Facebook has just announced a closed, limited test in which for the first time it will allow websites to process payments for virtual goods using Facebook Credits. Facebook’s virtual currency is currently the mandatory payment method for all Facebook games on the web, a payment option for Facebook apps, and became available as a payment option to mobile app developers last week. The only initial launch partner for “Facebook Credits for Websites” will be online and downloadable games site GameHouse that until now only accepted payments through credit card and PayPal.

During the test, Facebook will closely monitor the demand for Credits as a payment method and the user experience of those that pay though its virtual currency. If a high enough percentage of users make purchases through Credits and feedback is positive, Facebook may expend additional resources to let more websites add Credits as a payment option.

Eventually, Facebook might open the option to all web developers selling virtual goods or digital media, allowing the social network to earn a 30% cut on transactions across the web. In exchange, sites will be able to provide an easier way to buy their goods and media than punching in credit card or PayPal details. Facebook has provided a signup page for developers that want to try Facebook Credits for Websites if the test is expanded.

GameHouse users that sign in to the site with their Facebook login and play Collapse Blast or UNO Boost will only see Credits as a payment option, not credit cards or PayPal. If they choose to buy virtual goods or proprietary in-game currencies, Facebook Credits will be deducted from the same account that Facebook canvas and mobile games pull from. Similar to how it works within Facebook, users without an existing balance of Credits will be able to purchase a bundle within the payment flow.

Unlike on Facebook where Credits are the exclusive payment method for games, GameHouse may still offer other payment options. However, Ian Fliflet who handles corporate strategy for GameHouse tells me that those signed in through Facebook won’t see the option to pay with a credit card or PayPal account. This could anger some long-time GameHouse users that try signing in through Facebook for the first time only to find their preferred payment options missing in the two test games. That in turn could negatively skew feedback on Credits for Websites.

If the test does indicate a demand for Credits as a payment option outside of Facebook.com, its unclear whether Facebook would require developers to use its virtual currency exclusively. It could simply make them an additional payment option, the way Credits currently work for Facebook.com apps as well as mobile apps and games. However, it might extend this test model so that sites that want to use Facebook as an identity and login provider will also need to use its taxed virtual currency.

The impact of Facebook Credits for Websites could be significant. It could assist independent game developers and digital media merchants with monetization, as customers might be able to quick make purchases rather than having time to reconsider while enduring the friction of entering their credit card information or logging in to PayPal.

Currently, many independent game developers have to distribute through portals like GameHouse that have built a base of users that have already provided their credit card details. Facebook Credits for Websites could give them the opportunity to distribute directly to fans in way that gives them more control over branding. The tax that third-party game portals take on credit card or PayPal transactions may vary widely, so Facebook’s 30% cut could be less or more than developers are used to paying.

Facebook has much to gain from Credits for Websites, though. The more places they’re accepted, the more users that are likely to buy and maintain a balance of Credits, and the more transactions Facebook will get a cut of. A user might buy a bundle of Credits to spend them on a gaming portal or to buy a band’s album, but then spend then become a paying customer of a freemium game on Facebook.com.

More users maintaining a balance of Credits also makes Facebook a more lucrative platform for developers. Typically only a few percent of gamers ever pay to play, but if they already have a balance they may be more likely to spend. Facebook may need to initially reduce its tax or not demand any exclusivity as a payment method to get websites hooked on Credits. With time, though, Facebook Credits for Websites could become a significant revenue source and powerful way to attract developers.

Amazon Moves Into Social Games — IndustryGamers reports that RPG game designer Jonathan Tweet has been hired by Amazon for what could be the social games job they wanted to fill back in May. Details aren’t immediately clear, nor has there been any announcement of a Google-developed social game.

Azure Toolkit for Social Games — A preview of the Windows Azure Toolkit for Social Games has been made available this week. Through the new toolkit, developers will be able to more easily build social games on the Windows Azure platform, and includes accelerators, libraries, developer tools, and samples tailored to .NET and HTML5 games. It also supports leaderboards, user profiles, and in-app purchases.

Unilever Enters Social Gaming Through FarmVille — Unilever has entered the social gaming space with its LUX brand via the Chinese version of FarmVille this week. Through the social game, they have launched a limited-edition event dubbed “LUX Fantastical Manor,” which was created by advertising agency JWT and Zynga for Unilever. The one-month event will allow users to decorate their farms with various LUX-branded beauty items.

PlayPhone Signs Top Chinese Mobile Developers — Mobile entertainment content distributor PlayPhone announced at the Casual Connect conference this week that it has signed a deal with two of the largest Chinese mobile game developers, China Wireless Arts and Magic Universe. Through the partnership, the former will bring their title “Journey to Egypt” to Android for the PlayPhone Social patform. The latter is to incorporate the MMOG “Latent Dragon” for Android as well.

Social Gamers Plant 25,000 Trees — Talkie CEO Chris Swain issued the “Plant a Real Forest Challenge,” in association with Conservation International and Trees for the Future to Ecotopia players last month. The challenge had players planing 25,000 trees, in-game, in 25 days. For each in-game tree, Talkie committed to planting a real life within the Guaranta, Promissão Reunidas, Promissão Dandara and Arco Iris communities in São Paulo, Brazil.

[Launch] Pet Society Vacations Hits iOS — Playfish has expanded its Pet Society title into iOS with the launch of Pet Society Vacations. The new title is free-to-play and allows users to take their virtual pets off to island paradises, customizing their very own houseboat.

Playdom’s Next Title: Galaxy of Wonder — It looks like Playdom is expanding into the stars with its City of Wonder IP. Earlier this week, the company posted a teaser trailer on YouTube entitled Galaxy of Wonder. The developer’s newest game, City of Might, is expected to launch in the coming weeks.

Diversion Raises Series B Funding, Signs $1M deal with Sony Pictures — In a press release sent out today, L.A.-based social gaming startup Diversion has raised a second round of funding from TomorrowVentures, Hearst Corporation, and The Tornante Company. The amount of the funding has not been disclosed, but the Fame Town developer also signed a $1 million advertising deal with Sony Pictures. Its newest game, The A-List, just launched last week.

Quepasa & myYearbook Merge — Social games developer and social network owner Quepasa Corporation announced a merger with social mobile platform myYearbook. The $100 million deal ($82 million in Quepasa common stock and $18 million cash) will effectively double the pair’s user base with over 70 million registered users for the web, 2.2 million mobile instalss, 11.5 million mobile game installs, 2.1 million social game installs, and a consolidated TTM revenue and EBITDA of $33.6 million and $5.9 million respectively.

[Announcement] Double Down Adds Social Slot Tournaments to Facebook Game — Social and casual games developer Double Down Interactive has announced the introduction of “Social Slot Tournaments” within its Facebook title DoubleDown Casino. The new feature is available on all 10 of the slot machines in the social game, allowing 100 players to compete against each other with the top 10 earning virtual currency prizes.

[Announcement] Arkadium Opens Mobile Gaming Headquarters in Toronto — Casual games developer Arkadium has announced that it is expanding once again, this time opening a new mobile gaming studio in Toronto, Canada. Focusing on HTML5 and iOS titles, the new studio is slated to bring ten new games to market over the next year.

Even though Facebook likely has around 700 million users now, it actually isn’t often that we hear the social network is a major driver for user acquisition in mobile gaming — at least compared to FreeAppADay or having an inside connection to Apple.

But a veteran team from the social gaming world is trying to disprove this with its first app Mob Empire, a Foursquare-meets-Mafia Wars game. CrowdMob, which was co-founded by LOLapps’ former creative director Damon Grow, Alex Han and Matt Moore, is among a handful of startups that are trying to build location-enabled mobile games that are genuinely social.

The app, which the company has intentionally kept quiet about since its April 1 launch, pits friends and strangers against each other in a quest to gain control of venues in their city. The game has a modest number of users at the moment with just over 17,000 Facebook monthly actives on AppData, but that’s because the company hasn’t really publicized it to date. Grow said the company is focused on getting engagement of existing users up and ensuring the back-end can scale before marketing or promoting the title.

> Continue reading on Inside Mobile Apps.

As Facebook becomes crowded with successful titles, developers are looking for other ways to publish their games. Some are looking at alternative platforms. Still others are using the Facebook platform as a method to create a community. Supercell of Finland is one such developer.

GunShine, a semi-traditional MMOG we previewed in February, has no plans to run inside the Facebook canvas, yet it will use players’ feeds and friends list for virality. Eschewing the dogma of asking the player to post for help to complete a mission, Gunshine will instead ask the player to post only “brag” posts.

While this may sound appealing on a personal level, at first blush it appears as virtual suicide in game design. At this year’s Game Developer’s Conference Supercell CEO Ilkka Paananen, COO Janne Snellman, and Creative Director Mikko Kodisoja clarified their strategy and explained their plans for launching a successful MMOG using Facebook.

“We believe that if the game is good enough,“ commented Paananen, “it will sell itself through word of mouth. People will talk about it and that should increase our community. But this doesn’t mean we don’t have ideas on how best to use Facebook to our advantage.”

Upon entry, a user will be able to see which of their Facebook friends are currently active in the game. A message can then be sent to that player, allowing for synchronous play. If no friends are available and the user chooses not to play with strangers, Facebook friends can be hired like henchman in an asynchronous atmosphere.

While this works to bring together groups or find friends already playing, it does little to encourage a user to post to the wall. After several false starts at finding the answer due to language differences, I found the question that would elicit the answer I was looking for.

“You are depending upon people talking about your game to get them to start playing it. Brag posts are how they will know it even exists. Why would I even want to brag?”

“Credibility,” they told me in unison.

Credibility is a player stat that can either be purchased for significant Diamonds (the in-game microcurrency) or increased by posting brag posts to a user’s wall. The key to Credibility is in what it gives you — additional content. If Supercell makes this content compelling enough, they may have struck just the right balance to have created a mechanism that is both viral and monetizable.

Another mechanic that has been anathema to traditional MMOG designers but Supercell seems willing to embrace whole-heartedly is having durability on purchaseable items. Those these items can be repaired creating a never-ending money sink, they do eventually wear out and require replacement. Puzzle Pirates has existed successfully on this model for five of its seven years but it is a mechanic other North American designers have been unwilling to attempt.

Durability not only places a dependence between players (those who repair and those who need it), but it allows for a dependable revenue model as gameplay and monetization become one and the same.

With GunShine still in the first two weeks of closed beta it is difficult to make a determination as to whether the players find it a compelling game. Beta is invite-only and much can change before launch. But Supercell seems to be willing to the risks necessary to be successful by using Facebook without being part of Facebook.

New Zynga Funding — A number of financial publications reported this week that Zynga is raising a large new round of funding. The Wall Street Journal kicked things off on Monday citing sources saying the company is looking to raise around $250 million at a valuation of between $7 billion and $9 billion, following profit of $400 million and total revenue of $850 million last year. Bloomberg then reported that the valuation could be $10 billion, from T. Rowe Price, and Fidelity Investments. Then All Things D and The New York Times reported yesterday that Zynga is finalizing a $500 million round worth $10 billion from those investors and others; the latter publication said the company is considering an initial public offering as soon as 2012, according to sources.

SNAP Interactive Releases Curious Valentine’s Numbers — SNAP Interactive announced some numbers regarding Valentine’s Day virtual items late last week. Based on their Facebook connected AreYouInterested.com, the holiday marked a significant spike in virtual gifting with over 100% more Valentine’s style virtual gifts being purchased in the past month, over the prior, and a 15% increase overall.

Tribeca Film Institute & Ford Foundation Partner to Support New Media — The Tribeca Film Institue and the Ford Foundation‘s JustFilms initiative have entered a partnership and launched the Tribeca Film Institue New Media Fund. The $750,000 fund is said to provide support and funding to film projects that incorporate newer media platforms including video games, mobile apps, social networks, and micro-blogging.

Big Fish Games to Close Treasure Quest — According to Worlds in Motion, Big Fish Games is closing its Facebook title Treasure Quest on March 15th. The game marked the casual developer’s first venture into the social gaming market, but currently only garners around 48,000 MAU.

Nexon Getting into Social & Mobile Games — MapleStory developer, Nexon, is looking to move into making social games for Facebook as well as for mobile, says VentureBeat. In order to differentiate itself, Nexon is looking to hook players through game play that connects users with an online community.

Game Closure Launches Cross-Platform Multiplayer App — According to TechCrunch, Game Closure has launched a new SDK that will allow developers to easily create, host, and deploy HTML5-based, cross-platform multiplayer games. Shown at SSE Labs‘ Demo Day at AOL, the SDK is compatible across iOS, Android, and Facebook apps.

Richard Garriott Plans to Beat Zynga — Richard Garriott and his new startup, Portalarium, is set to release their first title in about a month, and says he’s planning to beat out Zynga, says VentureBeat. Though he has released no specific details about the game, it is noted that it will be released on Facebook, Hi5, and other such networks and will not be a “plagiarized” concept; referring to some of Zynga’s past games.

Check out the top headlines and insights this week from Inside Facebook— tracking Facebook and the Facebook platform for developers and marketers.

Sunday, January 23rd, 2011

• Facebook Agrees to Change Friend Finder in Response to German Privacy Complaint

Monday, January 24th, 2011

• Facebook’s North American Ad Rates Rose in December 2010, Traffic Stayed Flat
• Badoo, RootMusic, LivingSocial Top Among Applications That Grew the Most This Past Week
• Facebook Sets July, 1, 2011 Deadline to Make Credits Sole Canvas Game Payment Option
• Facebook Launches Page Citing Statistics and New Incentives for Adopting Credits
• An In-Depth Look at the Social Gaming Industry’s Performance and Prospects on Facebook
• Facebook Campaigns: Microsoft Hong Kong, Transportation and Topps
• Facebook’s Sponsored Stories Turns News Feed Posts Into Home Page Ads

Tuesday, January 25th, 2011

• Top 20 Fastest Growing Facebook Pages: Zynga, Harry Potter, MTV, Ronaldo, Music
• ISA 2011: Live Blogging The Future of Social Gaming Panel
• ISA 2011: Fireside Chat with Facebook CTO Bret Taylor
• Facebook Acquires Hyper-Local Mobile Advertising Startup Rel8tion
• Facebook CTO Bret Taylor: “Mobile is the primary focus for our platform this year.”
• ISA 2011: Live-Blogging New and Alternative Social Platforms Panel
• ISA 2011: Facebook Announces Buy With Friends and Frictionless Micropayments
• ISA 2011: Live-Blogging Growth and Monetization on Mobile Social Platforms
• ISA 2011: Sony Ericsson to Preload its Android Devices with Facebook Login at Startup

Wednesday, January 26th, 2011

• Yahoo and Badoo Rhyme Their Way to the Top on This Week’s List of Fastest-Gaining Facebook Apps by DAU
• Facebook Combats Image of Insecurity with HTTPS and Social Authentication
• Highlights This Week from the Inside Network Job Board: Facebook & Meteor Games
• Facebook Tests Voice Chat, Could the Facebook Phone Run on VoIP?
• Facebook Increases Application Requests Limite: More Virality, More Spam?
• ISA 2011: Roundup of Press Coverage

Thursday, January 27th, 2011

• Facebook Career Postings: Payment Operations, Sales, Mobile, Engineering and Data Centers
• Facebook Runs Survey to Assess User Perceptions of Credits
• ISA 2011: Growth and Monetization on Facebook — The Credits Panel [Video]
• EHow.com to Delete its User Profiles and Switch Entirely to Facebook Login
• Facebook Ups Application Security with Roles, Whitelists, and Notifications

Friday, January 28th, 2011

• Dating and Pictures Appear on This Week’s List of Emerging Facebook Apps
• ISA 2011: Facebook CTO Bret Taylor on The 2011 Facebook Platform Roadmap [Video]
• Facebook Confirms Removal o fSuggest to Friends Feature from Pages, Reducing Virality
• Platform Update: Developers Sit Reorganization, Deprecations Reminder
• Facebook’s Redesigned Page Creation Flow Helps Admins Choose a Category
• Facebook Roundup: Prineville, Zynga, Android, Verizon, Egypt, Tunisia, Japan, Zuckerberg and The Oscars

Mike Murphy Takes Advisor Role at Zynga — According to All Things Digital, former Facebook head of advertising sales Mike Murphy is now taking a part-time role at Zynga, advising on its advertising strategy. In addition to this, Murphy will be focused on team growth, advertising products, and creating new relationships with major brands.

[image via All Things Digital]

Mafia Wars Expands to Four New Languages — Earlier this week, Zynga announced that it’s long running Mafia Wars title will now be available in French, Italian, German, and Spanish. According to the developer, approximately 15% of the game’s daily players speak one of these four languages.

Castle & Co Launches in Chinese — In more localization news, Ubisoft’s Castle & Co is getting a Chinese language version this week. The new app is entitled “萌堡奇緣” or “Cute Castle, Amazing Encounter!”

SiXits Jumps into Social Games — A new startup by the name of SiXits is getting into social games says VentureBeat. Using cross-platform games, the company is hoping to set itself apart by incorporating more engaging games. Their first title, dubbed Babies Everywhere, centers around users caring for a cartoon-like baby.

Pocket God’s Episode II Launches on Facebook — Frima Studio and Bolt Creative have announced the launch of Pocket God’s latest update, Episode II: Clash of the Frightened! for Facebook. The new version includes new social quests, friend taunting, extra idols, and more.

PopCap Goes Cross-Platform with Bejeweled Blitz — PopCap Games appears to have gone cross-platform with its popular Bejeweled Blitz title for Facebook and iOS. Based on information from W3i’s blog, users can now connect and compete with one another from either platform.

Zynga May Acquire Whereoscope — Social developer Zynga may be close to acquiring a company by the name of Whereoscope, who helps parents keep track of their kids using a location-based application on smartphones.

Zong & Boku Partner with Verizon — Mobile payments companies Zong and Boku have announced a direct carrier billing service with Verizon through BillToMobile, says TechCrunch. Now, the companies can now offer services at a much lower transaction rate than SMS payments.

Foursquare Grows 3400% in 2010 — Foursquare released some interesting numbers this week, noting that it had grown 3400% in 2010. In addition to this, the company has totaled 381,576,305 check-ins last year, one of which was from the International Space Station. A full compilation of top check-in locations, numbers, and States, can be found here.

Spartacus Comes to Facebook — In more social gaming news, the recently previewed title Spartacus: Gods of the Arena has launched on Facebook. Published by 6 Waves and developed by Large Animal Games, the Starz show marks yet another franchise to make its way onto Facebook.

Facebook to Focus on HTML5 — After noting the growth and potential of HTML5 at ISA 2011, it looks like Facebook is now focusing more heavily on it with JSGameBench version 0.1.

Booyah & Indaba Music Present Nightclub City Album — Booyah and Indaba Music have announced the release of a new music album, Drop the Bass. Centered around the music of Nightclub City, the tracks are all created by members of IndabaMusic.com as part of the “Drop the Bass” contest held late last year.

HeyZap Gains First Unity3D Game — A previously reviewed title by the name of Foxie Hunny Jump is coming to HeyZap this week. Of particular curiosity, it is noted as the first title to utilize Unity3D on the platform, says the developers, Fusion Studios.

Check out the top headlines and insights this week from Inside Facebook— tracking Facebook and the Facebook platform for developers and marketers.

Monday, January 3rd, 2011

• Innovative Games Join Holiday Apps on This Week’s List of Fastest-Growing Facebook Apps by DAU
• Announcing Inside Mobile Apps: Tracking the Convergence of Mobile Apps and Social Platforms
• What Goldman Sachs’ Reported $450 Million Investment in Facebook May Mean
• Top 25 Facebook Games for January 2011
• Facebook and the Parallel Surge in (Early-and Late-Stage) Valuations
• With a Focus on Monetizing Mobile Apps, Tapjoy Leaves Its Scamville Past Behind
• November 2010 Facebook Traffic: Usual Growth Worldwide, Slower in US, Measurement Firms Show

Tuesday, January 4th, 2011

• Facebook Promotes Friend Lists with Notification When Added to Featured People
• Top 20 Growing Facebook Pages: Harry Potter, Manchester United, Rihanna, Gaga and Bieber
• Facebook May Move Headquarters from Palo Alto to Empty Sun Campus in Menlo Park
• The Best Facebook Page Strategies and the Pages That Use Them

Wednesday, January 5th, 2011

• Likes, Dating and Games Appear on This Week’s List of Fastest-Growing Facebook Apps by DAU
• Offerpop’s Tab Apps Let Pages Run Commenting Contests that Reach the Feed
• The Facebook Marketing Bible January 2011 Edition Is Now Available
• Highlights This Week from the Inside Network Job Board: Ubisoft, PlaySpan, Nanigans, & More
• Zibaba To Launch Affiliate Marketing Ecommerce Storefront for Facebook Pages
• RootMusic Nets $2.3 Million in Funding to Hire Engineers for Facebook App BandPage

Thursday, January 6th, 2011

• Facebook Career Posts: Mobile Operators, Lega, Data Centers, and More
• Countdown to Inside Social Apps InFocus 2011 – January 25th in San Francisco
• State, Local Government Agencies Reach Agreement with Facebook on Legal Concerns
• Vevo’s Lift Facebook App Awards Prizes to the Users Who Share Music Videos the Most

Friday, January 7th, 2011

• New Year’s Greetings Fill This Week’s List of Emerging Facebook Apps
• Sharethrough Helps Advertisers Place Their Videos Deep Within Social Games
• The Best Facebook-Integrated Devices from CES 2011
• Facebook Moves Friend Requests Link to the Home Page’s Left Sidebar
• Platform Update: Out with the Old Insights, Further API Migration Deadline Extensions
• Facebook Roundup: Loading Time HuffPo, Congress, Facebook Movie, Hyundai and More
• Thanks to Our Sponsors

Saturday, January 8th, 2011

• Highlights This Week from the Inside Network Job Board: A Bit Lucky, Arkadium, Menue, & More

Several months back, we touched on a Singapore-based startup called Manga Castle. It took that long for the developer to show us the fully Facebook-integrated version of their anime-style social game, Magic Castle, which operates as a stand-alone site connected through Facebook.

Reminiscent of apps like SuperPoke!, Magic Castle combines social interactions with virtual spaces to make a simplistic, yet charming social game that marries classic social gaming mechanics with a cute, anime style. Nevertheless, it’s a title that suffers from a lack overall purpose, and is often unclear as to what the point of many of its features are.

Starting out, players choose one of a handful of preset avatars that are representative of some of the more cliché anime personalities: the overly jubilant man, the serious guy, the bubbly girl, and so on. Right off the bat, players are granted a colorful cauldron in which they can mix pairs of random ingredients (broken hearts, chili, whips, and other randomness) together.

This is where things get interesting as players never know, for sure, what will come out of the brew. By buying cheap ingredients and mixing them, players will create random items that can be used on Facebook friends. This is where the well-known “poke” mechanic comes in, as these items can be used to harass or help one another.

Consisting of things like pranks, novelty items, and healing abilities, players can use their brewed creations (e.g. a slingshot or pimple outbreak) on one another. It’s a nice concept, and one that has proven popular in the past. Moreover, the anime/manga style adds a different flavor to the game that most of its predecessors did not have. The downside to this, however, is that “poking” one’s friends in this way doesn’t have a clear point or effect, a realization that led most players to give up on doing it long ago.

With each interaction, players gain experience, but can also raise and lower each other’s health and mood. As an example, a slingshot used on a character will lower its health while a healing item will restore it (which can be sent by friends). Other “pokes” also affect one’s mood, which is reflected in the Magic Castle profile. It seems that experience gates what abilities one can brew and what ingredients can be bought, and we’re also assuming health affects the actual ability to brew, while mood appears as just a fun extra for one’s profile. Unfortunately, the game never explains the true purpose behind any of these.

What does work well for Magic Castle is that brewing items comes with a sort of riddle. Since players do not know what will make what, there is a section called “Hints” that gives users subtle clues as to what two items are needed to make a specific spell. If you’re a fan of riddles, trying to resolve them and purchase the right ingredients is actually pretty fun, and once discovered the spell can be rebrewed (over a set amount of time) to be either used on friends or sold for a small profit.

This profit, though extremely small early on, can be used to purchase not only new ingredients, but decorative items for a virtual room as well. All in 2D, it’s best described as a static, anime-style, Pet Society type of room, that can, of course, be visited by friends. It may not seem like much, but the addition is a feature that is generally quite popular with social games.

If there is any one significant complaint with Magic Castle, it’s that the game seems confused in what its overall purpose for playing is. It has a lot of game elements, yes, but new players seem to be left with the question of “what do I do?” Should players strive to decorate the best room? Is it just a toy to poke friends with? Is the goal to be the highest level on the leaderboards? Or is it a puzzle-type game for discovering new brews? Independently, none of these are bad things, but they all feel like parts just thrown together with no unifying factor.

The only other problem is that the decorative items for the virtual space are vastly overpopulated with goods that cost virtual currency. On the whole, very few cost in-game coins, and even then they are very expensive compared to the miniscule profits earned through selling brews. The combination of these two aspects makes playing for decorative purposes discouraging.

Despite its issues, most of the problems with Magic Castle are easily fixable. And while the game may be made up of older concepts, it’s actually rather refreshing, in a nostalgia-inducing-way, to see it steer away from the mold of city-builders, farming, and other popular genres, and focus more on simplicity. While not for everyone, Magic Castle is a cute and simple game that could potentially have some staying power.

Over a year has passed since we last took a look at Rock Band on any of the Apple iDevices, but Harmonix and EA Mobile are at it again with the recent release of Rock Band Reloaded HD for the iPad. Making use of the newer device’s hardware, the title attempts the recreate the rock star experience for mobile with a quality selection of music and a host of downloadable content.

Coming with all the mechanics of any other Rock Band game, Reloaded does a good job of translating the title to the iPad, though it doesn’t exactly recreate the experience users have come to love in the console version. Even so, the overall game plays quite well with its new social challenge modes.

For those few who remain uninitiated, Rock Band is a rhythm franchise that allows players to become a rock star by timing taps on music notes that stream down the screen. As the player hits the notes, the score will increase, multiplying as they hit in succession, and playing the current song selected. If a note is missed, the multiplier is lost, and too many successive misses will result in failure.

All of these console mechanics are still present in Reloaded, as well as the special glowing notes that will charge the “Overdrive” meter (which can be activated, when full, to double one’s score multiplier). Also, it wouldn’t be Rock “Band” without the inclusion of all the instruments of guitar, bass, drums, and vocals.

Each instrument plays similarly on the screen to their console counterparts, but they do lack the same feel without an analog guitar or drum set controller. Of the instruments, drums will likely feel the most natural to most people with the tapping action, while the guitar will take getting used to for Rock Band (or Guitar Hero) veterans.

For those veterans, the title has incorporated the expert mode that was lacking in Rock Band’s original iPhone version. Like all the titles before it, the songs start off fairly simple, but ramp up quickly as users progress through the primary World Tour mode with increasingly tricky rifts and solos.

It’s also worth noting that the vocal recognition for the game works decently well, and many of the World Tour levels require users to utilize the vocals in a special “Challenge.” Thankfully, for those who feel a bit reserved about singing into an iPad, a special touch rendition of vocals is always available.

Challenges are particularly useful in the game’s core scoring and social mechanic. Measured in “fans,” which are earned by completing songs with more earned for higher scores on said songs, players can connect through Facebook and compare themselves to others via a global leaderboard. While this is fine and dandy, it’s the interaction with friends that is particularly interesting.

Once connected through Facebook, players can not only track each other through leaderboards, but can connect to a news feed that show how friends are doing in the game. This “News Center” will display any and all accomplishments that friends have achieved and users can simply tap on it to go directly to the exact same song, instrument, and difficulty and attempt to beat it. Once finished, this will update in their feed and can be posted to Facebook as well.

Rock Band wouldn’t be a band without synchronous multiplayer, so that’s here too. The traditional play is present, where users can connect via WiFi or Bluetooth and play songs together. Getting four friends with iPads can be tricky, so there’s also a Versus mode that pits two users against one another on the same device, and an iPhone version of Reloaded (same basic game, just much smaller and more cluttered) that is a bit more economically feasible for friends wishing to play together.

There aren’t any particularly glaring problems with Rock Band. The only truly negative aspect is that players cannot create their own rockers like in other Rock Band games, but then again, this is a mobile version. The avatars that do represent the band are rather distracting, especially the lead singer, who just sort of bobs around in synch with the music without moving his lips. While this might seem minor, it looks absolutely absurd, detracting from the gameplay.

Most users will enjoy Rock Band Reloaded quite a bit. It’s on the pricier end for iPad games at $9.99, but is still a good addition for music and rhythm-game lovers. The initial track list is pretty decent, too, with more songs available through in-app purchases. In the end, if you have the cash lying around and don’t mind the lack of the analog controllers, Rock Band Reloaded is a fun game that’s made even better with friends.