It's easy to look down on Farmville and just be a hater because it is a Facebook game. At the start, it was a simple game with a simple premise of repetitive actions that weren't for everyone. Fair enough. But over time it's morphed from a fun (imho) game to a money making thing to this... awful greed monster of a thing. On one hand, I'm fascinated and amazed. On the other, seriously disgusted. There is nothing wrong with making money, but the methods used both in the games themselves to the incident where Zynga has apparently copied another studios game....
I realize it's pretty easy to just sling things around. So I've gone through the last few seasonal events, which show a remarkable amping up of the money hounding that goes on in the game.
Farmville as it once was, was a game that I found relaxing. Mundane, but relaxing. I could either get to my crops in time, or not. It was a game to explore, and have fun with on my own time. Eventually they added the ability to build things, and one would need to ask their neighbors for items. This is done one of two ways. There is a direct request, that goes through the game to a specific neighbor. The other kind is one that is a general post to your facebook wall that anyone who plays the game can click on and help out with. Things went well for a while, but then people got bored and stopped playing. Which is all fine and good, but those still playing found themselves needing to get materials and being unable to do so. Which in turn, drove another bunch of people away from the game.
Eventually, they added a feature where you could be neighbors with people who were not on your own friends list, and maintain your privacy. Which, in theory, is a faboo feature. I refuse to add random people that I don't know to my facebook page just to play a game. Well, the thing is, other than being another farm you can go to, or sending a particular mystery gift box of random things (albeit useful if building older stuff)... there is no advantage. You cannot request materials directly from these new neighbors. They will not see your farmville feed, and be able to respond to those requests either. The biggest advantage they provided was the ability to buy larger spaces for your farm. And other than random gift boxes, the occasional lost animal request, and unlocking seeds request, there is no point to having these additional neighbors. This is a fine example of granting a feature that leaves the impression it will be helpful to the players, but in fact, more or less leaves them just as locked down as they were before the feature. [Update March 2012: It seems that they have added a feature on the send to a friend box that lists all your farmville friends that you can send a mystery box OR one of three specific items to neighbors... I haven't tried the actual feasibility of it yet, so I don't know if it's another bait and switch thing with giving us something we want and need to play the game, but not really enough to actually accomplish what we want...]
Now that we have covered how requests and getting materials work, hopefully the actual point of this post and it's examples will be made clear. Lets start with last Halloween, 2011. One got a Big Jack'o'Lantern, that one can fill up with various goodies that one gets from a variety of things, and a building (Duckulas Castle) to build. At this point, it has become fairly standard to have a building that produces an item for the event, and a container that stores the items from the event and awards prizes.
Once upon a time, there were 3 levels of building. The more you put into the building, the fancier it got. By the time we've gotten to Duckula's Castle, there are 6.
And in the case of the Huge Jack-O'Lantern, you can contribute treats that are gotten from "harvesting" Duckula's Castle, from items sent from actual neighbors (not the farmville only ones) and as rewards from using crafted items for the holiday. Multiple sources into one currency for the event.
Now lets hop to Holidays, 2011.There is a building, which granted snowflakes. Crafted items granted snowflakes. The only way to get tophats was from asking friends. Meh, all fine and good right? Let's take a look at the balance of items needed, shall we?
Lets assume we're insane and really want the top tier Aurura Unicorn. We'll need 120 tophats, and 28 snowflakes. Within the game, it's exceedingly easy to get the snowflakes. I had 100 in a day or two. As for the tophats, not so much. No friends are playing anymore, and I couldn't ask the farmville only neighbors for them. Interesting. So they were encouraging (in the way of forcing down a narrow tunnel) those who wanted items to more or less pay for them with farm cash, as that is the only way to get items when you don't have enough friends as neighbors to play the game. Hm.
Moving forward to Valentines, 2012. Same thing, a building that produces an item (Carriage that produces love arrows). I must admit to being so disgusted by all this I didn't pay attention if there was a craftable item that produced a reward or not. From what I found though, I was only able to attain love arrows from items and neighbors farms. The Bows and Wings were only available to me from friends, or direct requests to friends. Which again, as a person without many people playing, left me not able to participate even less than the holiday event. In order to win any of these prizes, you have to pick and choose what you are going to try to go for, as it is now divided into three divisions of prizes, and pushing the invest in our game agenda even further.
Now, outright, I see nothing wrong with in game currency and it being bought with real money. That is, after all, how most of these games make their money. And I wont' begrudge them that. What I find so appalling about Zynga, and in this particular case, farmville, is that the game has become so utterly focused on the aspect of farmcash items. It is, quite honestly, just funny to me at this point because it is so preposterous as someone who had played it in the early days.
So why do I find it greedy? Because unlike at one point when it was about perks that enhanced the game (but were not required to play it or participate in events) and special items here and there - it is almost entirely about special items by the gajillions, that one is encouraged in the game to collect like pokemon to keep up. Events that should be open to everyone to enjoy, became more and more complex and have left people unable to participate and enjoy the game. Which if their aim is to drive away potential customers and eviscerate customer loyalty, they've succeeded beyond their own expectations, I imagine.
It's greedy because it's now impossible to play the game without buying into it. I loved it when the English Countryside was introduced and there was a variety of quests to follow. It was leisurely and I could progress at my own pace and with the friends I had. Then came the Lighthouse Cove, which I found impossible to keep up with, because every quest was timed. Then the Winter Wonderland, and soon there will be a Hawaiian something or rather. All with timed quests that draw you in then cut you off at the knees if you refuse to pay loads of actual money or add people you don't know for the sake of playing a game. And by draw in, I mean they ask for 4 of something, then 8, then 12... it's subtle, but insidious.
Maybe you already hate Farmville (or Zynga)... maybe you love them. But I logged in the other day to make sure I wasn't missing anything for this, to open up to this:
Moving on to slots eh? Catch those gamblers! But wait! Then I logged in today.
It's like a train wreck. I just can't look away. It was one thing to see this progression of subtle coercion playing on the Pokemon mentality... to this. My mouth is agape. It's so blatant. Apparently, I didn't need to write this article, or ever mention their money trees, because they just hopped straight to the punchline. Rampant Greedmongering.
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