Social network, online gaming records being used in divorce proceedings

Media scolds have been talking about the risks of video games for decades now. They warn that games will make you obese or violent or attention-deficient or lead to a host of other problems. While evidence for all those supposed ills varies, it seems there's now a new risk associated with online gaming: losing your kids.

USA Today reports that 81% of members of The American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers say they've used information from social networks in a divorce proceeding in the last five years. What kind of evidence? Examples from the article include everything from online extramarital flirting to posted pictures of drug use to, surprisingly, time spent playing games.

"Father seeks custody of the kids, claiming (among other things) that his ex-wife never attends the events of their young ones," recalls one unnamed lawyer quoted in the piece. "Subpoenaed evidence from the gaming site World of Warcraft tracks her there with her boyfriend at the precise time she was supposed to be out with the children. Mom loves Facebook's Farmville, too, at all the wrong times."

So remember, while time spent playing online games is all well and good, it doesn't compare with spending quality time with your kids. Especially if the courts could be watching...

Crowdstar signs five-year Facebook Credits exclusivity deal

While social game developers as a whole might be ambivalent about Facebook's recent push for its new Credits virtual currency, at least one game company has pledged to get behind the effort in a big way. Crowdstar, makers of Happy Aquarium, Happy Island, Zoo Paradise, and other popular Facebook games, has announced a five-year deal pledging to accept Facebook Credits as the exclusive payment in its games.

This isn't exactly big news for Crowdstar -- the company has accepted payment in Facebook Credits, and only Facebook Credits, ever since it integrated the new currency into Happy Island when the game launched back in December. Since then the company has set up numerous free credit offers to get people interested in the payment system, and even accepted the Credits for a charity donation drives.

The focus apparently worked, as the company says average revenues per user have increased 50 percent since they started accepting Facebook Credits. Crowdstar attributes the change to "the increased level of comfort and trust that customers have when buying currency from Facebook."

With Farmville developer Zynga also signing on to support Facebook Credits recently (albeit not yet exclusively), we could start seeing more and more social game makers tying their fates to the pre-eminent social network and its new unified payment system. It will be interesting to see what effect this has on both the game makers and on Facebook itself in the near future.

New Year's Guide: FarmVille, FrontierVille, Cafe World & more

Happy New Year's to all players of FarmVille, CityVille, FrontierVille, Cafe World and other Facebook games! Pat yourselves on the back, you made it through the entire 2010 Holiday Season. You survived Halloween, Thanksgiving, and the Holidays. Even more impressive is how you managed the bombardment of new Facebook game updates, features, and items that each holiday brought about. New Year's is no exception, there's new items and features in all of your favorite Facebook games, welcoming in the new year with style. So don't miss these 2011 New Year's Facebook game specials, they only come once a year.

Jump in to the 2011 New Year's Facebook game festivities below.


Jump to: FarmVille | FrontierVille | Cafe World

Note: The newest posts are at the bottom of each list. Posts in BOLD are the biggest New Year's updates.

farmville new years
FarmVille New Year's

    FarmVille Party Barn / New Year's Ball Drop Event: Everything you need to know
    FarmVille New Years Clothing: Tiaras, Top Hats, Party Dresses, and more!
    FarmVille New Years Tree: Confetti Tree
    FarmVille Winter Countdown: Everything you need to know
    FarmVille New Years Items: New Year Horse, Party House, Cider Fountain & More
    FarmVille Winter Countdown items revealed - here's what to expect over the next 11 days
    FarmVille New Year Animal: Disco Ball Sheep
    FarmVille Disco Ball Tree makes an appearance in the market
    FarmVille New Years Items: Fireworks I, II, III, & New Year Gnome
    FarmVille: Get ready for a New Years Double Mastery Weekend!




frontierville new years
FrontierVille New Year's

    FrontierVille New Years Party Goals: Everything you need to know
    FrontierVille Winter Collection: Everything you need to know
    FrontierVille New Years RSVP Prizes: Everything you need to know




Cafe World New Year's

    Cafe World New Years Party Goals: Everything you need to know
    Cafe World Prep for the New Year Mission: Everything you need to know
    Cafe World New Years Party Catering Order: Everything you need to know
    Cafe World: The Saga of the New Years Goals continues, but this time with free iPads!




playfish new years
Playfish New Year's

    Playfish's New Years Event Round-Up: Catch up with Restaurant City, Hotel City, Pet Society & More!



Check out the rest of our Holiday 2010 coverage right here.

Which is your favorite New Year's Facebook Game update?

One in five seniors is a potential Facebook gamer, study shows

Is old pappy sending you new Mystery Gifts every day in FarmVille? According to a study conducted by All Assisted Living Homes, 20 percent of baby boomers--if you born anywhere from the late 70s through the 80s, likely your parents--are on Facebook. While they could be doing anything on Facebook, Deseret News mentions that gaming could be part of those activities. And we're willing to bet on that big time.

This 20 percent of seniors logs into Facebook for at least one hour daily. Since it only takes a few minutes to get the dirty work done in a Facebook game, there is likely a large portion of these old folks playing CityVille or what have you. This trend is growing so much so that at one senior center in Sandy City, Utah holds a course to teach seniors the art of Facebook. It's one of the most popular classes they offer.

It seems that FrontierVille and the lot truly are becoming the universal gaming language for first time gamers. While many are crying foul over social gaming's addictive or exploitative tendencies, there's nothing wrong with more folks getting into games. Sure, the gameplay languages between hardcore and casual slash social games are different dialects, but they both stem from the same root.

[Image Credit: Ryan's Go Blog]

Are you a senior that plays social games? What do you think of the increasingly older, and inversely new, demographic of casual and social gamers?

FrontierVille's First Birthday: Purchase Horseshoes for awesome prizes

To celebrate FrontierVille's first birthday on Facebook, Zynga has launched a Horseshoe promotion that should be available to most players already, and will last until at least June 15. Via this promotion, you can purchase three different values of Horseshoes to receive some special prizes. Of course, the more you spend the more you earn, so let's see what's at stake:

Buy $5 in Horseshoes - two complete Energy Refills
Buy $20 in Horseshoes - a Beef Jerky and six "Any Animal Boosts" (these boosts will boost five animals of the same type, apparently of your choice)
Buy $100 in Horseshoes - a Book of Experience (launches you a full level up instantly) an all Animal Ready Boost, and a Cougar Mystery Animal

While the full, instant level gain is an absolutely fantastic prize (I know I'd love to get my hands on a few of those), I'm not exactly sure many players will be willing to purchase $100 in Horseshoes in order to receive one (them), but I'm ready to be proven wrong if it happens.

What do you think of these Horseshoe packages and prizes? Will you spend $100 on Horseshoes just to earn the Book of Experience? How much would you be willing to pay for one instead?

RockYou to lay off 100 staff, will not publish John Romero's CloudForest Expedition on Facebook

Ever since Warstorm was axed earlier this year by Zynga, Facebook has been devoid of the nerdiest of dreams: fantasy card battles. (Well, aside from that Big Bang Theory game, we guess.) French game maker Everdreamsoft has formally announced Moonga for Facebook. The game allows players to compete in high fantasy battles through--what else--tradable cards with cool artwork on them.

Ah, our not-so-closet days of Magic: The Gathering are coming back to us. The game, which was released to the web in January 2010, is in an open beta test on Facebook. (In other words, it's live.) Moonga has existed on iOS for a bit longer, and was reportedly number one in role-playing games on the App Store in the summer of 2010. The gameplay appears to be your standard card battle game, but between friends on Facebook and in much shorter spurts.

Players build hands of five unique cards featuring monsters and weapons that duel in one-on-one combat. The idea behind the game isn't far different from most: Create a winning strategy by combining cards that work well together to reduce your enemy's defenses to zero. The game's iOS version doesn't appear to have any social features.

Regardless, Everdreamsoft CEO Shaban Shaame showed off the game's NFC technology that allows players to buy physical cards and import them into the iOS game. It's clear that Everdreamsoft looks to create the next Magic: The Gathering on Facebook and mobile. If the company can somehow incorporate a similar technology into Moonga's Facebook version, then the game maker might be onto something.


Click here to play Moonga on Facebook Now >

Have you been looking for a card battle game on Facebook? Do you think Moonga looks as if it can fill that void on the platform?aHard times have come to Facebook game developer RockYou, as the company has announced that it will lose 100 of its staff, leaving it with about 90 employees in all. As told to TechCrunch, CEO Lisa Marina says that this move will allow for the company to become profitable. "Last year was about finding a business model. This year, it's about making the company healthy and profitable," Marino says. With that profitability comes sacrifices, one of which will be the Playdemic studio that RockYou acquired back in January.

Playdemic will be sold back to its original owners for an undisclosed amount of money, and the Facebook game Gourmet Ranch, along with around 40 employees will go with it. As for what remains (after RockYou itself loses 56 employees), Marino has stated that RockYou will not be publishing CloudForest Expedition, the John Romero game we brought you a preview of earlier this year.

While Marino didn't give an exact reason for why Cloudforest Expedition is being shuttered (we could assume the worst - that RockYou no longer contains the manpower to develop it), she did state that perhaps RockYou had been a bit too creative in its past endeavors. "We went too far down the creative path and lost our way in terms of being a profitable organization."

Needless to say, it's disappointing that profits have been chosen over creativity in this case; however, it's not impossible that CloudForest Expedition will still see the light of day. A long shot? Sure, but if someone else were to suddenly jump in and take the reigns, we may be able to explore the jungle landscapes of CloudForest after all.

Are you disappointed that RockYou has turned down publishing CloudForest Expedition on Facebook? Do you think the game can find a new owner and actually be released?