FarmVille Unreleased Belted Cow and Belted Calf

FarmVille Community Manager, Lexilicious, mentioned via a FarmVille Podcast that a Belted Cow would be coming soon to FarmVille in the future. FarmVille Freak Martijn found what the still unreleased Belted Cow and Calf may look like.

Continue reading to see the Belted Cow and Calf in action.
   
Note: Unreleased items have no official release date or guarantee that they will make it to the FarmVille Market. Zynga is the sole owner of all their copyrighted images.

Sources:

    FarmVille Freak Unreleased Belted Cow – Zynga FarmVille Image | Animation
    FarmVille Freak Unreleased Belted Calf – Zynga FarmVille Image | Animation


This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.

FarmVille Unreleased Black Stallion and Black Stallion Foal

    farmville black stallion foal
Despite reports on other FarmVille websites, the Black Stallion is not part of the prizes featured in the Animal Mystery Crate which is currently available in the FarmVille Market. It is still an unreleased item with no official release date. Thank you to FarmVille Freak Shiori for finding these unreleased FarmVille Black Stallion and Black Foal!

Keep on reading to see the Black Stallion and Black Stallion Foal in motion.
   
Note: Unreleased items have no official release date or guarantee that they will make it to the FarmVille Market. Zynga is the sole owner of all their copyrighted images.

Sources:

    FarmVille Unreleased Black Stallion – Zynga FarmVille Image | Animation
    FarmVille Unreleased Black Foal – Zynga FarmVille Image | Animation


This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.

Hello City plots a spot in Facebook's crowded city-building game space

It'd be easy to argue that city building games have reached a saturation point on Facebook. With Social City, My Empire, My Town and Towner, we're involved in more urban planning than the average municipal government.

Now Happy Aquarium creator Crowdstar has decided to enter the fray with its own city-builder called Hello City. Like the other games in this genre, Hello City starts out with a small, sparsely populated town, and it's your job -- as overseer -- to build new properties and transform your space into a bustling urban center. That involves building homes and businesses, and then returning to harvest them for cash.

Keeping the town's coffers full, however, involves a little more manual labor than other city building games. You set the operational hours for the various businesses, opening them with the click of a button and then paying a certain number of coins to keep it open for a set period of time. The longer you want to keep your business open, the most virtual coin you'll have to spend. Of course, this will be balanced out by the rewards collected in the end, in theory, at least.

Right now this game is in its early stages, so it's difficult to give Hello City a fair assessment, other than the fact that the overall vibe is friendly and charming, and the play experience seems a little too familiar.

See for yourself: Play Hello City on Facebook >

Happy Pets Dino Den and Dinosaurs let players create their own Jurassic Park

happy pets dino den
Happy Pets has unleashed a new set of animals to inhabit your homes. Only these animals have been extinct for millions of years. That's right, dinosaurs are now available at the Happy Pets store for purchase. The best part is, though the Dinos don't come cheap, most of them can be bought with Happy Pets Coins.

Continue Reading to see all the new dinosaurs and discover how to own one. happy pets dino den

Owning a dinosaur in Happy Pets requires a few steps, the most important being the Dino Den. The Dino Den costs 800 Coins in the Happy Pets store and is a crucial requirement for buying a dinosaur.

Once you buy it you'll need to collect 80 parts to finish its construction. Ten torches, cement bags, hammers, drills, rocks, rivets, I-beams, and shovels are required. To get these parts, you'll need to enlist your friends, asking them to send you the various parts (pictured below).

You may also skip that process and complete the Dino Den instantly for 320 Facebook Credits.
happy pets dino den
Once complete, you'll receive a free Green Triceratops and finally unlock the ability to purchase Dinos. While there are just two different species: the T-Rex and the Triceratops, they are available in a variety of colors including once with a rather familiar head of hair. See below for prices.
happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur
happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur
happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur
happy pets dinosaur     happy pets dinosaur        

    White Triceratops - 37,795 Coins
    White T-Rex - 37,795 Coins
    Grey Triceratops - 39,795 Coins
    Grey T-Rex - 39,795 Coins
    Brown Triceratops - 41,795 Coins
    Brown T-Rex - 41,795 Coins
    Red Triceratops - 58 Facebook Credits
    Red T-Rex - 58 Facebook Credits
    Black Triceratops - 38 Facebook Credits
    Black T-Rex - 38 Facebook Credis
    Teal Triceratops - 68 Facebook Credits
    Teal T-Rex - 68 Facebook Credits
    Mr. T-Rex - 52 Facebook Credits (We had a chuckle when we saw Mr. T-Rex sporting Mr. T's famous hairstyle.)


I think the dinosaurs make for a pretty swell addition to Happy Pets. It's definitely worth making the effort to finish the Dino Den just because in the end, it's all free! Sure it'll take a little effort, but imagine having a T-Rex stomping around, blowing fire among your dogs and cats. Crazy stuff. Head over to Happy Pets to check it out for yourself.

Click here to play Happy Pets>

Mafia Wars Mystery Animals: Add more fearsome friends to your arsenal

Mafia Wars just released Mystery Animals that you can send and receive from friends. As you may be aware, animals have recently become increasingly important in everyone's favorite mobbed up Facebook game -- these critters are now part of your arsenal and the stronger the animals you have, the more powerful your family. See how these new Mystery Animals work after the jump. To send Mystery Animals to friends:

Head to the Free Gifts page and send Mystery Animals to your friends. Pretty simple!

mafia wars mystery animal

To snag your own Mystery Animals:

Head to your Facebook wall and when a friend sends you a Mystery Animal, click the Retrieve Mystery Animal button.

mystery animals

That will load the game, and in the homepage, you'll see a small window that says Retrieve animal (this kind of works like the Mystery Bags). Click 'Open It' and...

mafia wars mystery animal

... a pop-up window will let you know which animal you successfully retrieved.



Which Mystery Animals have you received so far? Leave a note in the comments below.
(AND, if you have images of your Mystery Animal, please send them to libe@games.com, and I'll feature them here with your name! Thanks!)

Mafia Wars Mystery Animals: See the complete collection *Spoilers*

The new Mafia Wars Mystery Animal collection will most likely have you hunting down a complete list of critters that can be added to your arsenal. See the entire lineup below. *Spoiler*


King Cheetah (rare)
21 Attack 42 Defense

Arabian Leopard (common)
20 Attack 16 Defense

Kangaroo (uncommon)
30 Attack 29 Defense

Electric Eel (uncommon)
36 Attack 20 Defense




Piranha (uncommon)
23 Attack 35 Defense

Badger (common)
17 Attack 19 Defense

Cassowary (common)
18 Attack 18 Defense

Dingo (common)
13 Attack 24 Defense

Buffalo (common)
25 Attack 12 Defense

Badger (common)
17 Attack 19 Defense

FarmVille iPhone version 1.01 crops up in the App Store

FarmVille for iPhone: You just downloaded it, now it's time to download the 1.01 update, which cropped up in the AppStore over the weekend. This new version doesn't introduce any big new changes to the game, just a handful of tweaks designed to fix some bugs that have been plaguing the portable farm game. You can download this update for your phone by clicking HERE or by visiting the Updates section in the App Store on your iPhone and downloading this patch from there.

Changes in the 1.01 update include the following:

    Fixes to allow farms to load faster
    General fixes to prevent crashes
    Improvements to sending gifts
    Fix for plots that get misaligned after plowing
    Fixes to reduce out of sync issues

Ultimate Fourth of July Guide for FarmVille, Mafia Wars and more

The Fourth of July is right around the corner, and you can bet your firecrackers that FarmVille, Mafia Wars and the rest of the big games on Facebook will release special items and events in celebration of this major holiday. Games.com - The Blog! will be compiling all of those special holiday items/events in this post, so check back here soon for a complete list.

For readers who do not live in the U.S., here's the low-down on this American holiday from Wikipedia:

"In the United States, Independence Day, commonly known as the Fourth of July, is a federal holiday commemorating the adoption of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, declaring independence from the Kingdom of Great Britain. Independence Day is commonly associated with fireworks, parades, barbecues, carnivals, fairs, picnics, concerts, baseball games, political speeches and ceremonies, and various other public and private events celebrating the history, government, and traditions of the United States. Independence Day is the national day of the United States."

FrontierVille
FrontierVille celebrates Independence Day with Firecracker, Liberty Bell
FrontierVille Liberty Cherry trees available for limited time
FrontierVille Independence Day Collection rings in the holiday weekend

FarmVille
New FarmVille decorations and free gifts: Celebrate Fourth of July with fireworks!

Pet Society
Pet Society rolls out Fourth of July items and clearance sale

Cafe World
Cafe World: Celebrate Fourth of July with Sizzling Summer Decor

Mafia Wars
Mafia Wars Fourth of July sale includes five limited edition items
Mafia Wars Fourth of July sale incentives: Elvis impersonator and more

Treasure Isle
Treasure Isle flags return in time for Fourth of July

YoVille
YoVille Fourth of July Fireworks now available
YoVille releases new July 4th items
YoVille Fourth of July items added to the clothing store

FishVille
FishVille creatures and decor flaunt Fourth of July flair

Zoo World
Zoo World celebrates 4th of July with collection game

Happy Pets
Happy Pets pretends Independence Day is Memorial Day

Hotel City
Hotel City lights up the sky with July 4th fireworks

How are you going to celebrate Fourth of July?

Flutter on Facebook takes us on a much-needed vacation from the farm

A few months ago, we wrote about a Facebook game called Flutter, where you steer a butterfly through the rainforest collecting honey dust, watering fruit trees, and customizing a home, aka the Grove, decorating with flowers, leaves and other forest critters. After several months in beta, the game has officially taken flight on Facebook, offering a big dose of creativity in a space that is inundated with me-too games.

Flutter takes mechanics found in other Facebook games -- harvest, collecting and social interaction- and mixes them in with basic adventuring and puzzle solving in a natural environment. Start the game by steering your butterfly through the forest, picking up Honey Dew (the game's virtual currency) floating in the air, stopping to open flowerbeds for Honey Dew and XP and harvesting water, which is used to make flowers and fruit tree grow. There are also seed chests that include mystery items inside and potions that can speed up growth and increase your luck. You can explore on your own, and once you're ready, start picking up quests that keep the game moving forward.
flutter tips
The social components of the game tread on more familiar ground -- visit friends' groves and harvest a social flower that grows by 50 Honey Dew every day a friend logs in. Please note that at the time of this writing, the game was not allowing me to invite fellow Facebookers to play the game with me, so I will loop back on this once that's up and running.

Flutter will have regular chapter updates that will introduce new species, plants, decorations and challenges, and -- as of right now -- there is no way to use real-life cash to purchase extra Honey Dew in the game -- though I'm sure that will be arriving soon enough.

My biggest complaint about the game is less about its unfinished state, and more about the tutorial. Since Flutter isn't just another farm or pet simulation game, it's not immediately clear what you're supposed to do. The tutorial starts out strong and then kind of peters out at some point, which left me twisting in the wind while trying to figure out what to do next. After flitting around the forest for a while (and consulting the Flutter mini-site), I eventually started to figure it out on my own.

Despite any potential confusion, Flutter is still worth taking the time to play The entire game is rendered beautifully with a lush forest setting and spa-like music in the background, and once I started playing, words like 'artful' and 'clever' kept popping into my head -- not terms I usually associate with the standard Facebook fare. Just like the similarly nature-themed 'Flower' gave PlayStation 3 gamers a break from gunning down bad guys, this rainforest game will provide you with a much needed vacation from planting and plowing your virtual farm.

Play Flutter on Facebook Now >

Inception 'Mind Crime': Play the mind-blowing movie game on Facebook

Nearly everyone has heard of Christopher Nolan's Inception (2010) at this point, but I'm willing to bet that most of Facebook's gaming audience were in the dark on Mind Crime, a Facebook advergame created by Escalation Studios to promote the film. It's also one of the most ambitious and lovingly executed advergame projects I've seen since The Expendables: 8 Bit Game of last month.
Inception Mind Crime Facebook game for the movie
Non-casual gamers have noted how Nolan's movie feels very much like a video game, with its fantastically surreal visuals, carefully delineated rules, complex levels, and action sequences. Moreover, the relationship between Leonardo DiCaprio's character and his wife reminds players of the Japanese survival horror game, Silent Hill 2. (Some even go as far to claim that the wife is a female Pyramid Head.) So it must come as quite the surprise to know that an Inception movie game was around since last spring, on Facebook the past month, and even on the Android phone, but there's been no word of game plans set for any consoles or PC release.
Inception Mind Crime Facebook game
You don't need to know anything about the film to enjoy the game. What the game first does though, is put you in the role of the Architect, where you'll design a maze from which a 3-D dream city will blossom (see YouTube clip here or above). You're then dropped into the maze, where you must fight your way out, retrieve items or assets, and avoid the enemy projections. Easter eggs, such as posters, trailers, and production photos, are rewarded to persistent players.

You can get a tour of the action in this video from Nolan Fans. As you can see, it's pretty sophisticated for a Facebook title, and totally not your usual point-and-click operation. Because of this, I highly recommend you read the game instructions.
Inception Mind Crime asks you if you want to Facebook Connect to play as Extractor
Using Facebook, you can share your maze designs, play on mazes designed by other people, and participate in the high score leaderboard.

To play, access the game via its official website, or on the Facebook page.

NOTE: You'll first need to have the Unity Web Player, a browser plug-in that'll enable the game to run in 3-D. It's a pretty simple deal though. Just click Install, Run, then Finish. Launching the game will make it ask you to download the plug-in, so it's a no-brainer.

Why 400,000 players weren't enough to save Street Racing

With social game mega-publisher Zynga recently deciding that hundreds of thousands of players apparently aren't enough to sustain games like Roller Coaster Kingdom, Ponzi Inc. and Street Racing, we've been wondering: How big does a game have to be, exactly, to justify its existence to Zynga. The answer, apparently, is pretty big, as industry expert Nicholas Lovell discusses over at Develop.

Lovell goes through some back-of-the-envelope calculations to estimate just how much a game like Street Racing brings in from players, and how much it costs Zynga to maintain. At first glance, the inflows seem pretty healthy -- if even two percent of players are paying an average of $15 a month on the game, Zynga is bringing in a cool $1.5 million a year.

But one-and-a-half million dollars doesn't go as far as you'd think. To keep the game going, Zynga not only has to hire developers (which can easily eat up over $95,000 a pop annually) but also spend money on marketing, customer acquisition, servers and infrastructure. Lovell estimates these costs could easily exceed $1.5 million a year for a company like Zynga.

Even if a smaller game makes a small profit, though, Lovell argues that those resources might not be worth the opportunity cost to Zynga. After all, why sink millions of dollars into a tiny game like Street Racing when that money could help pump up games like Farmville and Frontierville -- games that easily bring in tens of millions of dollars every year.

In other words, sometimes you have to prune the social gaming weeds in order to afford fertilizer for the social gaming flowers. Or something.

Square Enix engaged in "exploration" of social games business

Japanese mega-publisher Square Enix is best known for sprawling, story-filled single-player RPGs like those in the Final Fantasy series. So it's a bit surprising that the company is reportedly looking into the relatively confined, story-free area of social games as a way to expand.

"There's a lot of exploration that we're doing in terms of social media, and social games," Square Enix new U.S. president and CEO Mike Fischer told Gamasutra in a recent interview. Without going into details on specific projects, Fischer seemed very bullish on the new opportunities offered by social and online gaming. "You talk to the video game industry, and this is all upside," he said. "You can now add DLC revenue to our retail sales, we can now bring online subscriptions into play, we can make new money from social networking. It's such a positive, optimistic view."

Fischer is even optimistic that Square Enix's experience with epic RPGs might actually help the company in the more self-contained social gaming arena. "There's a storytelling component that is continuing to become more important [in social games] over time," Fischer said. "I think that gives us a very strategic advantage." Fischer also noted that the company has experience catering to female players through games like Final Fantasy. "If you look at the people that are playing Facebook games or iPhone games, you see more of the 50-50 gender mix," he said. "I think that speaks to the opportunity to grow our audience."

Source

Facebook stats glitch highlights need for independent stat reporting

Cafe World had been sitting comfortably at around 20 million monthly users for the entire month of July. So it was a bit of a surprise when Facebook's public statistics (as reported by AppData) showed the game's user base shooting up 75% over a period of three days, to a high of over 35 million monthly players at the end of the month. The change wasn't limited to Cafe World either -- dozens of games saw stratospheric increases in the same period.

Facebook eventually confirmed to Inside Social Games that the sudden increases were due to a bug in their reporting. But this temporary problem highlights the risk of trusting Facebook to report on the success of its own games without independent verification.

Facebook gaming stats aren't just a fun way to monitor the popularity of your favorite social games. For the companies that make the games, these stats provide an important public barometer of their success. As Gamezebo's Joel Brodie points out, "Game companies are trying to go public, sell out, and raise money based on these numbers. Many of the great financial minds on Wall Street and Sand Hill Road who are paid big bucks to analyze these numbers take them for face value."

But it's hard to rely on those numbers if they're going to be constantly buffeted by bugs and changes in methodology. Furthermore, it's a bit strange that we trust Facebook to self-report these important statistics when it's clearly in their self-interest to inflate the numbers. It's like letting NBC report how many people watched The Office last week, instead of trusting ratings agencies like Nielsen with that information."
Brodie suggests any "attempt by Facebook to change how game traffic is measured on their network without fixing the actual problem ... could grow into their very own private Antennagate." But that presumes we'd be able to notice and report on any such change. With Facebook in total control of the statistics, we're forced to take their statistics at face value. Absent some patently ridiculous trends (like those shown by this latest bug) Facebook could gently nudge their gaming numbers up and no one would be the wiser.

The solution, as I see it, is some sort of independent verification for these Facebook-reported numbers. I don't mean Facebook should open up their private database to some auditor. I simply mean some sort of third party company should estimate the popularity of individual Facebook games independently, either through surveys or through user tracking software. These estimates would theoretically be less precise than Facebook's own numbers (if Facebook is being truthful, that is) but they'd at least provide a point of comparison to establish trust in Facebook's publicly reported numbers.

There are plenty of companies well-positioned to take this important market role. Nielsen already conducts surveys on internet usage, and companies like Alexa already track usage of thousands of web users through their toolbar. It's time one of these companies stepped up and gave us the third-party statistics we need.

Playfish wants you to name the Pirates Ahoy mascot

You knPirates Ahoy Logoow that parrot that stands just under the logo of Pirates Ahoy, spy glass in hand? Apparently, Playfish feels that it deserves a name. Why? We have no idea.

Not to mention that the company mentions no reward to the winning name nor does the survey record names or e-mail addresses. We can only imagine Playfish is trying to increase the strength of its Pirates Ahoy brand, but at an impressive 6.8 million users we seriously doubt naming a parrot is going to change much. To put things into perspective, Zynga's FarmVille boasts a massive 61.7 million users and its unofficial duck mascot is still nameless.

Want to have a part in naming the mascot of your favorite swashbuckling adventure game? Head on over to the survey page and think up your most fitting name. We like the sound of "First Mate Squawksalot," but we we're no marketing pros.

Mortal Kiss lets tweens get their vamp on this fall

Mortal Kiss Loading page
Considering Zynga's Vampire Wars is home to 2.3 million users and the success of the "Twilight" series, we can safely say this vampire craze has surpassed "fad" status. Publisher Random House has teamed up with social gaming website Stardoll to get their slice of the bloody pie with an interactive story titled "Mortal Kiss."

Starting today, eight chapters of "Mortal Kiss" will be released over the eight weeks until Halloween when the final chapter will be revealed on the biggest day of the year for vamp fans. Stardoll, a social gaming website geared towards teenage girls, will allow users to vote on the outcome of key moments in the story and discuss major plot points as they happen.
Mortal Kiss Home Page
The project goes even deeper (and more capitalizing) than that with items inspired by the story available for purchase in the Stardoll store with virtual currency. With offerings like that, you could have bet your Stephanie Meyer-signed copy of "Eclipse" that this story will be localized in 17 languages around the world.

The story is currently free, but both parties are looking into advertising, e-book editions and subscriptions, said executive vice president of Stardoll Chris Seth.

"Anything that drives engagement and usage on Stardoll will ultimately deliver monetization as well, and there are multiple routes to realizing that," Seth added. "We're a social media business but in some ways we are also an old-fashioned content business, and we have been surprised by the popularity of books in the lives of teens and tweens."

According to The Guardian, Stardoll had 13.8 million users in August, which will prove to be a hotbed for fans of what Random House licensing publisher Fiona MacMillian calls "paranormal romance." If this interactive story model of social gaming takes off, things could get much deeper in the social game space.

NY Jets' Facebook game Ultimate Fan goes head-to-head against Madden (and loses)

Want a place other than the ESPN.com chat rooms to broadcast how much you love football? The New York Jets, with the help of New York-based social game developer Arkadium, want to welcome you into a new home for football fans, Ultimate Fan for Facebook.

The game begins with you choosing your favorite team and pits your pick against with the team it's slated to play next in the NFL season in a game of "Boost" -- essentially a poll that can be revisited every six hours. The team with the most Boost wins, though it's hard to say what happens other than proof that said team has more fans.
Ultimate Fan Match

Since this game doesn't seem to have any real consequences or rewards, we can't say what happens after a team wins more favor than the other. Fans of the winning team will receive Fan Points (think experience points) and Tickets, the game's main currency, which can be used to buy items for a virtual tailgating party. Some examples of items you might buy include drinks, snacks, hotdog cart, lounge chair, an inflatable pool -- pretty much anything you need to make your tailgating party over the top. Users can rate each others' tailgate parties, which increase both users' Fan Points so that they can pimp out their parking lot parties even more.

ultimate fan on facebook


Ultimate Fan's biggest draw will most likely be the Prediction feature that allows players to guess the outcome of the NFL season games (down to final score) for Fan Points. EA Sports' Madden NFL Superstars on Facebook also has a similar prediction feature, which will (if FIFA Superstars was any indication) grow more popular as the football season continues.

Ulitmate Fan Precidtions

While Ultimate Fan does a good job with building team pride and good-natured competition among NFL fanboys, we'd still like to see more of a 'game' evolve, especially in the Boost voting experience. If you're looking for a more robust football experience, we'd recommend EA Sports' Madden NFL Superstars, which has many similar features and gives you the chance to test you skills managing a football team, which, IMHO, is a helluva lot more fun than manning your own virtual tailgate party.

Play Ultimate Fan on Facebook >

The Bible Online enters beta testing, but would you play it?

Contrary to what many of our strict, Catholic upbringings have taught us, it's alright to play video games. German browser game developer FIAA wants to bring the faithful into the beautiful world of gaming with The Bible Online.

While not the first of its kind, The Bible Online is unique in that it's a MMO with real-time strategy elements. Most Bible-themed games are strictly educational, so this is an interesting turn for the sub-genre. The game follows the first book of the Bible, Genesis, and the lives of the original followers of God, Abraham and his descendants. But FIAA takes a much more historical approach to the story with The Bible Online.
The Bible Online gameplay
After creating your custom character from a selection of avatar portraits and username, you'll enter the world and complete a series of tutorial quests that introduce to the main mechanics of the game. While you won't assume the role of the Holy Book's protagonists, what you do will help those figures lead your people to the Promised Land.

To bring your tribe into supremacy and guarantee its safe passage through the Exodus, you'll have to do battle other players' tribes over the land's limited resources of minerals, wood, clay and grain. Your settlement will have to be as equipped to worship as it is to do battle, so barracks with a varied military are a must. With the balance between resource management and procurement as well as settlement building, think of The Bible Online as a less complex (and less enduring) Total War with a heavy focus on multiplayer competition and persistence.

Considering the length of the Bible, the game would have an extremely long lifespan. And you have to agree that the game's final patch, Revelation, would be pretty epic. However, what do you think of a game like this being on Facebook? Would you rather play through a different theology? Let us know in the comments below.

The Bible Online: Would you play this on Facebook?

Yoville: New Romantic Clothing for ladies and gents arrive

New Romantic Clothes YoVille: Gentlemen
New Romantic clothes have arrived to YoVille perfect for any formal occasion. Romantic dress, hair bows, gloves, and heels available to ladies in blue, pink, and purple. Available to gentleman are hats, canes, and suits in blue, red and yellow.

New Romantic Clothes YoVille: Gentlemen
New Romantic Clothes YoVille: Ladies
New Romantic Clothes YoVille: Ladies
This article originally appeared on YoVille Lounge.

Treasure Isle donates to Gulf Coast Recovery in Otters

Zynga has teamed up with the National Audubon Society to launch a new effort to save the Gulf Coast. The last time both organizations formed this partnership was with Charity Pets in YoVille. Now a very similar campaign is being held as "Coastal Critters" in Treasure Isle.

This means that for the next 8 days, there will be a Limited Edition Sea Otter in the Animals section of the Treasure Isle store. This Sea Otter differs from the one shown in the game's news page. Instead of a baby otter snuggling on its parent's belly, the one at the store sports a pink sea shell.

Nevertheless, Zynga has pledged that all money coming from the sale of this otter will belong to Audubon. Each otter costs 40 Island Cash, or the rough equivalent of $8.00 USD (since the game is currently having a 10% discount).
Treasure Isle Coastal Critters
Update: Treasure Isle's pledge amount drops from 100% to 50% on the game's official Facebook fanpage, while the Island Cash discount jumps from 10% to 30% off in-game. Shortly after, Zynga keeps the discount, but retracts the pledge drop.

Treasure Isle does a flip-flop on its Audubon pledge to the Gulf

Treasure Isle changes Audubon pledge to 50%
About two hours after Zynga announced their Coastal Critters donation campaign for the National Audubon Society in Treasure Isle, an announcement to the wall of the game's official Facebook fanpage came up that angered some fans. This is because the original announcement -- and there's proof of it in all the campaign artwork -- said that Zynga was going to donate 100% to Audubon, but the Facebook notice says they're only going to donate 50%!
Treasure Isle Island Cash 30% discount
Moreover, Zynga has increased their discount of Island Cash from 10% to 30%, and while the cost of the Coastal Critter Sea Otter remains at 40 Island Cash, its real world cost has dropped to about $6.00 USD. Lowering the actual value of Island Cash, while maintaining the virtual price would certainly encourage more people to donate. Did Zynga realize that their Coastal Critters idea was going to be a hit and wanted in on the proceeds?
Treasure Isle emphasizes their pledge of 100% again
Zynga has since deleted the initial post on Facebook, and put up a new one emphasizing to folks that they're behind their 100% giveaway, all the way! Not that it's going to stop people from complaining on whether this was a deliberate whoopsie on their part, but if you were confused about how much Zynga actually planned on donating, you now know the score.

FarmVille Sneak Peek: Autumn leaves chase off Germany for Caramel Apple Gnomes

FarmVille Caramel Apple Tree and Caramel Apple Gnome
You know what they say, the FarmVille Caramel Apple Gnome sure doesn't fall far from the Caramel Apple Tree. Alright, so that didn't make a lick of sense, but what sense can you make out of a Caramel Apple Gnome, anyway? Other than that it's cute, and perfect for your FarmVille gnome collection!
FarmVille German Castle, German Castle Ruins, Fall Fence, Fall Gnome, Swan Lake
But that's not all, as a Fall Leaves Gnome with a rake, is also in the works. But from the look of the German Castle Ruins, that gnome's been slacking off. That German Castle Ruins also doesn't look very German. Or at least, it's not as German as the German Castle, which sports little German flags on its towers. To corral off this bunch of upcoming goods, there's the pumpkin-adorned Fall Fence, and Swan Lake, which is more Russian than German in its origins, but one can still make an argument out of it, if you're enough of a literary nerd.

FarmVille Orange Butterfly and Wax Apple Tree Appearing in Mystery Eggs

FarmVille Orange Butterfly and Wax Apple Tree Appearing in Mystery Eggs
FarmVille updated the Mystery Eggs with some new prizes including an Orange Butterfly and a Wax Apple Tree! Most farmers like FarmVille Freak Jens Troger and David LowMiller are reporting that they have received these prizes in Gold Mystery Eggs and Rhode Island Mystery Eggs.

Have you received any new prizes in your Mystery Eggs?

This article originally appeared on FarmVille Freak.

Play Happy Pets on October 4 and get a Giant Blue Hamster

Happy Pets is having a large giveaway, and all you need to do in order to participate is play the game on October 4th. Everyone who logs into Happy Pets between 12 and 2pm Pacific Daylight Time that day will get a free Giant Blue Hamster. Unfortunately, this is right smack in the middle of the day, so those of you who will be at work will be sorely disappointed.

It's clear that Crowdstar is trying to do some load testing to see how many players they can support at one time. Either that, or they are really trying to boost their activity numbers for that day. We don't really care, so long as we benefit with free things!

Facebook and Apple better watch out for Nintendo 3DS' social features

Nintendo has been the most successful of the Big Three--the others being Sony and Microsoft--this time around in both gaming consoles and handhelds, but the company claims that it's more threatened by Apple's iPhone and Facebook games like FarmVille. But have no fear, the 3DS is here... in March, Nintendo's hopeful ace in the hole. And while the 3DS' flagship feature is obviously 3D without the glasses, Nintendo thinks that the system's social features like StreetPass will be what puts the dual-screen handheld ahead of the rest, the Wall Street Journal reports.

StreetPass is a feature that will allow 3DS systems to communicate, exchanging player and game data, even when they're dormant. Not to mention that it will allow gamers--complete strangers even--to play with one another, but there's a catch: WiFi.

Yep, the 3DS' StreetPass only works while in a WiFi hot spot, according to WSJ. Granted that will work beautifully in densely populated areas like Tokyo, but what about middle America, Canada or Europe? Even the most crowded cities in the U.S. aren't up to speed with nations like Japan and Korea when it comes to wireless Internet access. While 3G connectivity is an option, either players would have to pay a monthly fee much like Xbox LIVE or Nintendo would be forced to jack the price up well beyond the expected $250 to $300 for permanent 3G access (similar to the Amazon Kindle option). The company has already expressed its disinterest in forcing its customers to pay a monthly fee, so why the confidence?

Could Nintendo have another solution up its sleeve to compete the unchecked growth of social games and the mobile games renaissance? According to WSJ, its current plan is to add more WiFi hot spots for the 3DS to communicate with--but all over the globe? (We doubt it.) Could Nintendo even hope to compete with the mobile and social gaming titans with StreetPass? Only time will tell, but this is Nintendo we're talking about, so who knows what they might be cooking up. In other words, best be on your toes, Zynga and Apple.

Happy Pets' giant pets will terrorize your guests this Halloween

While it's beginning to seem as if CrowdStar might be labeling otherwise normal Happy Pets releases as "Halloween" items just for the sake of doing so, we're willing to give the developer the benefit of the doubt with this new release of Monster Invasion pets.

These pets are humongous, gigantic, and every other word meaning "large." There are five to choose from in all: Gigante Guinea Pig, Mother of All Ferret, Monster Legend Dragon, Monster Fable Dragon, and Monster Mythic Dragon.

The differences between the three dragons are the colors uses to create them. Each pet is multi-colored, so it's just a matter of picking the color pair that you like. Likewise, all five pets share the same price, at 70 Facebook Credits, the equivalent of $7.00 US.

Whether or not you consider these pets to be true Halloween items is up to you, but regardless of that, if you'd like to pick any of them up, make sure to do so fast, as these pets are limited edition and are currently available only in quantities of 500-1200 units each.

FarmVille: New giftable Halloween Black Rose seeds

The Halloween fun keeps on rolling in FarmVille. A new exclusive crop was released that will only be around for the Halloween season -- the Black Rose. Ironically, this rose isn't actually black, it's more of a navy blue that will, IMHO, look beautiful on your farm.

But, like all good things, you'll have to work to get these roses. The seeds can only be acquired by requesting them from friends, or buying them with Farm Cash them in packages of 20 (they cost 2 $FC each).

farmville black rose seeds market

Black Roses can be mastered, and they give out 100 coins and 2 XP after an eight-hour maturation time.

farmville black rose fully grown

The Black Rose seeds are available on the Free Gift page to send to friends, or you can request them directly from the Market. This will send a message to the friends that you choose, and they can click to instantly send you seeds back. Black Roses will be available to plant through November 17.

FarmVille Black Witch Cat free with any Farm Cash purchase

Zynga really wants you to purchase Farm Cash in FarmVille. How do we know this? Simple - in a new promotion, Zynga is now offering yet another free item to users who make a purchase for Farm Cash.

The next time you login to FarmVille, you may see a pop-up like the one above, offering a free Black Witch Cat with any Farm Cash purchase. As of this writing, the Black Witch Cat is unable to purchase from the game's store, and we're guessing that that's the way it will remain. After all, what better way to entice users to purchase Farm Cash than to reward them with an item that can only be earned through a purchase? Note: Turns out that exclusivity really wasn't, as Zynga has released the item in store for Farm Cash.

If you'd like one of these Halloween kitties, but don't necessarily care about the color you receive, remember that if you own an iPhone/iPad, you can purchase the exclusive White Witch Cat - it's the same animal, only white, and with a purple hat, rather than black.

Mall Dreams releases Haunted House and other buildings

Ravenwood Fair is one the fastest growing games on Facebook, with over a million players joining this cute and cuddly game since it launched earlier this month. While we've already brought you news concerning its Halloween themed decorations, games and buildings, today new costumes have been added to the mix, allowing you to give your in-game avatar a spooky touch to fit right in with the rest of the theme!

The costumes available are the Ghost, Mummy and Skeleton, and each is available for both girl or boy avatars. The costumes range in price from 19 to 59 Facebook Credits, or from around $2.00 to $6.00 US.

To change the look of your forest critter, simply click on them and click on the "Makeover" button, but do it fast! We're assuming these costumes won't be around for much longer.
Mall Dreams has over a million players now, so some of you out there must have been sitting back waiting for more Halloween items. So far, we've only seen a few gift options with no real good in-store items to purchase. Today, Mall Dreams has released a Haunted House in the store that is big, animated, and sure to bring in some scares. The Haunted House costs 1,800 coins, but if you're not yet level 19 you can purchase it for 19 Facebook Credits. It is a 5x5 building, so it's fairly substantial in size and gives out 260 coins.

In addition to the Halloween spookhouse, four new buildings were also released today. The Knack Store is an obvious homage to the Apple Stores nationwide, showing an image of a pear with a bite out of the side. It costs 800 coins, requires level 18, and gives out 240 coins. The Basketball Plaza is 1,100 coins and requires level 21. It gives out 280 coins for collecting from it. The High Steaks building looks to be a butcher shop, and if you're level 24 you can purchase it for 2,850 coins. Finally, the Dr. Nice's Drugstore is the best place to cure your ailments at 65 coins to own it.

Market Street: Toy Story 3 items invade your store

Playdom was acquired by Disney several months back, and aside from a promotion in Social City in September, we haven't seen much of the Disney intellectual property popping up in Playdom games. Today, a Toy Story 3 promotion has started in Market Street, giving players the opinion to make and sell toys and decorate their store with recognizable characters from the movie.

Your store can now be decorated with Toy Story 3 signs, and depictions of characters like Woody, Buzz Lightyear, Andy, and more. There are tons of toys for purchase, like the dinosaur, piggy bank, wagon, toy box, and soldier sign. Toy Story 3 has been out on DVD now for a short amount of time, and it looks like they're hoping that this promotion in game will provide mutual benefits for the movie and the game.

Market Street has been on a slow decline, having peaked at just over 9 million monthly active players and is now down around 3.3 million. That's still a fair number for sure, but they do seem to be heading on a downward trend. Could using familiar Disney branding bring back the spark in some of the Playdom games that's been causing a decline? Time will tell.

Cafe Life releases new decor in time for Thanksgiving

Cafe Life released a large set of new decorations and desserts for Thanksgiving already earlier in the month, but they're back for round two with another few items to add to the collection. This time, these items aren't all Thanksgiving-themed, but they're still promoting them as if they'll make great additions for your Thanksgiving feast. We're not going to complain about new items, even if some of these don't feel particularly festive.

The biggest addition is the two new stoves which were added to the game. The Wrought Iron stove is animated with a beautiful fire inside, which makes it the perfect cozy stove for a chilly fall evening. It costs 40 Facebook Credits, making it the only stove that costs real money at this time. The second new stove is the 50's White stove (shown to the right) which looks like a basic stove and luckily only costs 4,000 coins. For functional items, there is also a new Orange Espresso Maker, which costs 30 Facebook Credits (or about $3.00 USD).

For decorations, we have the new Olive Velvet Chair and the White Wooden Bench, priced at 15 Facebook Credits and 7,500 coins. The Fall Lantern and Fruit Harvest are both 15 Facebook Credits. There are two new wallpapers, the Golden Leaves wall at 2,000 coins, and the Festive Leaves wall at 1 Facebook Credit. There are also two new flooring options, the Dark Oak Hardwood at 3,000 coins, and the Ground at 400 coins.

All in all, this is a nice sized set of additions to the Thanksgiving theme that is already well underway in Cafe Life.

Baking Life introduces a new way to pay with Zip Cash

Baking Life Zip Cash
Baking Life has changed today from just using Facebook Credits for buying premium currency items, to now using Zip Cash instead. While this might seem like a huge change, it will be fairly transparent for players because Zip Cash can only be purchased with Facebook Credits. Zip Cash is named for the game's developer, ZipZapPlay.

Zip Cash is priced at what seems like a reasonable price, and the official Zip Cash FAQ does state that prices haven't changed for items. As an introductory perk, Baking Life have given all players 5 free Zip Cash, which is actually enough to buy some of the cheaper items in the game.

Baking Life are not the first game to do this. Nightclub City, in fact, just migrated over to their own currency a few weeks back. Why do developers do this? Well, the answer is pretty simple. When a game uses Facebook Credits, the official currency controlled by Facebook, they don't have much control over it. They cannot give out free Facebook Credits, similar to the way FarmVille might give out Farm Cash in Mystery Boxes or while leveling up. Having your own interim currency means that Baking Life can now give out Zip Cash whenever they want and it will benefit players. It does mean that if you convert your Facebook Credits into Zip Cash, you will only be able to spend them in Baking Life and not your other favorite Facebook games.

Cafe World Thanksgiving decorations have arrived

Cafe World already has the Thanksgiving catering order and the Turkey Deep Fryer, and now the rest of the decorations have finally made it to the game. We were wondering when we'd be able to turn our cafe into a haven for turkeys and pilgrims. We're in luck, because this is a fairly large collection of great items that are pretty unique from other games. Let's take a peek at the list of items available in the game as we speak.

Thanksgiving Dinner - 15 Cafe Cash, animated
Cornucopia - 3 Cafe Cash
Apple Cider Brewery - 5 Cafe Cash
Little Fox - 6 Cafe Cash
Happy Scarecrow - 13 Cafe Cash
Crazy Turkey - 14 Cafe Cash
Pile of Leaves - 14 Cafe Cash
Squirrel Autumn Tree - 15 Cafe Cash
Turkey Basket - 5,000 coins
Pumpkin Patch - 14,000 coins
Ship in Bottle - 15,000 coins
Pilgrim Statues - 20,000 coins
Stuffed Uncle -30,000 coins
Turkey Chair - 1 Cafe Cash
Rocking Chair - 2 Cafe Cash
Turkey Door - 2 Cafe Cash
Autumn Window - 10 Cafe Cash
Autumn Floor - 1 Cafe Cash
Autumn Wall - 1 Cafe Cash
Thanksgiving Wall - 120 coins

These items will undoubtedly only be available until just after the Thanksgiving holiday, which is next Thursday. We're sure they'll give us a few more days afterwards, but these fall items will have to make room for Christmas items at some point.

Ooh la la! French Week is here in Millionaire City

Millionaire City loves to have week long themes, and this next one is sure to please anyone who loves romantic locations with beautiful architecture and delicious food and desserts. French Week is the next major theme in Millionaire City, and today debuted five new items to kick the whole thing off.

There are two new French houses available. The first is La Maisonnette, which requires level 18 to buy. The second is the Parisian Town House, which is locked until level 21. There are also two new items for decoration, the Art Nouveau Lamp and the famous Moulin Rouge. Finally, there is a new commerce available in the form of the Louvre Museum, which requires level 30.

These items do all state that they'll be around for another 13 days, so it would seem that this French Week is actually "French Almost Two Weeks" but we don't mind. It's fun to have something new and exciting to look forward to each week. Hopefully the next few French items will bring something that everyone can enjoy and get excited about.

Ooh la la! French Week is here in Millionaire City

Millionaire City loves to have week long themes, and this next one is sure to please anyone who loves romantic locations with beautiful architecture and delicious food and desserts. French Week is the next major theme in Millionaire City, and today debuted five new items to kick the whole thing off.

There are two new French houses available. The first is La Maisonnette, which requires level 18 to buy. The second is the Parisian Town House, which is locked until level 21. There are also two new items for decoration, the Art Nouveau Lamp and the famous Moulin Rouge. Finally, there is a new commerce available in the form of the Louvre Museum, which requires level 30.

These items do all state that they'll be around for another 13 days, so it would seem that this French Week is actually "French Almost Two Weeks" but we don't mind. It's fun to have something new and exciting to look forward to each week. Hopefully the next few French items will bring something that everyone can enjoy and get excited about.

City of Wonder Marketplace: Profit off of your friends for surplus goods

In the wake of the Atomic Age in City of Wonder, Playdom has added a fitting feature: Mercantilism. Researching this new school of economic thought commonly known as ripping people off is simple enough. Just research Trade when you reach Level 7, then research Mercantilism at Level 8 and, just like that, you're on your way to becoming a master merchant.

The research unlocks a functional building called The Marketplace, which has a giant golden coin on the roof so your friends can't miss is. And that's extremely important. When players visit each others' cities and that city happens to have a Marketplace, they can buy Surplus Goods from that player's Marketplace at a randomly fluctuating price. These Surplus Goods can drop randomly when you collect from production contracts in the form of Rubies, Tulips, Lumber and Steel.

These Goods will sit in your Marketplace and randomly rise and fall in value daily, but you will only collect profits if you manually do so each day. The idea is to search around for the best prices in Surplus Goods each day while making sure your Marketplace is chock full of them as often as possible. OK, we know, real trade doesn't work like this, but sometimes you just gotta' say, "It's just a game." Besides, don't complain about free--you'll scare it away.

Mafia Wars Holiday Traffic Mission: Everything you need to know

Holiday Traffic
Mafia Wars is a pretty dark game, so it would only make sense that it reflects on the darker side of the holidays with the limited time "Holiday Traffic" Secret Mission. Zynga introduced this short event mission recently for only you and four friends to take on, which tasks your crew with taking advantage of the crazy holiday traffic. That's extremely vague, but we're going out on a limb a guessing it means murder and pillage for profit and glory.

If that sounds enticing to you, then take a look behind the break for a guide on this short-lived mission.

Mission Set up
To complete this mission you'll need the help of four friends to take over specific roles: a Driver, an Enforcer, a Sniper and a Fence. Remember, your friends' performance in these roles depends on their attributes, so choose wisely. Upon accepting the mission, you only have three days to complete it, so get crackin'.

Holiday Traffic Rewards
However, you're in it for the rewards, right? Well, there are quite a lot of items here to win, but even the rare drops are paltry at best compared to the items you can win in this weekend's gifting event, Serial Assassins. With common items like Traje de Balas only providing 10 Attack and 39 Defense and uncommon items like Injury Time packing a mere 38 Attack and 52 Defense, you'd think the Rare items would be seriously strong. Wrong. The first of the rare items, Roaring 20s, is a vehicle with 35 Attack and 62 Defense while the second is simply named Hippopotamus and provides 63 Attack and 43 Defense. Not exactly blowing me away, at least. Especially considering Secret Missions take far more coordination from fewer friends than gifting events. Whelp, at least it's something else to do this weekend. Just don't be too sad if you don't get a rare item--you're not missing much.

Zynga Poker Vegas Giveaway: Buy chips for a chance to win

It's the dream of every dedicated poker fan, isn't it? A chance to walk down The Strip, walk into any given casino and come out a winner. Well, that isn't guaranteed, but Zynga can at least guarantee you a chance to get there in the Vegas Giveaway Contest in Zynga Poker. As of right now, buying any amount of chips gets you three times the amount than normal and automatically enters you in the contest. Getting to Vegas is nice and all, but what's included?

How about a two-night stay for four in a Fantasy Suite at the Palms Resort? If thats' not enough, Zynga is also flying the winners there, carting them around in a limo, feeding them dinner at Simon and tossing them four tickets to a show. (It's not explained which show exactly, but don't assume this is a show of your choice.) Oh yeah, and the contest is only going on for one day, today. So, you might want to pick up some chips even if you don't play Zynga Poker just for the chance to win.

And don't forget, we here at Games.com is also giving away a five-day trip to Las Vegas for playing some Games.com Poker through Dec. 15. Why not play both and double your chances at finally stepping foot in Sin City?

Monty Python will introduce Facebook to something completely different

The Black Knight
Grab your holy hand grenades, because U.K. developer Zattikka has officially nabbed the license to create Monthy Python games on social networks. The first target will, of course, be Facebook. The game will reportedly honor all that is Monthy Python with the Monty Python team overseeing the project, especially Terry Gilliam, whose art style is said to be found throughout, according to Zattikka external producer Jim McDonagh.

"Knowing they are looking over our shoulder has inspired the entire team to create a game that will live up to the standards set by the Pythons themselves and delivers a fantastic experience for the fans," McDonagh says. More details will be given concerning the games this December, but Zattikka CEO Tim Chaney is already confident that Python's first game on Facebook will be a hit.

"By acquiring these rights we will be transporting Monty Python into the 21st Century, with a totally new experience for their unique comedy that will delight old and new fans alike," Chaney claims. "Forget Web 2.0, this is Python two point one and three quarters"

If this game somehow involves launching cows as siege weapons and killer rabbits, then there's no way this game could possibly fail. Stay tuned here for more details next month, because there is no way we're going to let this one slip past.