Zynga's Wringer

[Shamus Young]

Zynga's Wringer

Seems like everyone these days is playing Farmville. Let's fix that.

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[Gildan Bladeborn]

I heartily agree with the sentiments expressed in this article. You might however want to fix this part:

All that needs to happen is for someone to apply the Zynga social model to something more entertaining the Farmville.

Somewhat missing the N. Yay pedantry!

 

[Jared]

it does feel like people are wanting that market, and, I am all for it. As long as they can improve on the formula.

Ill admit, I played Farmville for a couple weeks, and, at first i did enjoy. I then saw what it was.

IF something with more depth can be made, something which isnt so mindless dull as tending to chickens, it might even appeal to a wider audience.

My eyes and money is on Popcap, they know the social and easy going market well.

 

[Enigmers]

I think a good game to introduce people to is, well, anything by PopCap. I've been playing games for like twelve years or more, and I still find the occasional game of Peggle, Insaniquarium, or Pizza Frenzy to be really fun. Call me crazy. PopCap just combines their visual style and their simple-but-fun gameplay in a pretty awesome way, and there's also some humour and a lot of personality in their games. (except maybe Bejeweled, that game doesn't feel very alive, it feels like you're a cryogenically frozen machine arranging gems somewhere deep in space.)

I heartily agree with the sentiments expressed in this article. You might however want to fix this part:

All that needs to happen is for someone to apply the Zynga social model to something more entertaining the Farmville.

Somewhat missing the N. Yay pedantry!

Actually, that should be "than."

 

[Fearzone]

Careful when you try to make games more popular by making them easier. GAMES are fun because somehow, somewhere, there is a challenge in it. If one's Farmville l33tness is they pwn at keeping a regular schedule of tending crops, then that's the game.

 

[Random Argument Man]

it seems after the March Madness thing, everyone here sees Zynga as some sort of Mafia, Warring with the actual gaming crowd.

It tends to do that after March Madness. Whenever some obscure company surpasses the popular ones, controversy pops up. Afterwards, we tend to study the companies themselves. We just need to wait a month and everyone will move on.

Note* Although, I'm wondering "what if Zynga had won?".

 

[Nuke_em_05]

Pacing really seems to be the problem for me; and that the two mechanics I find irritating really only exist for money's sake.

I tried my hand at Mafia Wars, and a few similiar types (not Farmville, specifically, I started one because my wife wanted me to play, but I had learned by then); but the overall pacing of Facebook games is really annoying to me. You can't sit down in one session and get as far as you want, you have only so many actions you can do, and you can do them all in about 5 minutes, but there's an hour (more or less) cooldown before you can do anything again. The most efficient way to play is come back every hour on the hour (see more ads), or buy the "tokens" that let you advance faster (cash money). These cooldowns really only exist so they can make more money off of it, and the gameplay suffers; at least for me.

Then, advancement in most of these games involves inviting all of your friends and having them play (viral advertising). You can't proceed to level 20 until you invite 50 friends and they all sign up. You can buy friends for your guild/town/coven (whatever the group may be), with points that are either very slow to grind (over cooldowns), or can be bought with cash money.

Also, with these Facebook apps, holy crap! The notices! You can progress further by either inviting more friends, and then by sending crap to your friends and having them send crap back. All the invites and notices finally just ticked me off and I removed all the apps and blocked them.

 

[randommaster]

Shamus, don't give away my secret ultimate master plan to change the internet forever!

Anyways, I think that if you added achievements to Farmville, or similar game, you woud be able to draw people away. What's the only thing better than getting virtual money from virtual crops? Being told that you are really good at it. I'm pretty sure you could release Farmtown or some such and include achievements and some activity to do while you wait for your cropsto grow and you would probably kill Farmville.

You could also go the Pokemon toute and allow people to customise the appearance of their crops.

 

[Waif]

Defining Farmville by old washing standards is, in my opinion, an unfair analogy. My rationality with this is based on the idea that there are different kinds of gamers. Hardcore gamers would look at a super casual game like Farmville, with disdain. So for this reason such an analogy would make sense to a hardcore gamer. Though you must consider that to the super casual gamer, Farmville is better than MW2. It fits their lifestyle, their niche, if you will. Thusly, preferences are the crux of the argument. That being said, I don't think Zynga has anything to worry about, as far as competitors are concerned. They already have a ton of competition, and they are still doing fine. There are a ton of games like Zynga games, and some people have already copied a few of their games, such as playfish (with which mutual borrowing has occurred) and mobsters (which came after Mafia Wars) just to name a few examples I am aware of. It's already been stated that the social gaming industry consistently borrows from itself. So it would be fair to say that others will come along and try to copy whatever Zynga is doing. Though with the massive user base that Zynga already has, there should be little to worry about, in my opinion. So for this reason, Zynga will do fine for many years to come. Granted their graphics are limited, but they use a flash as their gaming platform because they are a Facebook application developer. Now, whether or not they may try to make stand alone games like popcap, is a matter of conjecture. I would like to see something of the sort, kinda like Plants VS Aliens. Though, I am unsure if Zynga would ever want to go that route. They already make pretty good revenue off their current games, and I don't see that they need to change. However, it would be nice to see more complex games. Something that involves strategy, but still retains the charm and colorful graphics that many Zynga games are known for.

That being said, with MM, many of the gamers here disapprove of Zynga. To a point where it became a matter of fighting Zynga at all costs. Zynga came here to participate in a competition, and was largely attacked for it. For this reason, I would take it that there are still hardcore gamers looking upon casual gamers, with malice.

 

[SomeBoredGuy]

I heartily agree with the sentiments expressed in this article. You might however want to fix this part:

All that needs to happen is for someone to apply the Zynga social model to something more entertaining the Farmville.

Somewhat missing the N. Yay pedantry!

In fact, that "e" should be an "a".

OT: Great article as always, Shamus. Nice to know that there's still some intelligence on the internet.

 

[StriderShinryu]

After Ms. Arendt's article the other day, I'm wondering if a more palatable Farmville would actually be something a lot like Harvest Moon. At the core, the two aren't really very different gameplay wise but Harvest Moon has so much else going on on top of the plant->wait->harvest cycle that it is a much deeper experience. None of the extras it offers, however, are things that I feel casual type would have issues with... and they are also things that would just maybe make the game appeal to more hardcore types too.

 

[BDBracket]

Defining Farmville by old washing standards is, in my opinion, an unfair analogy. ... Hardcore gamers would look at a super casual game like Farmville, with disdain. So for this reason such an analogy would make sense to a hardcore gamer.

I don't think Shamus is saying that hardcore games are the 'better' alternative. I think he's saying another company could make much better casual games. Basically Wrigerryer as Zyngaopcap.

 

[Shamus Young]

I keep trying to read this bullshit, but I just can't.

Literacy and adulthood will come with time.

Keep practicing!

 

[Plurralbles]

"if you can't make something more entertaining than Farmville, you probably shouldn't be trying to make videogames to begin with."

Hear hear!

I liked this article. i like that there are multitudes of new potential gamers coming. What I dont' like is how Zynga is makin ga mockery of the whole deal.

 

[BDBracket]

I keep trying to read this bullshit, but I just can't.

Literacy and adulthood will come with time.

But maturity aside, there's a point in his posts. There are already much better casual games. The thing that Zynga uses and Popcap doesn't is aggressive, obnoxious spam.

 

[Waif]

Defining Farmville by old washing standards is, in my opinion, an unfair analogy. ... Hardcore gamers would look at a super casual game like Farmville, with disdain. So for this reason such an analogy would make sense to a hardcore gamer.

I don't think Shamus is saying that hardcore games are the 'better' alternative. I think he's saying another company could make much better casual games. Basically Wrigerryer as Zyngaopcap.

Well I do suppose that is possible. Though it was from the analogy that he made, is where I had drawn my conclusion. I had the idea that he was referring to upmarket games in general, and not one specific company. Though I do see your point, it is likely possible that he was referring to Popcap in his analogy. Which would have been more fair. So thanks for clarification .

 

[Waif]

I keep trying to read this bullshit, but I just can't.

Literacy and adulthood will come with time.

But maturity aside, there's a point in that post. There are already much better casual games. The thing that Zynga uses and Popcap doesn't is aggressive, obnoxious spam.

Well, as far as spam is concerned. The only thing you'll get from Zynga is when a user posts what they are doing on whatever game they are playing. Though you can always block that stuff pretty easily. That being said, these kinds of posts are intrinsic part of every social gaming application, particularly on Facebook (not so much Myspace, from my understanding). Zynga isn't the only one to do this, countless other Facebook apps do this as well such as Playfish, Zoo World, even tiny stuff like Astrology apps. Its how the business model dictates advertising. While it could be said that the consistent posts from all the many numerous applications are spam, it's not the company that's doing it, its your friends who either want to give rewards to their other friends who play the same application. If you don't want to see these posts in your feed, just hide them. All things considered, I think I have at least 100+ applications hidden from my feeds. Numerous ones, mostly quizzes, and I do understand why some people would call it spam.

 

[ObsessiveSketch]

it seems after the March Madness thing, everyone here sees Zynga as some sort of Mafia, Warring with the actual gaming crowd.

Not really. We're just a little upset that
A) these gamers are playing the lowest quality game available (wringer to washer, seriously, best analogy of the situation I've seen), due to lack of gaming knowledge and incorporation into a widely used social networking site. (Can you imagine who'd play this stuff if it weren't on facebook? NOBODY)
and
B) Zynga is a terrible dev with shoddy upkeep, questionable copyright issues, and near nonexistent customer service. Yet because they're taking advantage of "not-yet" gamers by latching on to Facebook, they've made kajillions of dollars while simultaneously ousting legitimate independent devs from any spotlight available.