Games.com Blog: “Quote of the moment: The Daytime TV analogy” plus 10 more |  |
- Quote of the moment: The Daytime TV analogy
- Cafe World: Limited Time Survey Earns US Players 2 Cafe Cash
- Restaurant City: Grab your free Flour and Mango
- Happy Aquarium: Lost Baby Hippo and Easter Demo Tank
- Happy Aquarium: Get a 100% Resale Value on Old Items
- Cafe World: Free V.I.P. recipe makes a comeback for Club Members
- Pet Society Guide: How to Send & Retrieve Free Gifts
- FarmVille March 29th Podcast with FarmVille Freak CliffsNotes
- Zynga Searching for Umbrella Site Name
- FarmVille Farmer's Market Loading Screen Teaser
- FarmVille Dogs: 'Don't worry ... you will see them soon'
| Quote of the moment: The Daytime TV analogy Posted: 30 Mar 2010 10:30 AM PDT  "Will Farmville games kill AAA [games]? Did television kill film? For a while, the film and cinema industries were terrified, convinced that television would prise their audiences away. They fought and complained and said that television was rubbish. And then discovered it was their saviour. It gave a long tail to movies A new revenue stream. Cinema was harder hit until it realised that it needed to smarten up and offer a unique experience, and now it is thriving."Facebook games are like television. They are mass-market, accessible, need no special skills (have you ever tried playing a PS3 game with someone who's never used a controller before...), and are free. They represent a large part of our future. "... We are at the early days of Facebook games. To extend the television analogy, Facebook games are daytime TV. They're not even good daytime TV. In the evolution of games-as-TV, we haven't even reached Countdown. There is no Facebook equivalent of The Wire. Of Dr Who or Torchwood. Of Dispatches or The Blue Planet or Desperate Housewives. We haven't even got to soap operas" -Gamasutra Expert Blogger Nicholas Lovell draws a parallel between Facebook games and another mass market entertainment medium
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| Cafe World: Limited Time Survey Earns US Players 2 Cafe Cash Posted: 30 Mar 2010 10:00 AM PDT  "Here is another great way to gain 2 FREE Cafe Cash from Zynga. Complete this limited time activity (US users only) by clicking on the link below. It only takes a few minutes! Please follow the instructions in the activity. Many people are completing this at once, so please allow a moment for it to load. http://zyn.ga/2V" FYI, this is actually Cafe World's second attempt to post this survey offer. Last night, they took it down after frustrated fans couldn't get it to work. Basically, the link led to the "Earn Cafe Cash" tab, but the "Future Friendly" survey being offered wasn't there. A lot of fans started wailing that it was a "scam" and a "hoax". Some claimed to have seen the video being advertised for the survey. Regardless, the link to the offer was removed and not put up again. Did the link work for you? Let us know in the comments.
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| Restaurant City: Grab your free Flour and Mango Posted: 30 Mar 2010 09:00 AM PDT  
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| Happy Aquarium: Lost Baby Hippo and Easter Demo Tank Posted: 30 Mar 2010 08:00 AM PDT  This new Baby Hippo is purple and male. Like most of the Lost Babies, you can only get one if another player posts a notice about it on the Wall of their Facebook profile. You also only get one per post, so if someone else clicks on the link first, you're out of luck. But it's for free. You can also mate the male Baby Hippo with the female Pink Hippo, but it'll cost you Pearls instead of Coins to do it. The Pink Hippo can be bought from the store for 58 Pearls or 48 Facebook Credits. 
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| Happy Aquarium: Get a 100% Resale Value on Old Items Posted: 30 Mar 2010 07:30 AM PDT  Happy Aquarium would like all players to know that it's now possible to receive a full refund from reselling old items at the store. Seeing that the game still doesn't have item storage, players who don't want to part with rare or expensive items due to low returns on resale, tend to dump items in their spare tank. But now, you toss out your old decorations, and reclaim those expenses in full. Now what you're probably thinking right now is: What about items that were bought with Pearls or Facebook Credits? Well, the answer is going to be a bit disappointing. You're going to get the equivalent of the Pearls or Facebook Credits in Coins. Now here's the second disappointment: This offer is random! When old man Harold pops up in your game window and says "Sell NOW!", he means NOW, cause otherwise, you're not going to get the deal on your resales. It'd be sweet if the game implemented a Resale Value Week instead, but hey, the option is still nice to have around.
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| Cafe World: Free V.I.P. recipe makes a comeback for Club Members Posted: 30 Mar 2010 07:00 AM PDT  This recipe creates 99 servings that'll earn you 99 coins per serving, which totals to 9,801 coins every 18 hrs. When it's cooked, the items displayed are going to be a steak, a lobster bisque (soup), and three desserts.
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| Pet Society Guide: How to Send & Retrieve Free Gifts Posted: 30 Mar 2010 06:00 AM PDT   Sending Free Gifts in Pet SocietyClick on the pink giftbox on the left side of your screen. Choose a gift, select a friend, hit send. Easy peasy.  How to Retrieve a Free GiftYou get your free gifts not within the game, but in the Requests section of Facebook. As you can see, I usually ignore my requests, because they involve tiresome invitations to groups like Make Me Change My Name to Spiderman or I prefer Internet smileys without the nose. Click "Other Requests." Scroll down the page until you find a notice like this:  
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| FarmVille March 29th Podcast with FarmVille Freak CliffsNotes Posted: 30 Mar 2010 05:45 AM PDT The March 29th Official FarmVille Podcast is up! You can listen to the Podcast video above, read the FarmVille Freak Summary below, or check out the entire Offiical FarmVille Podcast Transcript provided by Lexilicious at the bottom of the post. FarmVille Freak Summary of March 29th Official FarmVille Podcast: Spring Themed Items * Spring Basket feature works like Valentine's and Pot of Gold events. * Everyone will receive a free Spring Basket in your Gift Box. * Sendable Eggs as free gifts and can be found while fertilizing. * New farmers playing for 7 days or less can send 3 Spring Eggs to a single friend. * Up to 10 neighbors can receive a free egg by clicking on a Spring Egg sharing link via Facebook newsfeed. Horse Stable Change * Pink Hair and Brown Hair Ponies are producing their own Pony Foals. User Submitted Questions La Maison Building Details on Expiring: 1. Q: Will you be able to finish your La Maison building once the materials are no longer available in the Market? (from our very own FarmVille Freak Calry Elf !) A: "Once the buildable La Maison has expired, you'll no longer be able to send out its building materials, and the frame will no longer be available for purchase in the Market. If you've got any gift requests for the La Maison building materials that haven't expired yet, you can still accept them before they do. If you still can't finish the La Maison in time, you'll be able to purchase the rest of the construction for Farm Cash in the same way you can purchase an incomplete Chicken Coop expansion. The base cost to finish will be 50 and each piece of the La Maison you have in place already will subtract 1 Farm Cash from the total. So if you've already collected 25 pieces, you'll be able to purchase the rest of the construction at a cost of 25 Farm Cash." 2. Q: What are those floaters that appear when plowing? They look like golden potatoes.' A: This is FAQ newbie question. Coins are random and you will automatically receive 100 coins. 3. Q: If you yield a Foal from your Horse Stable, does that mean you'll never be able to get another consumable? A: No, finding a Foal does NOT affect your chances of finding consumables. Coming Soon to FarmVille Co-op Farming Details: * FV will soon feature new jobs that you can complete with your FV friends. * Each job will have a timer with specific rewards. * If you finish the mission before the time expires, you will earn a Gold, Silver, or Bronze Medal. * The faster you finish, the better the reward will be. * Earning a Gold Medal will unlock a "very special prize". Limited Edition Items: * New Mystery Box (regular) * April Fools themed Mystery Box * Spring Themed Limited edition items including: Chocolate Cow, Egg Shaped Houses, and some very cute bunnies. Read the entire Official FarmVille March 29th Podcast below: Source: FarmVille March 29th Podcast Transcript FarmVille Podcast - March 29th: Hey Farmers and welcome to this week's installment of the Official FarmVille Podcast! As per usual, my name is Lexilicious and I am in charge of all things community over here on the FarmVille team. This week, we will be discussing our latest releases, I will be answering some user submitted questions and you guys are all going to get a sneak peek of things coming to FarmVille in the near future. This week proved to be another really exciting week for the FarmVille team that was jam packed with some great new features and releases. First and foremost, we continued to release more items from our Limited Edition French Chateau theme, including the new Museum, Restaurant and Pavillion that can all be purchased from the Market for varying amounts of Farm Cash. The new Mystery Wings Box made its debut this week, introducing some very special new winged animals to FarmVille. So far, this box appears to be a big hit with you guys so if you haven't had a chance to get this new and improved Mystery box yet, make sure to grab one from the market before they disappear. And as things start to warm up over here at the FarmVille offices, spring themed items are slowly starting to make their way into the market, starting with the new Chick - n - egg and the Egg Fence. Both of these items can be purchased for Farm Cash and coins from the Market for a limited amount of time. We also released our first spring themed feature this week. The new Spring Basket allows you to collect Spring Eggs from your friends and redeem them for special items. Now, this feature works almost exactly like the Valentine's Day Box and the Pot of Gold so many of you may be familiar with how this event works. But for any of our new users who might be looking for some guidance, here are some quick tips to get you on your way. Upon opening your giftbox you will find a Spring Basket waiting for you. After you place the Spring Basket on your Farm, you will be able to start collecting! Now, in order to collect Spring Eggs, you'll have to receive them from friends as gifts. Eggs can be sent to Neighbors via the free gifts page. One key difference to the Spring Basket is that you are able to find Eggs when fertilizing a Neighbors Farm. Clicking the 'Ask for Eggs' button will allow you to send a single Spring Egg to any of your friends (just like the Free Gifts page), and give them the chance to send you one in return. (Note: You can only Ask for or Send Love to 10 Neighbors every 24 hours.) As stated in the message you receive when first opening the Spring Basket, new farmers that have been playing for 7 days or less can send out more Eggs at a time. New farmers can send three Spring Eggs to a single friend. Upon receiving and accepting a Spring Egg it will appear in your gift box. Clicking "Use" will place the gift in your box automatically. As you collect gifts, each item you can unlock will be revealed as you collect the proper amount of gifts, and the "redeem" button will become available for each item. Clicking "Redeem" will award you the gift in return for the proper amount of Spring Eggs. Every 5 Spring Eggs you collect, you'll be able to post a Feed to your wall to alert your Friends of how well you're doing and give them a chance to collect a free Spring Egg. 10 Neighbors will be able to collect one free Spring Egg when clicking on the feed within 24 hours. For each notch on the meter of your Spring Egg progress bar, your basket will change appearance, overflowing with more and more gifts. Clicking 'Progress' in the Spring Basket menu will show how many Spring Eggs you have in comparison to your friends. We all know that a little bit of healthy competition always makes things more fun, so make sure to keep track of your friend's progress! Now, before I get into answering some questions from the community, there is a quick change to Horse Stables that I want to fill you guys in on. Previously, the Pink Haired Ponies and the Brown Ponies would only produce brown foals when placed in the Horse Stable. As of March 25th, Brown Ponies and Pink Ponies will now produce Pony Foals when placed in the Horse Stable with a Stallion! I'm sure this will make all of our pony lovers out there very happy. Ok, so let's go ahead and get into answering some questions from the FarmVille Community! 1) Our first question comes to us from Calyr Elf and they'd like to know if they'l be able to finish their La Maison building once the materials are no longer available in the market. Once the buildable La Maison has expired, you'll no longer be able to send out its building materials, and the frame will no longer be available for purchase in the Market. If you've got any gift requests for the La Maison building materials that haven't expired yet, you can still accept them before they do. If you still can't finish the La Maison in time, you'll be able to purchase the rest of the construction for Farm Cash in the same way you can purchase an incomplete Chicken Coop expansion. The base cost to finish will be 50 and each piece of the La Maison you have in place already will subtract 1 Farm Cash from the total. So if you've already collected 25 pieces, you'll be able to purchase the rest of the construction at a cost of 25 Farm Cash. 2) Ms Nee would like to know 'What are those floaters that appear when plowing? They look like golden potatoes.' This is a question a lot of our new users have, and to answer you, the coins are a random chance for players to win 100 coins while plowing, planting or harvesting. It happens completely randomly with any kind of crop. If you see the coin above your head, 100 additional coins should be added to your balance. You can find answers to questions like this in the New User Support section of our forums, specifically tailored to help our newer Farmers get their bearings. 3) Our last question comes from IILtdesq, and they actually have a question about a feature that was mentioned in my last podcast. They want to know that if you get a foal from your stable, does that mean you'll never be able to get another consumable? Just so it's crystal clear, finding a foal does NOT affect your future chances of find any consumables. It just means that you will not find any consumables at that time. The next time you collect from your stable, you still have a chance of finding consumables as well as producing a foal. Remember Farmers, if you have a question that you would like answered by the FarmVille team, please make sure to visit the official farmville forums or www.farmville.com for more details. And for this week's coming soon section, I actually have some more information for you guys about a feature I briefly discussed in last week's podcast. I'm sure some of you may have seen our loading screen image teasing the new "Co-op Farming". As I said in last week's podcast, FarmVille will soon feature new jobs that you can complete with your friends. Folks in FarmVille will ask for help completing various farming jobs. You will be able to team up with your friends and Neighbors to tackle these jobs for various rewards. Each one of these jobs will have a timer. If you and your friends finish the mission before your time expires, you will earn a Gold, Silver or Bronze Medal upon completion, depending on how quick and efficient you all were. The Faster you finish, the better the medal. In addition to this, if you and your Neighbors are savvy enough to earn a Gold Medal, you will unlock a very special prize. This new feature is sure to add a very exciting new aspect to a game we all love. Since you guys have gotten a good peek into the details of this feature, it would be greatly appreciated if you could provide us with some feedback. Please make sure to visit the Official FarmVille forums if you have an opinion about this upcoming feature that you would like to share with us. And lastly, we have some very cool new Limited Edition items heading your way in the coming weeks. In addition to a regularly scheduled Mystery Box, there will also be a very special April Fools Mystery Box available for a Limited Amount of time. And as mentioned last week, our Spring Themed Limited Edition items will be coming soon, including a Chocolate Cow, Egg Shaped houses and some very cute bunnies. Alright Folks, that's it from me this week! I will be back this coming Friday to give all of you your latest FarmVille news and updates. Again, my name is Lexilicious and I will see you guys soon! Happy Farming everybody. This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.
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| Zynga Searching for Umbrella Site Name Posted: 30 Mar 2010 05:30 AM PDT  It seems that Zynga is looking for feedback about naming a new site that would work as an umbrella site for all Zynga games. According to the survey, the website would provide a place where you could access all your Zynga games. "Imagine a place where you can play all your favorite Zynga games like Farmville, Mafia Wars, Café World and others. This would be a place where you could play games: * that are always free * without losing any of the friends or game history you have already built up * that allow you to earn rewards faster and have them apply across all Zynga games * with faster performance and fewer glitches * where accepting gifts or neighbor requests is quick and easy * where helping friends or asking for help is easy to do * that allow you to see game-relevant feeds & posts in one place * that have a substantially larger game playing area * that allow you to trade items with friends * that show how you compare against your friends and other players * that provide exclusive game features * that let you receive and share tips with other players" Note: Out of respect for Zynga, we are not posting the original link to the survey because we do not know the original audience the survey was distributed to or intended for. This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.
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| FarmVille Farmer's Market Loading Screen Teaser Posted: 30 Mar 2010 03:00 AM PDT  There is a new teaser loading screen of the FarmVille Farmer's Market "Coming Soon". The "Coming Soon" time frame could mean weeks, months, or whenever the Zynga gods feel like it :) The Farmer's Market is rumored to be an interactive feature that will allow neighbors to help each other with immediate benefits. We first heard about it from an exclusive interview our friend Libe Goad at AOL's Games.com had with FarmVille representative Bill Mooney. What are your thoughts about the FarmVille Farmer's Market? When do you think it will debut? This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.
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| FarmVille Dogs: 'Don't worry ... you will see them soon' Posted: 30 Mar 2010 01:00 AM PDT  FarmVille updates and adds new features regularly. Because of this a lot of farmers question the seemed to be forgotten release of the FarmVille Dog and wonder why FarmVille constantly makes upgrades without releasing the Dog. FarmVille Community Manager, Lexilicious confirms and insures that Dogs WILL be coming soon. Read what Lexi said below: "Don't worry everyone, you will see the new Dogs soon. We just want to make sure that we work out every kink before releasing them, since we know how much the community has been wanting pets. As for more information about the Co-op farming, make sure to tune into today's Podcast for more details!" Source: Official FarmVille Forum This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.
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