City of Eternals

So lately I've been checking out City of Eternals, a vampire themed MMORPG.

City of Eternals is free to play and connects with your facebook account. You can post updates of your progess to facebook (which your friends will probably hate), invite friends to join, declare your facebook friends as your minions to complete special tasks for you, and connect with City of Eternals players through facebook.

It's a fairly casual/social experience, so there isn't a lot of RPG depth. If you're hardcore, you might be disappointed. But so far I've found it to be an interesting adventure. It's easy to pick up and play for just a few minutes, you can customize your vampire in numerous ways, and it's free to play. Enough depth to keep me interested, but still light enough to not wear me out!

I will admit, I've run into some bad slowdown and bugs, but the game is still in Beta.

I'm a n00b, though, so there's plenty more to explore. Check it out for yourself at www.cityofeternals.com.

Facebook Game Addiction

For the longest time I had avoided playing any Facebook apps. After all, I'm not really a big Facebook fan in the first place (The site is unorganized and confusing if you ask me and I'm just not super social anyway).

Despite my efforts, I was apparently just putting off the inevitable. Everyone I know seemed to be playing SOMETHING on Facebook and they were constantly encouraging me to give it a try. And as a gamer, I found myself growing more and more curious what the fuss was all about. I decided to give it a whirl and test the waters. I wanted to see what was out there, why people liked it so much, and why the gaming industry was going insane over it!

Naturally, one of the games I started off with was Farmville. I mean, over 70 million people are playing Farmville, so there must be something to it, right?

I made an effort to limit the number of Facebook games I played so that I could still keep some sort of a life. Of course, that didn't last long. I started logging in multiple times per day and made sure that checking the status of my Facebook games was one of the first things I did in the morning and last things I did at night before bed. I even dished out some cash to purchase virtual currency for some games.

The more I played the more time these games were stealing from me. I would login and waste hours doing monotonous tasks such as feeding my fish or harvesting my crops. When I was only spending a few minutes per day playing, it wasn't so bad... but as your game expands to new levels you end up killing more and more time. Easy to see how people end up blowing HOURS in these games.

Making it all worse, what was I gaining from this whole experience? No, these weren't real fish I was feeding or real crops that I was harvesting, so there's no 'real world' benefit. And unfortunately, I wasn't even having fun playing these repetitive games any more. I finally came to terms with this and decided to stop wasting my time playing a game I don't even like. My test was complete!

It's really easy to become addicted to these games. All of your friends are constantly harassing you to play them through Facebook requests, they're easy games to pick up and play, they prey on your instincts to care for things like plants and pets (you're always thinking "oh, I had better water my crops!" and "I bet my virtual pet is hungry"), it allows you to compete with your friends and work on achievements, and they're attached to Facebook... and everyone is on Facebook.

Of course, this is all severely exaggerated. I was never one of those crazy people logging in at 4AM just to make sure my crops were still alive and I never dropped my offline life to make sure my virtual fish were healthy. But the point remains the same - these games are easy to get addicted to and many people continue to play them NOT because they are fun... simply because they are addicted. Sadly, this takes the enjoyment out of gaming and turns it into a chore!

Don't get me wrong, there are some really fun games out there and the social gaming trend is leading to some really great breakthroughs in the industry. I'm still exploring the realm of social gaming and will keep on enjoying what it has to offer. But I think I'll avoid the addictively un-fun games for a while. :)

Zynga Helps Haiti

There's a pretty good chance you play Farmville... considering something like 70 million people are playing it. I'm literally playing Farmville right now as I type this.

If you're an avid Farmville user and want to help make a difference in the world, why not buy some White Corn? 100% of the purchases will go to Zynga's Haiti relief efforts. Previous Farmville charity efforts have been pretty massive, so I expect this to raise a lot of money. White Corn costs 25 Farm Cash. Looks like I might need to go out and buy some Farm Cash...

Anyway, full details in the pic below:

Update: Just wanted to throw in that Zynga is also helping with Haiti through Fishville. Image below!

Too Much Farming

After only a few days of Facebook gaming, I've come to realize there are really only 3-5 different games on Facebook. And then dozens and dozens of others that just recycle those same 3-5 formulas.

The farming games seem to be the most over-used.

Facebook App Games

Well, I may have finally given in. I have to admit, I've never been much of a fan of Facebook (despite me being logged in right now).

Anyway, it seems that everyone I know is addicted to some sort of Facebook game. I've played a few, but have never really put much time into any of them. I think my brother may have finally convinced me to give Farmville a second try.

Any other suggestions for games? I've tried Barn Buddy as well and so far I think I like it better than Farmville.

We'll see how it goes...

Richard Garfield Working on New Game

Mind Control Software and Richard Garfield, the legendary creator of Magic: the Gathering, have just announced collaboration on an upcoming digital strategy game called Mind Twist.

Mind Twist will be supported by microtransaction purchases of pre-constructed armies. These armies can be customized to the player's liking just like a deck of cards in a TCG. It will be a head-to-head, free-to-play strategy game available on iPhone as an application and on Facebook. And of course, all players will start the game out with a starter Army so that you can explore Mind Twist and potentially get addicted.

Garfield is also joining Mind Control's advisory board, with promises to work on future products.

As a big Magic fan, I'm personally excited about this announcement. Particularly because it's free to play and putting it on Facebook will make it widely available. Should be an interesting game to follow...

Teaser site:
http://www.mind-control.com/mindtwist/

More info from Gamasutra:
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=24498

Free Realms Updates

Seems like every time I log into Free Realms, there's something new. They do a great job of keeping the place up to date and fresh with improvements. A lot of the changes aren't major, but it's just enough to show you that they're constantly working to deliver the best game possible. You have to admire that!

Heh, and for any facebook users out there... try redeeming this code: facebookfans03.

Ok, time to go back to playing!!!