In a previous post I discussed A. J. Patrick Liszkiewicz’s suggestion that we play Farmville because we’re polite. Farmville, he argues, is a cooperative game; one needs help from others to get very far. So you are invited to play by friends, entreated to assist them, and given gifts to encourage your participation. The game “entangles users in a web of social obligations,” to the point where not playing would be rude or signal an effort to distance oneself from your friends who play.
Well Farmville is old news. Cityville was launched on November 18th, 2010. Within 24 hours it had 290,000 players. Within one month it had 84 million players, exceeding the total number playing Farmville, previously the most popular web-based game ever. Today, more than 100 million people play Cityville. And I’m one of them.
Well not really. Bored on a plane flight over the holidays and enjoying free wifi on the plane, I decided to check it out. And, despite expecting that there was a highly social dimension to the game, I was amazed — ah-mazed — at the pace at which Cityville asked me to publicize my participation and get others to join. Below are the kinds of entreaties I received every 20 seconds or so.
Each time I achieved a “goal” Cityville suggested that I tell everyone and share coins with friends. Sometimes Cityville would suggest that I get friends “started” by sending them gifts or help them with a city they’ve already got. It also suggested that I add neighbors and populate my own city with my friends in various roles. You can also visit your friends’ cities, help them out (e.g., harvest for them), or own businesses in their cities. All of this earns both of you points of various kinds. In fact, Cityville would only let me do certain things if my friends helped me do them. Cityville also told me which of my friends were playing.
Then, despite having at no time clicking on “share” anything, Facebook put the news that I was playing Cityville on my wall (it was probably in the “I agree” contract at the very beginning). Gwen was predictably surprised:
Finally, after about a week, Cityville got directly into my email inbox to tempt me to play again with FREE CASH!.
So there you have it. Cityville implores, pleads, begs, insists, threatens, and cajoles the user into getting their friends involved. It’s an insidious social network parasite… and it’s contagious…
Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.
Comments 21
Tabatha — February 6, 2011
I couldn't help but crack up at the Facebook comments between you and Gwen. High-larious. :)
JT — February 6, 2011
The facebook screencap is too funny!
Emro K. — February 6, 2011
Anyone who would start playing the game in the first 30 minutes would realize the things that you conclude at the end of the text. All Zinga games are designed to be as you point out: 'contagious'. Its barely a news any more. I'm sorry, but I do not understand what is the actual point of your text?
Casey — February 6, 2011
The "started playing" thing is what happened for every facebook app, game or not. it's a facebook thing, not a zynga thing.
That said, yeah the game is obnoxious as all get out. Even if you just let it sit for like 20 seconds it will insist that you do something for someone. The pace lowers later on as you start fulfilling less goals and doing less noteworthy things.
I wouldn't say it's all that insidious, it's just a marketing campaign. The company would collapse if people didn't buy in. But then, most marketing is pretty much insidious to begin with.
underbelly — February 6, 2011
This is exactly the reason why I stopped playing Farmville.
Mary — February 6, 2011
Hey, if you're looking for neighbors....
LQ — February 6, 2011
I do play Farmville, and I still gave up Cityville at a few weeks in because it blasted through my 'social play' ceiling. There are limits.
Kate — February 7, 2011
I got sucked into a bunch of flash games on fb - yes, because my friends are playing them. But with my PC out of action, my inner gamer was craving SOMETHING. I tried lucky train and treasure isle and cityville. I LOVED cityville... but I deleted it two weeks in. I only have two friends playing it and it wasn't enough. Unless you have more than 10 friends, you just can't do anything - unless you want to pay to achieve things, which I don't. Sorry, my friends are adults and don't want their feeds taken up with annoying messages.
I still play a couple of other ones, and post to my wall (because I assume everyone but my friends who share those games have blocked the apps) but I can feel the annoyance building and the fun fading. I do actually like the contact it gives me with some people I rarely see - sort of the fb equivalent of a chain email about kittens. But the social gaming thing doesn't work so well if it ends up annoying your friends!
meerkat — February 7, 2011
I waste time on FaceBook games, but they need to have enough content to be somewhat enjoyable even without bugging friends constantly or spending real money. CityVille didn't make that cut for me (although not having any friends signed up at all put it at a disadvantage, since some games let you achieve goals by "helping" your friends without necessarily bugging them with messages). The game companies must hate me though, since I give them no money and as little publicity as I can unless I really like the game.
Ricky — February 7, 2011
I love city simulators, and there was a good one released way back in 2003. Everything since then in the genre has been rubbish. I really didn't think a city building game could possibly get any worse than Simcity Societies released a few years ago. I mean seriously, it was horrible, how could it get any worse? Oh right, Cityville. This game is like a high school computer science project from 1996. Yet, it has over 100 million players?! Holy hell. I don't even want to see what comes next. With the success of Cityville it will certainly get much, much worse. Hopefully I will be dead by then.
Lynne Skysong — February 7, 2011
Lisa, you should also check and see if you're unknowingly posting app relate stuff on your frends' walls when use Facebook apps. I was trying to try out a Facebook stalker app that would let me see who view my Facebook page, saw that it required me to confirm another app just just to confirm that I was "human." At that point I exited and then found out from my boyfriend that I had posted on about 6 on my friend's walls about this app, twice on one. And I had no way of knowing. I never ever finished confirming to use the app and if was spamming my friends. And continued to do so until I finally figured out were Facebook moved the "delete my apps" button to. I generally avoid apps and when I don't it always seems to be more trouble that it's potentially worth.
Tina — February 8, 2011
@Lynne Skysong - All those Facebook "stalker" apps are rubbish, or worse, scams. http://urbanlegends.about.com/b/2011/02/05/facebook-stalker-apps-are-scams.htm
Anonymous — February 16, 2011
All of these games have the exact same setup. They even look pretty much identical. Seriously, the only thing that changes is the theme. Farm, frontier, cafe, aquarium, city, pets, hotel. Just different blinds on the same window.