Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Farmville Finishing School


Many people keep in touch with their friends and family via Facebook, and it is a great way to keep up. I adore Facebook; all my favorite people are there. But, every once in a while there arises a problem. Many of the friends and family members who we are glad to keep in touch with on Facebook also love playing social media games (read: Farmville) and, unfortunately, a few of them get a little over-excited and behave badly when it comes to common gaming courtesy. These are not things they would do face-to-face, of course, some of them even taught you the manners they are ignoring, but on the tubes, they sometimes need a little nudge in the courteous direction.


*shoves ever so gently*


Remember, this is for people who LIKE playing games. If you don’t ‘cause you’re really cool and have an actual social life/job, don’t take it out on the rest of us game dorks. Surely you figured out long ago how to block apps, but the following should still amuse.





Like it or leave it:
"Like" is a very handy feature for game playing on Facebook. It allows you to give a nod to the poster when you've taken something they've posted. It is like tipping your hat and saying thanks. It's like thank you notes your mom made you write for terrible things you got as presents growing up because it let the person who gifted it know you received it and that you were taught manners. If you don't acknowledge the gift-givers, they get annoyed...and then you don't receive any more black sweatshirts with glitter, and musical notes, and rhinestones, because you were in the orchestra and clearly, glitter and puff paint is your style. You write that thank you note even though wearing that sweatshirt, in south Florida where it doesn't even get cold, got you made fun of your entire 7th grade year and you have nightmares about it still...
But these are actually things you want, you are actively clicking them.
So make a point to “like” things when you take them, otherwise you are just a common snatcher... a common snatcher with bad manners.



Breakin’ 2- Electric Boogaloo:
When someone is sick/on vacation/mourning the death of a loved one and makes a point of announcing it on their status, unless they are sending you requests, LEAVE THEM ALONE. Get your watering cans/valentines/wooden boards somewhere else. Coming back to 332 requests after being in the hospital for a week in traction as a result of a terrible skiing accident just adds insult to injury. You might as well just post on their wall, “I didn’t care enough to notice that you were away… it probably wasn‘t very important anyway. Can I have a pixilated sheep?”



I'll steal your honey like I stole your bike :
Don't take everything someone posts. “But there are so many gold nuggets, I just can't help myself!” Help yourself, stop at 6. Sniping is bad. People don’t like snipers. That’s why they stick them in those towers alone. It’s not for the head shots, it is because they’re uncool.



I heard she’s been givin’ it up to all them graffiti guys:
Avoid allowing a game to post things on your friends' walls unless there is a damned good reason for it (or unless they have expressed that it is okay). When you post something one someone’s wall, they get notification, often an email. Then they get all excited that they have some love from a friend on their wall when they really needed it because they were having a really hard afternoon and all they needed was a kind gesture, and there it is… only it’s not love, it is a stupid post telling them that you found some fuel on their make-believe farm and that you have nothing nice to say to them at all. It’s a let-down.
I propose that all wall posts from games should be accompanied by a note reminding the recipient of what you like about them. That way, if you are crapping up their personal wall with your pig slop (does anyone ever want pig slop?!) at least when they see it is just a stupid game request, they can have an uplifting experience, instead of just annoyance.



Sham-a-lama-ding-dong:
You’re smart enough to know when it is a scam. Really? 100 unicorns for your farm by clicking HERE! No... and you'll probably need to change your password, too.



Something’s got to give:
Again, unless you have discussed it with someone beforehand, multiple gifts (6 or more a day) are obnoxious, really, even if you need them and are sending them so they can send it back. If you figure each person is sending 3 or more gift, times the amount of people you had to add to get a 26x26 farm, that is way too many freaking requests a day. And that is just one game. Most people play several.


The corollary of which is... If someone posts that they finished a collection, or mission, or that they are avoiding it all together, don't send them those objects. Request them, sure, but don't send them.

Yes, I am saying that you should actually make an effort to know what is going on with your friend's games (yes, your friends... people who you would like not to hate you). Take a minute to research. If worse comes to worse, just add random people whose friendship doesn't matter to you and annoy the crap out of them. Who cares if internet strangers think you’re a jerk!

Thanks to Rhea, Seja, and Gemma, for helping me with various aspects of this post!

6 comments:

  1. I quit Farmville a while ago because it was eating my life. Now I don't really play any facebook games except for Family Feud sometimes. I really hate the ones where you have to wait a week to get one coin or one magnifying glass or whatever.

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  2. haven't read the entire blog but OMG this was very reconizable!!!

    my aunt (which isn;t a real aunt but a 3rd line cousin whatever... ) plays something similar...
    while I was going to spend 5 days in their BIG house in Amsterdam to baby-sit their crazy cat... my aunt was kinda hectic the hour before they went on a holiday trip... because she needed to take care of her garden otherwise there would be too many weeds in her garden when she got back...
    Luckily for me.. it wasn't really reconizable the fuzz she was making about some bits n bites.. but rather funny to see her histerical riddicioulous moment...

    Now I have a collegue who is addicted to farmville.. and tells me all about the new stuff she got... it's kinda sad but also pretty funny to hear about this stupid farmville and other related game stuff

    xx/

    ReplyDelete
  3. This post had me PMSL... I used to abuse my friends with Farmville and Citylife and Cafe World and any other game Zynga could dare me to play, and I genuinely started losing friends lol. That led to me creating a new facebook account and getting friends from these "farmville Friends" apps, now I'm level 85 and spam all day long, if they don't like it, remove me.. I don't know them! It's awesome LOL

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  4. HONESTLY, all the non gamers have to do is click "block" on the Farmville App, but because they don't want to, I have to memorize all these rules of etiquette that will insure I never get ANYWHERE on the games? Arrrrgh. There needs to be a gamers section of Facebook, where you can go and game away, with abandon. Fatty, good idea, but wouldn't I have to start my games all over again?

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  5. hahahah :P bbhhhaahahahaha......(excuse me)

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