While A-ya Chiu is an extreme example of a gamer gone add-happy, many others are following suit and significantly changing their experience of Facebook. Even a moderate player like Ulrika Ruston, an English teacher in Sweden, has added 41 complete strangers. Many items in Pet Society cost thousands of coins, and buying them would take weeks of playing (or real money) if you don't have many friends.
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Sarah Gordon Weathersby, a retired IT professional in Raleigh, North Carolina, jokes that such forums feel like the "red light district," but other gamers can't resist clicking the add button. My pet needs more friends," is a familiar plea. Hence, players flock to forums and blogs to find one another. You know there are others like you, but you are often alone in your immediate circle. Entering Pet Society for the first time is a little like being gay or Asian in Oklahoma. Problem is, while these games have millions of users, many people have only a handful of real-life friends who play them. He emphasized that Restaurant City, another Playfish product, is less about restaurant management than about employing one's friends as cooks or servers. "There needs to be a benefit for users to invite others into the game," he said. During a discussion panel at July's Casual Connect conference in Seattle, Sebastien de Halleux, COO of Playfish said that connecting with friends is an immediate objective of social games.įor example, see the amusing Pet Society trailer the company released on August 26. Other online games, such as Zynga's Yoville, also reward players for interacting with friends. The more friends you have, the more money you can make and the more things you can buy. Each day you visit a friend’s pet, you earn up to 30 virtual coins. Such differences are caused by the fact that friends equal money in Pet Society. In comparison, Karen Bedford of England, who has been playing the game for about a year for one to two hours a day is five levels below Chiu, and her house, while nicely decorated, is smaller. In three months, IceLashes has advanced to level 38 (out of a maximum 47) and her virtual house is stuffed with the latest must-have items that are released each week. But a gamer is exactly what she is.Ĭurrently unemployed, Chiu plays games on Facebook for more than eight hours a day. She looks more like a booth girl than a gamer. On her Facebook profile, Chiu, who is 24, shows pictures of herself playing up for the camera, sticking out her tongue and exposing her legs. Because of her vast network, Chiu is the most popular girl in Pet Society, and her alter-ego "IceLashes" enjoys a fabulous lifestyle in the virtual world. Most of these friends were added for Pet Society, the Playfish game revolving around cartoonish pets. With a vibrant community and great social options this is one title you can’t afford to miss unless, of course, you’re the sort who likes to do all the aforementioned activities in real life.Last month, A-ya Chiu of Taiwan had more than 4500 friends on Facebook. Add rewards for clearing a variety of levels and trophies to the mix and you’ve got yet another serious time devourer of a game.
It’s literally all the things you would do if you had a real pet and the requisite amount of space/time in your life, if only you didn’t spend it all playing games online.īut jokes aside, for an internet social game it looks great with crisp 2D graphics and a cuteness factor that would make the most hardened of hardcore gamers’ heart melt. From customising his appearance with a variety of accessories and clothes to shopping for furniture and interacting with a motley variety of other pets at the café, I was having a blast. Within a few minutes of creating my virtual pet I was hooked. However, I found that I couldn’t help myself at all. Pet Society is one part The Sims, one part Barbie and in every way a game a 20-something wannabe alpha-male like myself should not be playing at all.
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