FarmVille is an affront to my senses, and my dignity. The game is an utter wash, to put a dull point on it.
I decided to take it upon myself and try the game, so that everyone who is avoiding it like the plague can figure out if they are making the right move. You are. The game is garbage.
Now I have strong credentials in this field: as an ex-dedicated SimFarm and SimCity player, I know the genre. Hell, I have actually worked on a farm. I have done this in the real, so I know farming better than most. I do have something to stand on.
Farmville is built on the idea that if they make it sticky, people will never leave. It worked. You plant crops, but to harvest them later, you actually have to log in when they are ripe, and harvest them in that time frame, or they die. So, after you take the time to plant your whatever (eggplant, strawberries, etc), you have to watch your clock to know when to come back.
Most of my plants died. I planted them, got to work, glanced back, and had a patch of dead strawberries. You literally have to have nothing to do to enjoy this game. Do you even have a vague hobby? If so are already way to busy to play this disastrous game.
But of course, for all the hassle, it’s easy, right? Half way. The gameplay is such boiled down simplistic blah that any child can play it. It shows that they made this game mass market. But to actually get anywhere requires some serious, serious time input.
FarmVille told me that since I had leveled up, I could get a chicken! I was excited. Well, no, but it sounds better to say so.
I headed to the market to buy a chicken coop, looked at the price tag and realized that I would have to play FarmVille for over a week to get enough “coins” to buy it. What?
So it’s a game that is titchy, and requires a lot of work? Just so that I can have a virtual chicken coop? Bite me, because I am not nibbling on that lure.
Of course, that is why FarmVille makes money. Don’t want to wait to get that tractor? A credit card is all you need. The game is designed to make you so frustrated with its bad design that you will fix it with your money. People do. Brilliant, if you are a bit of a tosser.
The game also ruins farming, by making it seem so routine. Anyone who has ever walked onto a farm will find this game so over-simplified that it is an exercise in “oh that is such bull, it never works like that.” All in all my two days in Farmville were a waste.I did so that you do not have to. You are welcome.
For sale, one crap FarmVille farm.
Thanks because, I swear, like every {…deleted because I can’t write it out or I’d be a bad person…} in my family is on it. I get those damn Farmville updates all the time. I wonder if there is something to it. I’m glad there is nothing to it and that I didn’t have to torture those connected to me with updates to find out. ;)
However, wait, do you think The Next Web can create a game or app? If they can do it, so can we!
Just out of curiosity, does anyone edit these articles before they make it on here? What kind of sentence is this?
Do you even have a vaauge hobby? Then you are already way to play this disastrous game.
Wow….I really like the site and the info, but jeez, I can’t send this link out to my friends. It looks terrible.
Fixed.
Not fixed. vage != vague
I just figured ‘vage’ was a hot word for vaginal.
Ha, WordPress spell check is beyond horrible. Fixed!
You are both right and wrong.
The game does consume a lot of time (my wife plays it when she feels bored), but you can get ahead very quickly if you build up a network of other farmers, then that chicken would be granted a free gifts from one to another.
The game is well sustained, because it always gets new stuff in it. New inventory, new gifting techniques, etc. That’s what keeps the crowd in and still flowing.
I believe it’s popularity is based solely on marketing, and the successful use of Adobe Flash for a friendly beautiful interface – that’s what most games lack.
Me? I find it more fun to spend my time of boredom and laziness enjoying games from kongregate and armorgames (bubble tanks tower defense, gemcraft, sonny, mastermind and other fast games you can save progress in)
A lot of time for what? To have a pink tractor? I stand by my views.
:) Alex, the point in any game is to have fun. Having fun involves various activities. For someone it is seeing their virtual self grow, become richer, etc. That’s the point in any RPG game, ain’t it?
The tractor is another of those “Swords of a thousand truths” in any RPG game, it’s just that this is written in Flash, played on Facebook, and the scope is not to kill mythical creatures but to become a better virtual farmer. The tractor offers you that opportunity.
Once you’ve criticized FarmVille you can just go ahead an criticize just about every MMORPG game, because the arguments you are using apply to all of them.
Cheers :)
Never have played, never will.
The game will be forgotten by March.
There was one thing about this game that made laugh. A message from one of my friends saying that in farmville some of his “neighbours” came a long and fertilized his land. In other words they came and shat on his lawn. :-)
Off the top of my head, they have plants that take: 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12, 16, 24 hours, 2 days, 3 days, and 4 days to be ready. You don’t have to have no life to play, you just need to be able to ask yourself “when will I next be on the computer.”
You’re right, the game is a massive time sink, and terrible. But not for any of the reasons you listed. You’re article is trash, and it is clear you didn’t put more than a few hours of “research” into it.
Don’t speak in an informative tone if you don’t know what it is you’re talking about.
Yes this is rly a time consuming junk.. but still why many ppl stick to it cuz of the other fellow farmers..to beat their score..to have a beautiful farm than others. One Question..
Is there a END for this game??
it’s a crap, no doubt.
Farmville is one of the reasons I switched to Facebook lite, I got annoyed by my friends activity feeds getting polluted by Farmville messages, and I’m thinking about abandoning Facebook altogether, all these apps are a pain in the butt, I wish there was an option to disable messages from certain apps (and if there is I’d like to know where I can change it).
Hover the update, click “Hide”, click “Hide Farmville”, done. Additionally you can go to the application’s page and block it so you don’t get any requests.
Thanks for the tip, I’ll do that as soon as I’m home.
I agree with you Alex. I tried Farmville for a day but was like wtf when they expect you to come back and harvest between x hrs and x+2 hrs or your plants are DEAD
who cares, it must be nice to have time to bich over a computer game. Don’t u people work.
Well, I don’t like Farmville too, and can not understand people why they are playing it but oh well. I play other game where we always tell people who are bad “Return to Farmville” because it is easy. Anyway I like the fact that you dared to say something bad about the most played game on Facebook :P
What’s wrong with neglecting some crops or putting your pigs on a strict diet? I like my salad black and fluffy.
An others are copying FarmVille, FV is the most successful game in Facebook. And also it's the worst game design. Well.. I kinda agree with your, but not 100%. Your article seem to be bitching about your dead plants because you don't harvest it on time.
Could you write deeper? Like, its game play, networking, UI design bring up the fact will ya.
I played farmville for several months and had a great time. It was fun creating my farm and planning what I wanted it to look like but what I loved most was the connection I made to people all over the world who are also playing Farmville. Everyday I networked with smart, witty, creative, warm people who were having fun playing Farmville. Connecting with other “farmers” was great and even though I don't have the time to play the game right now, I really miss all my farmer friends and seeing what they are up to on their farms today.
Game is a waste of time and a proof of lack of intelligence…
hwy sampad…..i feel your pain bro…i detested playing farmville as i was having the same feeling you had before yu played the game….i read your blog headline the day yu posted this..but gt time to read it fully today…..yu saved another soul from the torture of this game…
L@@KS like were upon march 2 weeks away i hop you see this forgotten is forever LMAO@ THIS POST HERE,,,,,,,,,
I have been playing it for a few months now. In fact, the only reason i made a crappy facebook account was to play some of the games my gf kept playing.
I can thoroughly say that the game is indeed crap. Everything takes FAR too long to do. The rewards are not even really rewards, they are just incentives to waste more time with the game. All the new items like animals and decorations that have been coming out cost FV cash… I will never EVER PAY for one of the worst designed games ever so they are ruining any chance of me staying with the game since everything is now costing real money. The only other way to get FV is to level. They give you one FV for a level. But here is the thing… the experience needed at higher levels to level, makes you have to play for weeks to get one level… and your reward for each level is the ability to now plant one or two new plants and do it again for another level. Many of the plants you unlock have terrible pay outs and in some cases, they are so bad, that you will never ever plant them. Not even once. Other options…. spend real money on the game to play a pretty broken concept…. really not fun at all.
What really pissed me off was how they force you to have neighbours to be able to expand your farm. None of my friends play this shit, so I had to invite strangers and let these strangers add me to facebook, giving them my personal info… just to expand a farm… it really does not make sense. I was certainly not going to add strangers just for neighbours, so I created fake facebook accounts and dummy farms just to add neighbours. I can also log in to these “friends” and send myself gifts whenever I want to. This is probably why you see so many monthly users of the program… all the fake accounts because I can not be the only one that said to themselves I am not adding strangers for farmville.
There are a lot more faults with the game too like gifts disappearing, out of sync issues, farms not saving properly, animals disappearing and the list goes on….
My best advice… stay far far away from this game. I can not even call this a game any more. It is a chore. Maybe that is what they were aiming for, making it tough work like running a real farm… who knows
Great post. The tips and the ideas given in the post seems to be very much informative and useful for the job seekers. Thank you for such a good post.
i am at level 32, moving up a level about every ten days and i work full time and read at least three books a week, take care of a home, husband and son. i have never spent a penny in actual money on farmville, it is not necessary. i fertilize my neighbors crops and feed their chickens for coins and experience points and have lots of animals and trees, which were sent to me by my neighbors. all free. harvesting your trees and animals gets you coins. if you plant a crop that requires two days, you do not have to watch the clock. it will not wither unless you run at least a whole day over. if you don't want to play, that's fine, but please do not make assumptions that just aren't true.
its use a true money
All you guys hate Farmville so much , y talk about it, no one from farmville is bothering you, if u dont like the feeds on facebook from all those games u can always block the apps geniuses !!! without having to erase ur friends. So instead of talking trash bout other peoples way of passing time, get something better to do.
Thank u.
live and let live. farm and let farm. c’mon! i like farmville and don’t care much about the haters! what you think is none of my farm’s business.
It’s a game people. Get over it. I love farmville nothing wrong with it. Got it on my iPad.