini-icons.  
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| FarmVille Unreleased Items: Mystery Bag, Motorcycle, Scooter, Checker/Dog Bowl, & Jacaranda Tree Posted: 04 Mar 2010 04:34 AM PST From time to time, we like to share with you some FarmVille Unreleased items. These items have been discovered, but there is no official release date or confirmation that they will actually make it to the game. Thanks to FarmVille Freak Xan995 for sharing his findings.
Sources:
This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.
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| New YoVille Whimsical Sweets are free! Posted: 04 Mar 2010 04:12 AM PST The YoVille free gifts page was updated with whimsical sweets.Four new cookies and three colorful cakes are now available. Send them all to your friends now for free!!  
 This article originally appeared on YoVille Lounge.
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| Playdom Adopts Facebook Credits as Currency in Tiki Resort Posted: 04 Mar 2010 04:05 AM PST  The Facebook Credit system will take the place of Gems in the game, and will be used for future premium item purchases. If you are one of the many players who still have gems to your name, however, don't fear, as Playdom has assured all via the game's fan page that Gems will continue to be valid until you run out: "Aloha Islanders! We've just introduced Facebook Credits in Tiki Resort. This will make purchasing your favorite items even easier! If you already have Gems, they'll still work until you run out. For those of you having problems with the new system, we're working to fixing these issues. Thanks!" Tiki Resort is now one of an increasingly large list of games that support the universal credit system. Are you happy about the switch, or did you like having the in-game Gems serve as your representation of real world currency? [Via Frisky Mongoose]
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| Bejeweled Blitz offers new prizes for March Posted: 04 Mar 2010 03:45 AM PST  Through March 9, players that register at least 1 million team points on the game will be eligible to win one of 16 iPod Touch units. Not bad in itself, but it pales in comparison to the prize Popcap has promised for later in the month: a new Mazda3 iSport 4-door sedan! With nearly 11 million monthly users, your chances of actually winning any of these prizes are vanishingly slim. Still, it's nice to dream that every new high score might be getting you that much closer to a brand new iPod or car. At the very least It helps make the hours you wasted playing the game seem a bit more productive...
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| Restaurant City's awards fans 500 Coins and a Pumpkin! Posted: 04 Mar 2010 03:30 AM PST  The free Pumpkin can be gotten here, while the 500 Coins can be grabbed here. And because they're feeling extra generous, for every ten fans who vote 'like' on their free coins announcement post, they'll give fans another coin. Currently, that announcement has a whopping 89,097 individual 'likes'!
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| Playdom Acquires Super Farkle Creator Offbeat Creations Posted: 04 Mar 2010 03:00 AM PST  "With this acquisition we are bringing a talented new game studio into the Playdom family with a very exciting game pipeline," said John Pleasants, CEO of Playdom in a press release announcing the merger. "We have aggressive plans to expand our social gaming footprint in 2010 and the addition of Offbeat Creations will significantly enhance our development throughput and expand Playdom's game pipeline this year." Offbeat is best known for Super Farkle, a simple dice game that has attracted over one million monthly average users, according to AppData. Despite that success, Offbeat's hit game now represents only the seventh most-popular game in Playdom's catalog, well behind Playdom mega-hits like Farm Life, Sorority Life and Tiki Farm. The deal comes on the heels of the recent purchase of Mindjolt Games by MySpace founder Chris Dewolfe, and seems to signal it's once again open season on mergers and acquisitions in the Facebook gaming space. What developer will be the next one to go on the sale block?
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| Farmville ad brings Microsoft's Bing 400,000 new fans in one day Posted: 04 Mar 2010 02:30 AM PST  The increase represents a nearly 400% jump from the page's roughly 100,000 fans on Monday, and gives Microsoft a huge new audience of people to reach through News Feed updates, even if those people signed up more out of interest in the Farm Cash than in the search engine. (currently 560,033)
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| Zoo Kingdom: A new zoo-themed Facebook game with video game roots Posted: 04 Mar 2010 01:00 AM PST  Put on your zoo keeping hat and get ready to jump into Zoo Kingdom, a simulation game where players manage a small petting zoo and build out the place by caring for animals, which, in turn, rewards the players with virtual coins that can be used for upgrades. This new game is similar to RockYou's popular Zoo World, but with a much slicker presentation. Part of the reason for this game's good looks might have to do with the company behind it -- Blue Fang. This traditional game developer has been creating zoo sims for years, including Zoo Tycoon for PC, World of Zoo for the Nintendo Wii. Does that mean the game will be better than the others? Right now the game looks great, but also has all of the trappings of the average social game: gifting, in-game store, friends list and, of course, microtransactions. Zoo Kingdom is much easier to navigate than Zoo World and there seems to be more options when it comes to the zoo layout, which is a big plus.  Blue Fang also announced that a version of this game is in the works for iPhone and iPad, and indicates that this is the first of several Facebook games to come. We'll be taking a closer look at Zoo Kingdom, in the meantime, check out this new Facebook game for yourself and let us know what you think! Play Zoo Kingdom on Facebook >
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