Zynga Heads Out West for Its Latest Release, FrontierVille
In the console gaming market, the new Western title Red Dead Redemption is single-handedly reviving the market. Could a Western-themed social game do the same on Facebook? Zynga thinks it’s worth a try, with a new game out today called FrontierVille.
In FrontierVille, players will take on the identity of a pioneer, trying to hack a living out of a wild plot of land and raise a family in the process. If that sounds a bit like Little House on the Prairie, that’s intentional on Zynga’s part; if it also sounds like Oregon Trail, that’s no accident, either.
Actually, Zynga’s new game doesn’t fit firmly into any category — something we’re seeing from more social game developers this year, in a sharp turn from 2009′s me-too spate of farm and fish games. There are, of course, heavy farming elements in FrontierVille. But there’s also a bit of city (or, at least, homestead) building, and another helping of exploration and discovery.
In short, it’s something for everyone — at least, Zynga hopes so. “One of the things that we were looking for was something that appeals to a broad range of people, ages and genders,” we were told by Brian Reynolds, the Zynga developer who built FrontierVille and, in a previous life, was lead designer for famed titles like Civilization II and Alpha Centauri.
So FrontierVille has ended up with an interesting array of features. Veteran FarmVille players happily planting crops may be surprised by a wandering bear; Treasure Isle aficionados can amass collections of virtual items. Perhaps the most interesting addition, though, is the idea of spouses.
As everyone who has studied early American history knows, each pioneer that headed out west had a sweetheart waiting back home for good news (one per pioneer, no less and no more). So Zynga has provided players with the same, a distant lover that can be corresponded with and sent gifts.
Following a successful courtship, players can then bring their new wife or husband to the homestead and get hitched. From there, it’s time to make babies — also a major facet of early American life. The more babies the better, since nothing suits growing children more than farm work. Eventually, says Reynolds, players can accumulate quite a clan, if they continue having children.
For this title, Zynga has stopped short of letting real players marry each other — the spouse, though it can be named after a real-life sweetheart, is strictly virtual. But the company is nevertheless also trying to encourage more collaboration between players.
As in other games, players can visit each other to help out or gain a benefit. But in FrontierVille, Zynga has expanded the range of options; players can cause each other’s crops to unwither, trim back the encroaching forest and help construct buildings. And unlike earlier games, they’ll actually see their friends’ avatars at work on the homestead.
Along with more ways to cooperate, Zynga has also added “hearts”, a sort of experience point that grows the “reputation” of players. With higher reputation, users will become more effective at helping out on others’ homesteads, hopefully leading to more regular cooperation.
For Zynga, this is an especially important point to get right, since Facebook’s notification changes earlier in the year hurt its ability to keep players engaged. With higher rewards for cooperation, players may be willing to interact more with their friends, thus creating a stronger community effect.
We’ll take another look at FrontierVille down the road if it seems to be doing well. But from here, that seems quite likely. Zynga’s release schedule has slowed down significantly this year, so making each title a success has become more important. And FrontierVille has also gotten a significant time investment, having been in development for at least a quarter; so it’s reasonable to expect that Zynga will be promoting the game heavily.
June 9th, 2010 at 8:26 am
Yawn
June 9th, 2010 at 12:41 pm
Another shitty game by Zynga..
It’s EXACTLY like farmville except its western.. 4 months GTFO?
June 9th, 2010 at 3:03 pm
@Jason The difference between this and FarmVille is the mind who worked on it. Reynolds worked on a number of “hardcore” games, including CivII and Rise of Nations. There are quite a few mechanics (from what I’ve heard , I never played Farmville, but I’m playing FrontierVille)that have been added.
June 9th, 2010 at 7:56 pm
That doesn’t make any sense .. Sure a different guy could make the game, but at the end of the day when you compare the two – the same game mechanics exist here as in Zynga’s Cafe World (progression bar system), the same farming and cattle process exist here as they do in Farmville, and the movement / friends / gift system exists here as it does in Treasure Island.
With all the money Zynga has and all the employees it has I’m really shocked that Zynga cannot put out a better quality game. Does anybody remember “Harvest Moon” from the 90s? Compare that to Farmville please.
* BUT please do not take my word for it.. for I am only offering my opinion.. just look at the facts of the system.. Zynga had 280 Million MAU in December 2009 .. now it has around 215 Million MAU .. people are sick of their crappy games and spam.. It’s no wonder Zynga has been on an acquisition spree lately buying up other companies – perhaps trying to compensate for it’s MAU problem.
June 10th, 2010 at 3:27 pm
@Jason All games have experienced drops in MAU due to Facebook changes. There have been alot of changes that basically took out the viral aspects of these games. Also every game except a few has life cycles. I’m not still playing super mario brothers from SNES, why would you expect anyone to play a game forever?
June 11th, 2010 at 9:40 am
NotJason – yet the new Super Mario Bros Galaxy game is the best reviewed game of the year and will be a runaway hit. So, poor analogy.
June 12th, 2010 at 5:16 pm
I actually really like this game. It does remind me of the Oregon Trail. It’d be a lot of fun if a bug didn’t prevent me and several thousand other players from even entering the game.
June 14th, 2010 at 3:06 am
[...] mois, surtout avec le lancement en grandes pompes de FrontierVille, le petit dernier de la gamme : Zynga Heads Out West for Its Latest Release, FrontierVille. FrontierVille, le dernier social games de [...]
June 14th, 2010 at 7:19 am
[...] list. The game, Zynga’s newest, has only been around since last Wednesday. As we noted in our review, the game is heavy on both farming and city building elements, although there are a few twists, [...]
June 21st, 2010 at 8:06 am
I’m with Jason.
This is just another activity, not a game. No skill (or even thinking) is involved. Just click whatever.
You cannot progress past a certain point, too, unless you either 1) Buy coins, or 2) Make lots of friends join. Surprisingly, this point comes very early.
Here’s a game summary:
1. Click a few things.
2. Be told you achieved some super minor, meaningless goal.
3. Pop-up screen asks you to Post or Skip posting this UNBELIEVABLY LAME-O achievement to your general Facebook page (there-by showing your friends how truly lame you are)
4. Click a few more of the same things.
5. Be asked to recruit your friends into the game.
6. Keep using that mouse to click away!
7. Asked to help/share with a ‘friend” of yours who is also playing.
8. Repeat 1-7 until you’re completely zombified.
Oh, that’s it. What is so unflippin’ unbelievable is how many times the “game” asks to post to FB and even more, how many times it asks to recruit your friends. There’s just no way to turn this off.
FrontierVille has zero meaningful innovations. Just same old, same old.
July 1st, 2010 at 12:00 pm
[...] title, FrontierVille, finally makes its way on to the list this month at #10. Having grown significantly in the past few [...]
July 2nd, 2010 at 5:32 pm
sos ne peut plus jouer jeu rafraichis ?
merci de debloquer suit en nelle caledonie sud pacific
July 22nd, 2010 at 6:31 am
[...] account from their office). The concept of having it earn more money is also fairly reminiscent of FrontierVille’s rep system, which, like it or not, is a much more interesting method of incorporating the same [...]
August 11th, 2010 at 5:17 pm
[...] FarmVille mechanics was done with Wonder Island from Gamenaughts. Though it uses different games, FrontierVille is yet another app to mix and match features (such as FarmVille and Treasure [...]
August 31st, 2010 at 2:49 pm
[...] produce a small amount of coin, while items like a beehive produce sellable honey. Like Zynga’s FrontierVille, trash, toxic geysers, and toxic waste from machines fill up the land and must be cleaned up. With [...]
September 3rd, 2010 at 5:43 pm
[...] Game Bar — Zynga has released a new web browser tool bar for its growing Facebook game, FrontierVille. The add-on works for both Internet Explorer and Firefox and will allow users to see both when [...]
November 18th, 2010 at 9:33 am
WHY DONT YOU ALL JUST ENJPY THE SILLY GAME AND STOP TRYING TO COMPARE IT TO EVERYTHING ELSE YOU PLAY ON A CONSOLE lofl… IF YOU DONT LIKE IT GOOD DONT PLAY AND GTFO OF CHAT ROOMS YOU LOOK STUPID
March 7th, 2011 at 10:31 am
[...] inside the Facebook canvas, a true role-playing game has yet to break through. Social RPGs such as Frontierville, Ravenwood Fair and the like do include an avatar but the progression, stats, and choices that [...]
March 17th, 2011 at 12:40 pm
[...] West Town obviously resembles FrontierVille, Zynga’s similar-themed game from last year. But while it makes use of many of the [...]