Considering how simple the concept is behind trivia games — provide questions and answers — lots of developers have tried to build their own on Facebook. That said, these types of Facebook applications need to attempt to do something a bit out of the ordinary in order to attract users. To that end, a simple game by the name of Triviable, from Big Bad Bird, came across our doorstep. Always wanting to give the smaller titles a chance, we took a closer look.

On the surface, Triviable is your standard trivia game. Offering the categories of geography, history, science, entertainment, the arts, sports, or random selections, players are presented with a series of 10 questions for them to answer. With each query, the player has only a few moments to input an answer before a 10 second timer begins counting down. From here, answers are removed one by one until only the correct one remains.

Of course, there is more to this removal of wrong responses than just the onset of knowledge. Triviable actually has players make wagers before each question is presented, and the longer you wait to answer, the less you win. Oh, and the minimum bet is “$1000″ in virtual currency. Sadly, this bet screen has a tendency to move on to the question before you’ve had a chance to read everything on it and change said wager, most of the time.

Regardless, it’s not a big deal as, obviously, it’s not real money, but, rather, players use it to buy virtual items such as virtual cars, collectibles, jewelry and so on. It’s nothing significant, in the grand scheme of things, but it does add an extra element to displaying your trivia prowess.

Truth be told, however, this rewards method is a bit dated. Static images of fancy merchandise was something we saw nearly two years ago on Facebook. Nonetheless, what did catch our attention, almost immediately, was the fact that the game actually offers chances to win various prizes. Periodically, the developer has a raffle, of sorts, with prizes that can be won. In order to enter, all a player needs to do is play the game.

Furthermore, these prizes are no slouches either. They range from electronics, to even useful appliances and kitchenware. At first glance, the latter might seem odd, but if you do consider the fact that a large number of Facebook users are older women, a fancy set of dishes is probably more useful to them than, say, an iPod touch.

Again, in order to enter, one only has to play a single solo game. However, by challenging friends you get entered five times and if you upgrade to a “Pro Member,” you get 10 entries. Moreover, these latter two play methods earns $50,000 and $100,000 in bonus cash respectively.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t really seem like this is that much of a necessity if you know your trivia. If the user knows their stuff well enough, they can not only win a base $4,000 by answering correctly, immediately, but can even double down on the winnings for even more cash. Also, there’s that, and the fact that we couldn’t really find out how to “go pro” anyway.

A lot of Triviable does feel unfinished, and these Pro features, as it were, feels like one of them. It’s not the end of the world, as many young apps slowly build themselves out while open to the public. Furthermore, once all the features are done, all the gifts are added, and so on, Triviable could very well be a nice, quaint trivia game.

If there were any complaints to be had, it would primarily stem from usability. Evidentially, there is no way to stop an existing game and go back to the main screen. Granted, there are menu buttons strewn across the top of the app, but clicking them does nothing. Also, even if you refresh the browser and come back, it still seems to lock you out half the time; even if you click the option “Play Later.”

Another issue we had was that the developers try extremely hard to monetize the game. Now, this isn’t a bad thing, and all the advertisements are hardly a hindrance, but they do push the Pro membership very hard, yet when you click the link, nothing is there yet. As the game is still being built out, that, in and of itself, is not a big deal, but until you are Pro, you cannot choose the categories in which to receive trivia questions. Taking away user control with no way to get it back – that’s a bit annoying.

In the end, Triviable isn’t going to change the world with its developments, but it isn’t bad at all. At worst, it’s just not finished. There are a lot of features that are just “coming soon,” so here’s hoping they come sooner rather than later. Once everything is complete, the whole wagering and incentive to challenging friends (with the sweepstakes) feature is actually very nice. Perhaps something other than buying static images with your winnings would be more prudent, but time will tell, and we hope to see more Triviable improvements in the future.