In Indonesia, a country just north of Australia, two siblings found each other through Facebook, after being separated for 35 years.
Brother and sister, Anton and Nurlianti Dehi, got separated in 1974. Anton, then in his early twenties, left their home in Palu, the capital city of Central Sulawesi Province in Indonesia. He moved to Manado, North Sulawasi Province’s capital city, to find work.
For the first two years, Anton kept in touch with his family in Palu. However, in 1977, the Dehi family lost touch with him. Nurlianti looked for Anton for many years but eventually gave up when she could find no trace of him.
More than 30 years later, when Nurlianti heard about Facebook, she immediately signed up, hoping that she will find her brother through the social networking site. She was not mistaken. Nurlianti and Anton’s daughter, Risna, met in the site. Through her neice, Nurlianti found that Anton and his family had moved to Jombang. Jombang is a city in Java, an island west of Sulawasi.
When Nurlianti and Anton talked over the phone, she was skeptical that it was really him. She was filled with joy when Anton disclosed some childhood memories they both shared. Finally, Nurlianti had found her long lost brother.
Facebook is not only a site where one can reach out to old friends or play games. It is also a site that can reunite long lost family members.
Most people playing Facebook games just want to relax and unwind, nothing too fancy like hardcore online game fanatics, playing 24/7. Simple as it may seem though, these games can get you hooked! You will feel like what you have is not enough and you will want more and more of those chickens and cows and crops! You will want to upgrade your kitchen to stay on top of the game, so you would purchase a new stove or a fridge to increase your production.
Gamers who are addicted end up purchasing virtual goods or virtual points to buy virtual goods. Some fall for “offers” that promise points or virtual money in exchange of answering surveys or checking out their products. However, they end up spending even more than what the virtual item or points cost.
There are also other means of increasing ones holdings, like checking out tips. Facebook game tips are everywhere on the internet. A gamer can check out tips for FarmVille, Café World, Pet Society and FishVille for free. However, beware of some sites offering cheats. These sites sell instruction booklets and updates of new cheats. Most are for Mafia Wars. Mind you, they are not for free. Other than charging exorbitant fees for their cheats, their cheats might not also be as good as they promised. In addition, they would bombard your email with spam.
There are several ways of succeeding in Facebook games. It is up to the player which road to take.
A somewhat odd notification push has been circulating among Facebook players. During the second week of December, users playing ad-based social games in Facebook are being offered points and virtual cash in return for sending an email. The email is about losing employer-based health insurance if ever a government-based insurance option is passed as part of the health system reformation. This email will be sent to Congress.
The notification push was said to be coming from Get Health Reform Right. This is an alliance of health companies which includes America’s Health Insurance Plans, and the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association to name a few.
A lot of advertisements have been using the offers-marketing strategy to introduce their products or service to the public. Social games in Facebook are ad-based. Many players do not have enough points to purchase virtual items. So, their option is either to purchase virtual items or points with real cash or click on “offers” by advertisements, like surveys or free trials.
However, the virtual cash offered in exchange for a letter has been denied by Get Health Reform Right. In fact, Blues spokesperson Jeff Smokler stated that they temporarily suspended the GetHealthReformRight.org web site after finding out about these ads that offer virtual money in Facebook games.
With 100 million visitors each month for Zynga games alone, it is quite difficult to determine where these kinds of offers are coming from. Nevertheless, the coalition is currently investigating about this matter and will implement any legal action needed to correct the issue.
With over 21 million monthly active users, PlayFish’s Pet Society is one of the most popular games in Facebook. With your pet, you can play games, decorate your house, visit and give gifts to your friends’ pets, compete against other pets, etc..
There are many ways to get coins, experience, and paw points in the game. However, as the game’s name suggests, Pet Society is primarily a social game. Therefore, the best way to gain points and coins is to visit friends. Purchase apples. When you feed your friends’ pets, you gain over 10 experience points and 2 coins. Washing or brushing your friends’ pets also earns your extra coins.
Paw Points are used to access locked features and items. To earn these, get a friend whom you trust. Choose your most expensive item and send it to your friend as a gift. When he or she receives it, ask him or her to send it back to you so they also get a lot of Paw Points. It’s a win-win situation.
When fishing, get the best fish use by using the right bait:
- Apple, Banana, Cheese, Lemon, and Strawberry to get Apple Fish, Banana Fish, Cheese Fish, Lemon Fish, and Strawberry Fish, respectively
- Bone to get Puppy Fish
- Carrot to get Sea Horse
- Chocolate Heart to get Chocolate Fish
- Homegrown Coconut to get Coconut Fish
- Homegrown Cupcake to get Cupcake Fish
- Homegrown Orange to get Orange Fish
- Homegrown Sweetheart Root to get Loveroot Fish
- Milk to get Catfish
- Pink Donut to get Strawberry Donut Fish
- Rare Steak to get Piranha
- Whole Watermelon to get Melon Fish
So, go ahead and try the game. Enjoy your pet like millions of Pet Society users.
With tons of lawsuits being hurled at Facebook, a class-action lawsuit has yet again smacked Facebook, Zynga Inc., and others. This is due to the widening ad-based social game scams infesting Facebook.
The so called “offers-marketing” have been popping up like mushrooms in Facebook. These ads would offer virtual money or goods in exchange of certain offers like subscribing to Netflix, a flat rate rental-by-mail and online streaming video store, or answering a market research survey. There is one instance where players are asked to answer an I.Q. Quiz wherein they need to enter their mobile numbers to receive the quiz results and then charged $9.99 without their knowledge.
Another scam is the “Video Professor”. Players are offered virtual currency if they sign up for a free CD. The gamers are tricked into believing that they only pay for the shipping fee of $10. But upon agreeing to get the CD, on a different page of the contract, it is stated that they are actually purchasing an entire set of learning CDs and will be charged $189.95.
The strategy of these ad-based games is to bait free-to-play game players. To increase competitive edge, some players use real money to get upgrades. However, those who do not want to shell out cash can fall prey to these “offers-marketing”, not knowing that they would likely end up paying more than what the upgrade or virtual items cost.
Due to the increase of scamming incidents, Facebook has taken action against some of these advertisers by disabling the ad networks and suspending several games. Hence, a lot of developers have been greatly affected by this move. In return, the developers opted to shut out their offers completely instead of losing a spot on Facebook.
Addicted to a game but can only play it in front of the computer? Good news! California-based company, Sibblingz, is now developing a “universal social gaming” platform that let players play the same Flash-based game in iPhone, Facebook, and other websites.
For players, other wonderful features of this platform are:
- It allows iPhone and Facebook users to play for free.
- Users can access the same game on the go and at home. Details of each user’s game are stored in a cloud server farm so that players can access their game easily.
- Players will be able to see the leaderboard with the same friends in it whichever access point he or she uses.
For developers, they will love this platform because:
- The tools to create new games in this platform are free. However, when the game is released, a percentage of the earnings (from the game’s virtual goods store) will go to Sibblingz.
- Sibblingz handles the back-end work needed to monetize the game. So, developers can concentrate on creating new games while the money comes in, instead of worrying about both.
- Developers only need to create one version of the game. That single version can be used in iPhone, Facebook, and other sites.
- There is a greater chance of earning because the game is available in different popular channels.
- The platform uses Facebook connect to allow games to have social features, thereby allowing the game to spread via “word of mouth”.
The platform will not be available to the public until the 2nd quarter of 2010. However, you can see a demo of “Little Monsters” which can be found on Sibblingz website (http://sibblingz.com/).
As the reigning most popular social network, Facebook will yet have a new interesting game to be launched soon. As we all know, these applications are of great importance to increase Facebook’s users.
Good Game Productions, a newly developed California-based company intends to bring free-to-play multiplayer online games to Facebook. It’s most recent launch, together with True Games Interactive, is Warrior Epic Sagas on iPhone. This role-playing game (RPG) revolves around the idea of players going on campaigns to earn gold, prestige, and cool items (loot). The gamers are asked to form several parties to go on a mission simultaneously. The said game would also be available in Facebook soon.
Founder of Good Game Productions, Grantley Day, who is also the current CEO of the company, stated that they are focusing on strategic development and marketing, while developing massive interactive online games. Day has previously worked on Dungeons and Dragons Online and Neverwinter Nights 2.
The developer also has several other games and is working with a number of companies like Ntreev, True Games, and GoCash, so that Facebook users will have new games to look forward to in 2010. Hopefully, Good Game Productions will concoct other games with the same quality as Warrior Epic Sagas in the months to come.
Fresh from the oven of Digital Chocolate, MMA Pro Fighter has been integrated on Facebook, one of the most popular social networks on the World Wide Web. The game is quite different from most of the online games we see on Facebook. First of all, it is more of a one-on-one interaction with another gamer’s avatar rather than interacting with multiple players. Secondly, the avatars were created in a very detailed way — amazing 3D with rippling muscles and all! It will make you feel like you are really in the zone!
MMA Pro Fighter is a mixed martial arts role playing game. Like any other game in Facebook, a player needs to use his Facebook username and password to login to MMA Pro Fighter. To start, the player has to choose a “class”. The class consists of three divisions that would generate more money, health, or stamina. The game has two categories of mixed martial arts style and six sub-categories for each. The player may select one of each discipline.
After a player chooses his class and his fighting style, he can customize his avatar with items available for purchase in the shop.
The goal of the game is to win against other players’ avatars and move up in the ranks. The basis for winning the bout is the avatar’s stamina and cardio. To develop these two, the character must undergo training, missions, or quests. While training and undergoing quests earn players money, the amount earned would gradually lessen as the player progresses in the game. What’s interesting is that a player can purchase items (with real money) required to increase the stamina, or items needed in a fight.
The developer Digital Chocolate has partnered with Offerpal and is planning to have this game on iPhone via Facebook.
For Facebook users who love to play strategic RPG games, this is good news for you: True Games Interactive will soon launch the Warrior Epic Sagas on Facebook!
Warrior Epic Sagas is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG). It can be played in different modes: Solo, PvP (player vs. player), and multiplayer campaigns. The goal of the game is to complete quests for lost ancient artifacts, ward off tribes of warmongers, and hunt for monsters. To complete the quests, each player can recruit up to 5 Warriors. They can earn gold, booties, and “prestige” as they complete the missions. The gold can be used to upgrade the warrior’s equipment and armor, while “prestige” can be used to get new warriors.
The game has a unique feature that allows fallen warriors to be revived in the player’s headquarters, the Warrior Hall. They can also be changed into spirits that can be incorporated into weapons, to increase its power and open its abilities, or to be summoned to cause huge damage on enemies. The warrior spirits can also be imbued into new warriors.
A basic version of Warrior Epic will be available in Facebook where each quest can last from 5 minutes to an hour. However, should the player want the full 3D game, they can go to the game’s website (http://www.warriorepic.com) through a link from the Facebook page. The Facebook version is designed to introduce players to the full game.
Warrior Epic was developed by Good Game Productions and published by True Games Interactive. It has also been launched in iPhone.
Within several months of growth, some of Facebook’s social games are showing seasonal decline in terms of the Daily Active Users (DAU). From 97 million users in November, the number of users decreased to 85.5 million as of December 21. One possible reason for the decline may be the December 9th Facebook platform issue that affected all applications for 48 hours. Another probable cause is that, since it is the holiday season, more people opted to concentrate on holiday activities like shopping rather than playing on-line games. Also, some of these games revised their structure hence affecting the game. An example would be Mafia Wars which added an anti-hacking tool to their system. On a positive note, Pet Society introduced a lottery feature in the game which helped increased their DAU.
Below is the table showing the decline of each game:
| Game |
Dec High DAU |
Dec 21 DAU |
% Decline |
| Farmville |
28,168,448 |
26,240,616 |
-7% |
| Café World |
10,714,586 |
9,079,596 |
-15% |
| Happy Aquarium |
8,169,204 |
7,070,370 |
-13% |
| FishVille |
7,459,387 |
6,644,904 |
-11% |
| Mafia Wars |
7,021,764 |
5,574,330 |
-21% |
| Zynga Poker |
5,013,652 |
4,773,945 |
-5% |
| Pet Society |
5,094,052 |
4,753,688 |
-7% |
| Restaurant City |
4,680,805 |
4,113,377 |
-12% |
| YoVille |
3,463,083 |
2,833,933 |
-18% |
| Farm Town |
5,374,337 |
4,110,261 |
-24% |
As shown in the chart above, all the games showed considerable decline on the number of active users per day. The question is will we see improvements next year or a huge decline now that Facebook is currently upgrading its gaming platform with the launch of Game Dashboard on January 2010? Everybody’s eager to see the developments and hopefully it will be for the best.
