FarmVille gift alert! Some attractive colored flags have appeared as new giftable items. You can pass along yellow, blue, green and red flags (they're more like pendant flags rather than flag flags) to your FarmVille besties, then they can use them to add a little color to their respective farmscapes. They also flutter oh so gently, so if you pretend hard enough, you can almost feel that cool country breeze on your face.



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FarmVille released a new feature that lets you store virtual items in barns or sheds. There are quite a few storage options to choose from, that is, if you are willing to pay up to 27 FarmVille dollars per barn or 22 FarmVille dollars per shed, which let you store 20 and 15 items respectively.

The problem is: If you don't want to pay, you're left with only two options: buy a barn for 40,000 coins, which holds six items, or a shed for 14,000 coins, which holds two items.

Players have been wildly debating whether storage barns are a godsend or a total rip-off. Here are a few choice quotes on the negative side of the big debate:

"It's almost like they get half baked ideas and just throw them together toss them into the game and move on to the next thing. In game storage for in game items is useless. If you guys at Zanga want to make money just offer 50 units of storage in the gift box for 50 Farm cash and people would jump all over that. Anything is better than in game storage units that take up space." - Rettahs.

"The new Storage is the biggest sh*t ever All the time i thought we get a Box and can put our items there unlimited.. i feel bad :S this sucks so much..." - gschw

"Why can't they have some storage like the gift box???Just drag the item and put it in??? Every item can be stored in gift box too.....Why cant we put it back to gift box??Is it that difficult?? These greedy people just here to make money. Not to make the players enjoy it more. That's the feeling i get from all this crap." - Judebinoy

I'm fully aware that FarmVille is only partially free to play and the company makes money on players buying virtual goods, but, there's a balance to strike between making bucks and keeping players happy.

It does seem a little weak that the storage you get without paying actual real-life cash holds almost a third less than what you can hold in the premium storage buildings.

I spent the 27 FarmVille dollars to buy a Sleek Black Barn and am pretty happy with it so far. Maybe the storage cap on all buildings need to be raised a little higher to keep a mob of angry farmers (with pitchforks) converging at Zynga's doorsteps.

Starting today, you'll be able to put your seasonal goodies and whatever else into storage on your virtual farm. When you log into the game, you'll see a tiny red barn icon on the left hand side of your screen. Click it and you'll be immediately taken to see the new storage options. Basically, all of those barns and sheds that have previously been just for looks will now hold those extras that might be cluttering up your farmscape.



Storage options come in large and small; you can buy a red barn for 30K coins and use it to store up to six items. A shed costs less -- 700 coins -- and can be used to store two items. The rest of the storage options (and, frankly, the better options) will cost you real-life cash. Barns that store 20 items run for 27 FarmVille dollars, and a pink shed that stores 15 items costs 22 FarmVille dollars. IMHO, it's worth spending a little cash for some extra space, especially if you are a power farmer, i.e. someone who obsessively logs in every day to play (like me).



Question: Do you think there are enough storage options for people who don't want to pay FarmVille dollars for them? Leave a comment below.


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We were tipped off to a document today that shows Zynga has applied for a trademark on the name "PetVille" in the UK.

The application was filed with the UK Intellectual Property Office on September 7, and was reportedly listed in the UK Trade Marks Journal in October 2009.


*The art above is not the logo for the game.

The document says the trademark can be used for "Downloadable computer game software for use on wireless devices and computers; computer game software, video games, online games, and game related applications... ' and "Entertainment services, namely, providing computer games, enhancements for computer games, game applications and development tools... providing an Internet website portal in the field of computer games, gaming, social networking and virtual communities..."

We also ran a search through the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, and found no publicly available documents linking Zynga to a trademark application for PetVille in the the states. That doesn't necessarily mean that this process isn't in the works, but this is based on the information currently available on the USPTO Web site. Update: We contacted Zynga for comment and will update when the company replies and the response was "no comment."




It's not totally out of the realm of possibility that Zynga would be thinking about launching a pet-based game. If you look at the company's existing portfolio, a pet game would be a welcome edition, especially considering the success of Playfish's Pet Society and some positive buzz around the new Happy Pets game from CrowdStar.

This also follows a well-established pattern for Zynga (and to be fair, many other social gaming startups) -- launching games inspired by others. FarmVille has been called out for being a little too similar to Farm Town and was also slapped with a lawsuit that claimed Mafia Wars was a copyright infringement of text-based gangster game, Mob Wars.

Thanks, Justin!

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A new social game for Facebook -- Platinum Life: Web Edition -- takes wanna be hip-hoppers from "the streets to penthouse suites."

Start out playing shows at small dive bars and then move up the ranks to playing in brand-name venues, all the while watching your star-meter rise to the top. You'll be living la vida Diddy before you know it.

"Platinum Life on Facebook lets players fully realize their fantasy of having it all and showing their friends just how high they're riding," says Anthony Castoro, CEO of Heatwave Interactive.

A similar Facebook game, Diva Life, lets you go from struggling artist to a Beyonce-style triple threat, a total diva who can sing, dance and act. The game from LOLapps launched in late October, and has almost tripled in popularity in November (AppData).

Platinum Life: Web Edition is the social game counterpart to Platinum Life, a full-fledged MMO for that's currently in development, release date is still unknown. PL:WE arrives on Facebook in the beginning of December. We'll drop more details as soon as we have them.

Looks like the Black Cats in FarmVille have undergone a change. Now instead of harvesting yarn from these furry felines, you harvest ... hair?



That's right, once your black cats go 100%, you now have the option to brush them instead of collecting yarn from them. What -- did the FarmVille folks decide pulling yarn from cats was a tad too surreal? One that note, if you found a donkey hiding in one of the new pink mystery boxes, s/he can be brushed as well.

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A new mystery box has appeared in FarmVille -- a pink box that costs 16 FarmVille dollars (roughly $5) and when opened, reveals a surprise inside. The boxes will only be around until So far mystery boxes have yielded surprise items from the lukewarm (striped rest tents) to the super hot (as in, our very own manor).



These new Pepto-Bismol pink boxes include some groovy prizes including a Zen Garden and an Animal Float that looks like it's prepped and ready for a FarmVille Thanksgiving parade.

Below is the complete list (so far) of the pink mystery box items and how many experience points you earn with each of them.

Animal Float
XP Gained: 250
Sells for: 1,250 coins
The float looks ready for parading, complete with a cow, duck, pig and, of course, turkey made of flowers.


Water Tower
XP Gained: 250
Sell for: 1,250 coins
It's a tower. With water. Probably the least impressive mystery item in this batch.


Carousel
500 XP
The carousel looks great, and it's animated!


Zen Garden
XP Gained: 300
Sell for: 1,500 co
The animated Zen Garden is like, totally, Zen, but your farmer can't actually use it. Bummer.


Silver Streak Trailer
150 XP

Donkey
500 XP

We don't have pics (or all of the info for) the Trailer and Donkey yet. If you have them -- please email them to us at editors@games.com, and we will post them here (and give you credit, of course!).

I binged on seven of these new mystery boxes -- and four of them were water towers. I like water and all -- but there's a limit. Fortunately, I also picked up the Animal Float, Carousel and Zen Garden. Viva la mystery boxes!

Related Stories:
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Scared Wild Turkeys Wander into FarmVille

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Big news for Happy Pets on Facebook -- when you adopt a pet, you can now choose whether its male or female. Previously, the cats genders were already decided, so --- just as an example -- all white cats were male and black cats were female. Why does this matter? Because players like to have options, and pet obsessives (like myself) want to re-create my real-life pets in the game...


Anyway, I'm glad to see Happy Pets developers are listening to player suggestions, which might help explain the exponential growth in this game's popularity since it launched in early November. Then again, maybe it's the fact that you can adopt adorable fluffy kittens.

Related Stories:
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Spike TV has announced its nominees for the 2009 VGA awards show, which honors the year's best video games. As an official VGA Awards judge, I get to vote on the nominees, which include a heap of fantastic games, such as Modern Warfare 2, Left 4 Dead 2, Grand Theft Auto, Batman: Arkham Asylum and the like. I'm especially pleased to see to see PopCap's "hard casual" game Plants vs. Zombies made the list.

However, I can't help but notice that there's some big gaping holes in the nominees, namely FarmVille, Mafia Wars and other social games.



This could easily lead to a huge debate on how these awards are for the "core" gamer and not for casual player, but I know plenty of people (including myself) who play Modern Warfare 2 will then turn right around and play FarmVille and Mafia Wars on Facebook.

Also take into consideration that FarmVille boasts roughly 60 million active players a month (World of Warcraft has about 12 million players). Based on that statistic alone, social games deserve to be recognized for the hours of entertainment they bring to gamers -- both core and casual -- lives on a daily (sometimes two or three times a day) basis.

So to my hard-working pals at Spike TV, I implore you to consider including a category for Best Sociable Games next year (or at the very least, an honorary tip of the hat). Millions of virtual farmers, mobsters and pet owners will thank you.

If you're interested in checking out the awards, they will air live on Spike TV, Saturday, December 12 at 8 p.m ET/PT. The show also has a fan favorite category -- so go to the official site to place your vote.

See the complete list of this year's Spike TV Video Game Awards 2009 nominees after the jump >

Women Click More for Virtual Money
A report says 78% of women who play social games have clicked on ads or signed up for a direct marketing promotion (as in, take a survey in exchange for 1,000 coins!) to earn virtual currency without having to pay real-life cash. People who rack up virtual currency says it's "fun" and "addictive." Uh oh, does that mean we're breeding a generation of virtual shop-a-holics?

Fish Rule the World (or Facebook, at least)
Facebook gamers around the world are going mad for aquarium games. Both Happy Aquarium and FishVille gained the most followers last week, says number crunching site AppData. The brand new Fishville gained 9 million new players and Happy Aquarium pulled in almost 2 million new players. Fish, anyone?

It's Official: "Unfriending" is An Actual Word
The act of unfriending is, well, like breaking up. But it's so commonly used that the Oxford dictionary will be adding the term to the big book's pages, along with "tramp stamp" and "funemployed." Unfriending, we can see. Tramp stamp and funemployed? Seems like Oxford has seriously lowered its standards.

Mafia Wars, FarmVille Creator, Zynga, Raises $15 Million (More) Dollars
Free cows for everyone! And, yes, social gaming is blazing hot right now, so much that an undisclosed venture capitalist wrote the company behind Mafia Wars, FarmVille etc a giant check.

Seems like there's a whole lot of turkeys roaming around FarmVille these days and we wanted to clear up any confusion.

First, there's the limited edition Baby Turkey (on the left in the pic below), which you can buy in the FarmVille Market for 7 FarmVille dollars. After three days, the baby turkey transforms into a full-grown turkey (see second pic below). Then after two days, the gobbler can be harvested for turkey feathers (for 80 coins).



Then, there's the Wild Turkey (on right in both pics), which can only be adopted from friends who find them, lost and scared, on their farms. Like the regular Turkey, the Wild Turkey can be harvested in two days for turkey feathers (for 80 coins).



Does that help clear up any turkey questions? Good, now get back to farming.

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Starting now (and for the next 48 hours) you can start cooking Super Sliders in Cafe World. What's so great about these sliders? They're in honor of Cafe World reaching 1 million fans, and the mini-burgers won't spoil in the next 48 hours. Light up those stoves and get cooking, chefs.




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Look out Pet Society and Pogo Puppies -- a new game is in town and its gunning to be the top dog of pet-themed social games. Happy Pets, the new game from CrowdStar (the creators of the popular Happy Aquarium) lets you adopt a kitten, take it home and make sure it stays well-fed and entertained.



Like the other pet games out there, you'll have to visit a virtual store to buy food, toys and decorations for your cat's humble abode. Unlike Pet Society and Pogo Puppies, you can unleash the cat lady inside and adopt more than one pet. How many exactly? We're still testing this in the Games.com social gaming laboratory.

The entire game experience is based on virtual coins, which can be earned by taking care of your pets, clicking on the piggy bank in your pet's home and in your friends' homes every day and, of course, there's the option to use real-life cash to buy coins to use in the game.

Since Happy Pet's launch on November 10, the number of players have skyrocketed to just under a million in a single week. I never met a kitten I couldn't resist, and it seems like thousands of others can't either.

Stay turned for more Happy Pets information (including cheats and tips) this week.

Tap into your inner gumshoe to crack the case behind four missing college students in this new hidden object game -- Mystery Case Files: Dire Grove. A special edition version of the new hidden object game from Big Fish will be ready for download starting November 25. In addition to the game, you'll get access to hidden content, bonus puzzles, a strategy guide and early access to the game (the regular version of the game will arrive in early December).



Like the rest of the popular Mystery Case Files games, players must solve puzzles, which unlock clues used to solve the case. Dire Grove dials up the tension by incorporating Blair Witch Project style shaky cam segments into the game, and -- from what we've seen so far -- give you that feeling of dread right in the stomach.

The Collector's Edition costs $19.99 and is only available to Big Fish Game Club members. The standard version will have a free trial and will cost $6.99.

Related:
Mystery Case Files: Dire Grove Launch Trailer


Never played Mystery Case Files? Try them on Games.com now.

- Mystery Case Files: Huntsville
- Mystery Case Files: Madame Fate
- Mystery Case Files: Prime Suspects
- More Mystery Case Files

Thanksgiving has arrived in Pet Society. Starting today, you can turn your pet's pad into a veritable den of Thanks with the new Fall Candle Set, Fall Wreath, Fall Forest Wallpaper, a Thanksgiving sign, Deluxe Turkey Feast Table, Pumpkin Pie and, of course, a Roast Turkey. Rather than eat the food, however, we're going to buy it and go fishing with it to catch the coolest new item in the game this week -- the Turkeyfish.

Clothing-wise, dress your pets in Pilgrim and Wampanoag outfits for the occasion, including our second favorite item this week -- the Wampanoag Dress and Shoes that are just too cute for words. See the entire lineup of new Turkey Day goodies in the images below.



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