What's the deal with Farmville?

If you believe what a few of its 72 million worldwide players told USATODAY, the Facebook-based, virtual-reality social game offers a mild sense of escape, fosters a sort of virtual diligence (about tending one's virtual crops and farm animals), and encourages community and charity toward one's virtual neighbors (neighbors get "points and gold for scaring away pests, fertilizing or feeding chickens" on each other's land). Farmville wasn't always purely positive, of course (see "Social gaming cleaning up its act?"). Farmville's parent, San Francisco-based game developer Zynga, announced last fall it was banishing all "offer advertising" from its games (Farmville fans, have you seen any lately?), but they're something to watch out for in social games – those parasitical little offers that tricked players into ultimately paying "far more for in-game currency than if they just paid [the game itself] cash," TechCrunch reported. Just because Zynga supposedly got rid of it doesn't mean other developers did, so talk with your kids about "free" offers on phones and on the Web. [Meanwhile, SocialTimes.com reports that the BBC is getting into social gaming (looking at the iPhone, Facebook, and Nintendo Wii and DS platforms), having hired a new executive VP of games.]

Social gaming cleaning up its act?

Well, some social gaming companies, it appears. If you're not sure what's meant by "social gaming," you may've heard of Farmville, an extremely popular little game in Facebook. TechCrunch recently ran an exposé that called this gaming ecosystem "scamville" - great family-discussion fuel. He wrote that the games "try to get people to pay cash for in-game currency so they can level up faster and have a better overall experience. Which is fine. But for users who won’t pay cash, a wide variety of 'offers' [that get] them to pay far more for in-game currency than if they just paid cash (there are notable exceptions, but the scammy stuff tends to crowd out the legitimate offers)." A week later, TechCrunch reports, Farmville's parent, Zynga, has announced it will "remove all offer advertising from their games [right away]. This isn't a meaningless action. Offers account for 1/3 or so of Zynga's rumored $250 million in revenue." But social media – which is a blend of user-produced and professionally produced media – is all about lack of control by the companies that host it. So here's the tricky thing about this situation: Zynga itself can't control the offers or ad content in its games, its CEO Mark Pincus said, which is why it's just deleting them for now. Zynga also participated in the latest Online Safety & Technology Working Group meeting in Washington – an added sign that, like other corporate members, it believes that corporate responsibility ultimately pays off.

US teens' gaming highly social: Study

Digital gaming is virtually universal and very social among US teens, the Pew Internet & American Life Project found in a study it released today. "Fully 97% of teens [99% of boys and 94% of girls] ages 12-17 play computer, web, portable, or console games," Pew reports. As for the social aspect of digital gaming, 65% of teens play with other people in the room; 27% with people online; and 82% play games alone, but 71% of those also play with other people. "The gaming experience is rich and varied, with a significant amount of social interaction and potential for civic engagement," Pew says in its press release.

In other key findings, 80% play five or more types of games and 40% eight or more (e.g., racing, action, shooter, rhythm, puzzles). The respondents' top 5 games were, respectively, Guitar Hero, Halo 3, Madden NFL, Solitaire, and Dance Dance Revolution. "The average rating for teens’ favorite games is just above a Teen rating," and nearly "a third of teens play games that are listed as appropriate only for people older than they are," but the average game rating for all the teens surveyed was an E10+ rating." Ninety percent of parents say they always or sometimes know what games their kids play. As for civic engagement, this was an interesting observation by the authors: "Teens who take part in social interaction related to the game, such as commenting on websites or contributing to discussion boards, are more engaged civically and politically." "Computer games drive social ties" was the BBC's headline and "Can games make your kid a better citizen?" was MSNBC's.

Here comes social gaming

There's hearts, checkers, chess, Texas hold 'em, Dolphin Olympics, a form of Scrabble, and on and on. Which - if you're a game aficionado - can make the social Web a 24/7 party (it can also give young gamers 24/7 access to communities of players of all ages, but more on that in a moment).

"Online social gaming has been around for years, available on Yahoo and other sites. But its popularity is surging, piggybacking on the success of Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, and other social networks," the San Jose Mercury News reports. There are now business conferences gathering the corporate players and advertisers in the social gaming space. Kongregate.com alone has more then 4,500 games, the Merc adds, and "more than $30 million in venture funding has been invested in Silicon Valley start-ups that specialize in social games." This is distinct from the multibillion-dollar digital gaming industry dominated by Electronic Arts, Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft, it adds. The difference between social gaming and the "old" kind is that you're interacting with people, not software (multiplayer online games such as World of Warcraft-type worlds and the real-time chat of Xbox Live always did involve real-people contact). Interacting with people adds mostly fun and unpredictability but also an element of risk that gamers need to be alert to, if a game is associated with chat and other means of non-game communication with other players.

Social gaming, kid-style

Virtual worlds are social-gaming environments for kids, and they're multiplying like rabbits. The BBC calls this "boom time for virtual playgrounds." "Worlds" such as Webkinz.com, ZooKazoo.com, and ClubPenguin.com and services such as AddictingGames.com are "places where your children can interact with other children, and they are becoming a central part of the business plans of the people who make TV programs, toys and cereal," the New York Times reports.

Disney's newest world is "Dgamer," part virtual world and part social-networking site for kids, accessible via computer or Nintendo DS, the Washington Post reports. The Post says Dgamer gives parents a lot of control by allowing them to sign up for various levels: "At the most basic level, they can only message one another with preselected words and phrases. On higher levels, they are allowed more freedom, but there are filters for profanity." But the service is free, so it's not clear how parents could control kid workarounds. Dgamer joins Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean, Cars, and recently acquired ClubPenguin. "According to research firm eMarketer, 12 million kids between ages 3 and 17 will regularly access virtual worlds this year. The firm expects that figure to rise to 20 million by 2011."

Worlds to watch for

Coming in the next six months or so, according to the New York Times piece: Spore (which will be playable via computer, phone, or NintendoDS), BarbieGirls.com, World of Neopia (Neopets' world), LegoUniverse, and PixieHollow.com (to go with Disney's soon to be released animated film Tinker Bell).

Downsides & how to deal with them

There are many positives involved in online gaming, we see in the research: e.g., the collaborative action in World of Warcraft guilds, individual and collective strategic thinking, thinking under pressure, and the informal learning associated with group activity involving multiple ages.

But there are downsides too, usually associated with the real-time chat around online gaming. For example, Doof.com, a brand-new UK-based social-gaming site. Have its creators thought about what parents might think about their kids participating when they read this heading on its About page: "Connect with Friends and Strangers," under which is listed Doof's "Private Messages" feature?

With household rules or in family discussion, parents might consider advising their gamers to make sure that...

Chat sticks strictly to game-related topics, nothing personal

No private one-on-one chat with people unless about it's just about the game and they tell a parent about it

They turn off their headphones or stop chatting if the trash talk gets to be too much

They come talk to you if anyone starts getting too abusive or tries to get uncomfortably close or overly friendly.

Kids need to know that getting lots of compliments can potentially be worse than trash talk and other abusive online behavior. Flattery can be one form of online grooming (see "How to recognize grooming," "Police on gaming community risks," and "How social influencing works."

Virtual worlds are by definition highly immersive. So parents may also want to be alert to signs of obsessive play. Besides the risk factors involved in real-time communication, there are concerns about something called "videogame addiction." Here's the US News & World Report's focus on younger gamers in this area (see also "'SIGNS' of Internet addiction."

Related links

"Are ads on children's social networking sites harmless child's play or virtual insanity?" in The Independent

"Fair game? Assessing commercial activity on children’s
favourite websites and online environments" from Childnet International and the UK's National Consumer Counsel

"Building social currency in online games" at ClickZ.com.

"Notable fresh videogame findings" at NetFamilyNews