NPD Group Blog » Modern Warfare and Farmville - More Alike Than You’d Think!

Modern Warfare and Farmville - More Alike Than You’d Think!

Tuesday, August 24th, 2010
By Anita Frazier, Entertainment Industry Analyst Toys & Video Games

Last December, I blogged about my experiences running my own virtual cafe’ in Cafe’ World via Facebook. Since then, I spent a lot of time in Cafe’ Frazier, sending gifts of food and stove parts to friends, cooking up a storm to keep my level higher than those of my neighbors, and trying out new decor items. There are times when I am too busy to play online, so I go dark for a period of time, but something always seems to reignite my interest, and I get sucked in again.

Along about April, however, my participation with Cafe’ World and Farmville came to a screeching halt. Why? I was getting ready to move my family cross-country and simply didn’t have any time to waste (there, I’ve said it) on non-real-world activities. Besides, most of my neighbors had trailed off on their participation, and it just wasn’t as much fun sending gifts but getting few in return.

This whole phenomenon of social network gaming is the topic of our latest research report cleverly titled “Social Network Gaming,” and it explores in-depth this relatively new form of gaming that has introduced the world of video games to entirely new groups of people. Of all social network gamers, over a third indicated they had never played a game before. But that means that about 2/3 of social network gamers came from existing gamers, which debunks the theory that “real” gamers could never be interested in such simple games. In fact, I was just chatting with one of my nieces the other day. She’s interested in going into the games industry after she graduates from college, and is a pretty dedicated gamer - playing on everything from mobile phones to PCs to handhelds to consoles. In fact, she was telling me how much she is looking forward to playing Black Ops when it releases, but also told me about the time she spent playing Bubble Island while on the job. For her, the social aspects were meaningless - it was about how easy it was to access these games, and at certain locations, to pass time. Another existing gamer, my friend Tim (his name has been changed to protect his identity), is what I would call a core gamer through and through. His current obsession with Farmville, Mafia Wars, Vampire Wars, Castle Age, and Zynga’s Texas Hold ‘Em left a few of us scratching our heads, since we figured he’d never be the type to succumb to this new form of gaming. He mentions the achievements, the collections, and enjoying the fact that his level is higher than that of his neighbors (because he is more efficient at managing his farm) as similar to his experience on Xbox Live and Modern Warfare! He also doesn’t highlight the social aspects as driving his involvement, other than liking the cooperative nature of the gifting - but that is more about getting the collections and achievements than it is about being social.

Regardless, there is a lot that game developers can learn about the swift adoption of social network games. Whether they’re developing social network game titles or more traditional forms of games for other platforms, developers need to pay close attention to what makes these titles so attractive to gamers, and learn to apply this to their own games. Sure, it’s easy to say that a lot of the appeal comes from the fact that so many titles are free to play, but there is much more to it than that. Things happen beneath the surface that encourages someone to take money out of their wallets and pay for virtual items, or, conversely, make them leave out of boredom.

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