By now, you're probably aware that you can upgrade your General Store in FrontierVille. Through this quest set, you not only upgrade the visual look of your General Store, but you also unlock a series of Boosts that will help you more quickly advance through the game's repetition missions (Harvest X number of crops, Groom X number of animals, etc.).
While Boosts are now available to help you in feeding animals and harvesting trees, meet us behind the break for a full guide concerning the new Crop Boosts available from the store.
These new crop boosts (not to be confused with the previously released Wither Protection and Unwither Crop boosts), are available to purchase from a new menu within the upgraded General Store - simply click on your General Store and click "Buy Boosts" to access this new menu/store.
They will cause any "unready" crop to become instantly ready, and are purchased in sets of five, with one individual boost making one individual plot ready to be harvested.
For reference, the prices of each boost will vary (even among Horseshoes and coins), depending on your level, with four prices being available for the full range of current levels. In the guide below, we will list the cheapest, and the most expensive price of each particular boost, to give you an idea of the range of coins and/or Horseshoes you will have to spend.
Finally, please note that the 5% store discount from the Rithmatic school house lesson will apply to these prices.
Crop Boosts -
Clover Ready Boost - 1,050 coins - 8,350 coins
Tomato Ready Boost - 3,125 coins - 25,000 coins
Pumpkin Ready Boost - 1 Horseshoe - 10 Horseshoes
Potato Ready Boost - 3 Horseshoes - 20 Horseshoes
Flax Ready Boost - 4 Horseshoes - 28 Horseshoes
Corn Ready Boost - 4 Horseshoes - 35 Horseshoes
Wheat Ready Boost - 6 Horseshoes - 49 Horseshoes
Cabbage Ready Boost - 5 Horseshoes - 40 Horseshoes
Peas Ready Boost - 9 Horseshoes - 69 Horseshoes
Cotton Ready Boost - 11 Horseshoes - 85 Horseshoes
Sunflower Ready Boost - 5 Horseshoes - 42 Horseshoes
Eggplant Ready Boost - 2 Horseshoes - 14 Horseshoes
Finally, a Peanut Ready Boost is also available to purchase, but only after you complete all four of Hank's General Store missions. After this point, you will be able to purchase the Boost for between 12 Horseshoes and 98 Horseshoes, depending on your level.
And there you have it - an easy, albeit fairly expensive way to easily complete quests that ask you to harvest a certain amount of a particular crop. Be sure to check back with us in the future, as we bring you guides for the Animal and Tree Boosts in the future.
Work at home & Earn Money
Thursday, February 2, 2012
Pet Society Steampunk items now available
Last week, we let our excitement boil over to 11 with the announcement that this week would be Steampunk Week in Pet Society. We were given a small taste of the items that would be available then, and we can even more excitedly share the full theme of items that have actually hit the market now.
Meet us behind the break for all of the Victorian furniture, mechanical wonders and leather clothing that you can handle!
This theme begins with a truly awesome start, as you can now add fully brass flowers to your garden, via the Glow in the Dark Mechanical Flower Seed that's available for 3 Playfish Cash.
From there, the brass color theme gives way to a mass amount of Victorian furniture, most of which will only be available in the game for one week only. You can pick up a brass table, complete with parchment and magnifying glass, a stately armchair, two versions of curved staircases, and an animated desk that is to die for (figuratively, of course), with a code scrolling across a computer screen, and steam raising from quaint little tea-cup.
You can purchase a Vintage Brass Bed for the the bedroom for just 900 coins, a robot named Brass Bob that dances (at the price of 10 Playfish Cash), and even a mechanical bird that will be only available for a limited time (less than a day, as of this writing).
This theme contains quite a few functional or simply animated items, like an awesome Mechanical Camera that allows you to take sepia screenshots, a set of animated, mechanical wings (available tomorrow evening), a red and copper colored floating airplane, and a wallpaper and flooring set that looks as though you are inside a tall tower, or even inside a flying airship. This duo is particularly interesting, in that it changes color as the day turns from day to night. There are four settings available - Dawn, Daytime, Sunset and Night, with the scene changing according to the time in your own time zone.
With all of these swoon-worthy items (this only scratches the surface of what's available), it's only fitting that your animal friend should also receive a bit of pampering, along with their home, and you can now buy a Vintage Leather Outfit for both girl or boy pets for 800 and 700 coins each, respectively. For reference the boy's costume is cheaper because it has one less element. Regardless, you can also outfit your pet with a stylish monocle for 150 coins, and a Short Circuit Hat for 500 coins.
What can we say? We love Steampunk, and this week's theme in Pet Society definitely doesn't disappoint. Keep in mind the limited time availability on some of these items, and make sure you pick them up while you can!
Meet us behind the break for all of the Victorian furniture, mechanical wonders and leather clothing that you can handle!
This theme begins with a truly awesome start, as you can now add fully brass flowers to your garden, via the Glow in the Dark Mechanical Flower Seed that's available for 3 Playfish Cash.
From there, the brass color theme gives way to a mass amount of Victorian furniture, most of which will only be available in the game for one week only. You can pick up a brass table, complete with parchment and magnifying glass, a stately armchair, two versions of curved staircases, and an animated desk that is to die for (figuratively, of course), with a code scrolling across a computer screen, and steam raising from quaint little tea-cup.
You can purchase a Vintage Brass Bed for the the bedroom for just 900 coins, a robot named Brass Bob that dances (at the price of 10 Playfish Cash), and even a mechanical bird that will be only available for a limited time (less than a day, as of this writing).
This theme contains quite a few functional or simply animated items, like an awesome Mechanical Camera that allows you to take sepia screenshots, a set of animated, mechanical wings (available tomorrow evening), a red and copper colored floating airplane, and a wallpaper and flooring set that looks as though you are inside a tall tower, or even inside a flying airship. This duo is particularly interesting, in that it changes color as the day turns from day to night. There are four settings available - Dawn, Daytime, Sunset and Night, with the scene changing according to the time in your own time zone.
With all of these swoon-worthy items (this only scratches the surface of what's available), it's only fitting that your animal friend should also receive a bit of pampering, along with their home, and you can now buy a Vintage Leather Outfit for both girl or boy pets for 800 and 700 coins each, respectively. For reference the boy's costume is cheaper because it has one less element. Regardless, you can also outfit your pet with a stylish monocle for 150 coins, and a Short Circuit Hat for 500 coins.
What can we say? We love Steampunk, and this week's theme in Pet Society definitely doesn't disappoint. Keep in mind the limited time availability on some of these items, and make sure you pick them up while you can!
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Joy to the world, Bejeweled 3 is here!
It's a monumental day in the world of PC gaming -- both Bejeweled 3 and the World of Warcraft Cataclysm arrive in stores, causing a frenzy among gamers of all stripes.
buy bejeweled 3 nowAt Games.com, our enthusiasm is directed toward PopCap's gem-matching game, which is getting its first serious refresh in six years. Bejeweled 3 keeps the game's classic match-3 gaming experience intact, but has completely overhauled the graphics and sound and has thrown in a few twists to keep things fresh.
Some of those twists include Quest modes, a timed Lightening mode (inspired by PopCap's Facebook game Bejeweled Blitz) and a new Zen mode which you can play forever and activate "options for meditation and stress relief, including breath modulation, ambient sounds, binaural beats and mantras for focusing your thoughts."
Gallery: Bejeweled 3: First look
Four examples of some of the new Bejeweled modes you'll encounter in the game:
- Poker: Make matches to create winning Poker hands and -- as the game progresses -- avoid making 'outlawed' hands, when a flip of a coin will determine whether it's game on or game over
- Diamond Mine: Explode gems to tunnel beneath the earth, and discover gold, artifacts and Hypercubes along the way
- Butterflies: Match butterfly gems to free them before they reach the top of the board. If they elude your gem-matching skills, the spider waiting for them at the top wins.
- Ice Storm: Keep a wall of rising ice at bay by matching gems as fast as possible in a limited amount of time.
Bejeweled 3 has also overhauled its badge and achievements system, and you'll also be able to check out your game stats after you finish a round.
Aside from the fact that Bejeweled 3 has sold millions of copies and has rocked the casual gaming "Best of" charts for the past decade, probably one of our favorite stats about the game is that a copy is sold every 4.3 seconds. If you're ready to have your 4.3 seconds, you can purchase Bejeweled 3 for $20 in online (right here on Games.com) and in stores.
buy bejeweled 3 nowAt Games.com, our enthusiasm is directed toward PopCap's gem-matching game, which is getting its first serious refresh in six years. Bejeweled 3 keeps the game's classic match-3 gaming experience intact, but has completely overhauled the graphics and sound and has thrown in a few twists to keep things fresh.
Some of those twists include Quest modes, a timed Lightening mode (inspired by PopCap's Facebook game Bejeweled Blitz) and a new Zen mode which you can play forever and activate "options for meditation and stress relief, including breath modulation, ambient sounds, binaural beats and mantras for focusing your thoughts."
Gallery: Bejeweled 3: First look
Four examples of some of the new Bejeweled modes you'll encounter in the game:
- Poker: Make matches to create winning Poker hands and -- as the game progresses -- avoid making 'outlawed' hands, when a flip of a coin will determine whether it's game on or game over
- Diamond Mine: Explode gems to tunnel beneath the earth, and discover gold, artifacts and Hypercubes along the way
- Butterflies: Match butterfly gems to free them before they reach the top of the board. If they elude your gem-matching skills, the spider waiting for them at the top wins.
- Ice Storm: Keep a wall of rising ice at bay by matching gems as fast as possible in a limited amount of time.
Bejeweled 3 has also overhauled its badge and achievements system, and you'll also be able to check out your game stats after you finish a round.
Aside from the fact that Bejeweled 3 has sold millions of copies and has rocked the casual gaming "Best of" charts for the past decade, probably one of our favorite stats about the game is that a copy is sold every 4.3 seconds. If you're ready to have your 4.3 seconds, you can purchase Bejeweled 3 for $20 in online (right here on Games.com) and in stores.
FrontierVille Cheats and Tips: The Dinner Triangle
For the more popular pioneers out there, waking up to a ton of visits from friends in FrontierVille can at times be more of a pain than a blessing. Especially for those with fully expanded homesteads. This is because visitors can appear almost anywhere on the map such as behind trees, buildings or even tall crops. And you and I both know that the little star that above our characters' heads barely helps us keep track of our own pioneer much less others if it were placed on them.
This is exactly why Zynga introduced an item called the "Dinner Triangle" a ways back to FrontierVille. This functional item will literally summon all of your visiting friends and family to its location when clicked. Obviously, this is essentially the end to all of your neighbors' hide-and-seek games. Not to mention how handy it would be for missions like the recent Family Quests. However, the item costs 10,000 coins and 10 Wood to purchase from the Market.
So, just make sure you're well in between quests before picking this terribly useful item up as it'll set you far back for a while. Though, if you consider yourself a lucky fellow, the Dinner Triangle can appear in Mystery Boxes, but I wouldn't bank on that happening anytime soon. If your shy neighbors are truly bugging you that much, just pony up and buy the item. Besides, if you're friends visit you in such numbers that often, it'll pay for itself in no time.
This is exactly why Zynga introduced an item called the "Dinner Triangle" a ways back to FrontierVille. This functional item will literally summon all of your visiting friends and family to its location when clicked. Obviously, this is essentially the end to all of your neighbors' hide-and-seek games. Not to mention how handy it would be for missions like the recent Family Quests. However, the item costs 10,000 coins and 10 Wood to purchase from the Market.
So, just make sure you're well in between quests before picking this terribly useful item up as it'll set you far back for a while. Though, if you consider yourself a lucky fellow, the Dinner Triangle can appear in Mystery Boxes, but I wouldn't bank on that happening anytime soon. If your shy neighbors are truly bugging you that much, just pony up and buy the item. Besides, if you're friends visit you in such numbers that often, it'll pay for itself in no time.
FarmVille creator Zynga and Citi join forces for exclusive game rewards
Mystery Animal Crate Lightning Stove
Citi Bank cardholders will be delighted when they check their ThankYou Rewards account today. Well, those that happen to be social gamers, that is. Zynga announced today that it has joined forces with Citi to add a new category of ThankYou Rewards to Citi's long list of goodies: virtual items. Starting immediately, players of hit Zynga games like FarmVille, FrontierVille and Cafe World can redeem their ThankYou Points for exclusive items in several of the company's Facebook games. Starting at 600 ThankYou points, players can begin to redeem virtual rewards as well as physical Zynga Game Cards for a boost to the tune of $25 for 3,500 ThankYou Points. Exclusive items in some of Zynga's games include:
FarmVille:
-Purple Harvester (1,400 Points)
-Red Pinto Horse (1,000 Points)
FrontierVille:
-Mystery Animal Crate (1,000 Points)
-Pink Deer (1,500 Points)
Cafe World:
-Lightning Stove (3,500 Points)
-Outdoor Fountain (2,000 Points)
This partnership with Citi marks Zynga's second collaboration with a credit company--the first being with American Express and its Membership Rewards Program. (This is also why some of those items might look familiar.) If this strategy catches on, expect other social game developers to hop onto Zynga's tailwind. Terry O’Neil, Executive VP of North American Cards at Citi says that Zynga ThankYou Rewards keep Citi's ThankYou Point offerings relevant and meets a demand for social game rewards. I'd say hundreds of millions of players is relevant enough, wouldn't you?
Citi Bank cardholders will be delighted when they check their ThankYou Rewards account today. Well, those that happen to be social gamers, that is. Zynga announced today that it has joined forces with Citi to add a new category of ThankYou Rewards to Citi's long list of goodies: virtual items. Starting immediately, players of hit Zynga games like FarmVille, FrontierVille and Cafe World can redeem their ThankYou Points for exclusive items in several of the company's Facebook games. Starting at 600 ThankYou points, players can begin to redeem virtual rewards as well as physical Zynga Game Cards for a boost to the tune of $25 for 3,500 ThankYou Points. Exclusive items in some of Zynga's games include:
FarmVille:
-Purple Harvester (1,400 Points)
-Red Pinto Horse (1,000 Points)
FrontierVille:
-Mystery Animal Crate (1,000 Points)
-Pink Deer (1,500 Points)
Cafe World:
-Lightning Stove (3,500 Points)
-Outdoor Fountain (2,000 Points)
This partnership with Citi marks Zynga's second collaboration with a credit company--the first being with American Express and its Membership Rewards Program. (This is also why some of those items might look familiar.) If this strategy catches on, expect other social game developers to hop onto Zynga's tailwind. Terry O’Neil, Executive VP of North American Cards at Citi says that Zynga ThankYou Rewards keep Citi's ThankYou Point offerings relevant and meets a demand for social game rewards. I'd say hundreds of millions of players is relevant enough, wouldn't you?
Bejeweled 3: We're giving away 10 free copies of the game
bejeweled logo
Update: This contest has ended. Head to Blog.Games.com or our Facebook fanpage for more awesome giveaways.
PopCap Games has unleashed Bejeweled 3 on the world, and productivity is about to hit a standstill. If experience tells us anything, this new Bejeweled (like the others before it) will most likely have you swapping gems day and night if you don't keep yourself in check. (And, if you don't, well, we'll most likely be right along there with you).
Bejeweled 3 is available for download online (right here on Games.com) and at retail for $20 -- but, if you're lucky, you can enter to win a code that will let you download the game for the low price of FREE. And, considering the holiday season tends to be a little spendy, it sure would be nice to get something for FREE, wouldn't it?
Gallery: Bejeweled 3: First look
To enter to win a free download code for Bejeweled 3, please do the following:
Step 1: Go to the Games.com Facebook fanpage: (http://www.facebook.com/gamescom).
Step 2: 'Like' the fanpage so you can see the latest Facebook game news, tips, and cheats.
Step 3: Enter the giveaway by heading to the fanpage and tell us what item you're most likely to have bejeweled (as in encrusted with jewels). Wedding ring, cell phone (or something more creative?)
Over the next few days, we'll randomly select 10 winners, message them on Facebook with the free code and directions on how to download the game. Sound easy enough?
Get started by heading to the Games.com fanpage to enter for a free downlodable copy of Bejeweled 3.
Bookmark this site!
Update: This contest has ended. Head to Blog.Games.com or our Facebook fanpage for more awesome giveaways.
PopCap Games has unleashed Bejeweled 3 on the world, and productivity is about to hit a standstill. If experience tells us anything, this new Bejeweled (like the others before it) will most likely have you swapping gems day and night if you don't keep yourself in check. (And, if you don't, well, we'll most likely be right along there with you).
Bejeweled 3 is available for download online (right here on Games.com) and at retail for $20 -- but, if you're lucky, you can enter to win a code that will let you download the game for the low price of FREE. And, considering the holiday season tends to be a little spendy, it sure would be nice to get something for FREE, wouldn't it?
Gallery: Bejeweled 3: First look
To enter to win a free download code for Bejeweled 3, please do the following:
Step 1: Go to the Games.com Facebook fanpage: (http://www.facebook.com/gamescom).
Step 2: 'Like' the fanpage so you can see the latest Facebook game news, tips, and cheats.
Step 3: Enter the giveaway by heading to the fanpage and tell us what item you're most likely to have bejeweled (as in encrusted with jewels). Wedding ring, cell phone (or something more creative?)
Over the next few days, we'll randomly select 10 winners, message them on Facebook with the free code and directions on how to download the game. Sound easy enough?
Get started by heading to the Games.com fanpage to enter for a free downlodable copy of Bejeweled 3.
Bookmark this site!
Have Zynga's FarmVille and FrontierVille become more like 'BegVille?'
Beg for those items!
Alright, so it isn't Deliverance bad yet. But since quests have been recently added to FarmVille, the community has responded less than favorably, if a recent poll on the forums is any indication. With 470 votes as of this writing, 37 percent of them have claimed that Quests in FarmVille are "Not for me." While this is isn't necessarily an overwhelming majority, it most definitely speaks to how a large number of farmers might feel about the relatively new feature.
And despite a pretty small majority voting against Quests in their game, the rest of thread seems to imply a much worse situation with some commenters alluding to FrontierVille, which many claim has too many Goals. But that isn't their only beef with Quests and Goals. It seems as if a large amount of players are unhappy with how quests operate with one player writing, "Not in favour... especially if they involve constant begging from neighbours all the time. Lately, we seem to do that 90% of the time as it is. They should change the name of the game to BegVille."
"BegVille," huh? Let's get a better understanding of (and a way to stop) this interesting, chuckle-worthy moniker after the break.
FarmVille Quest Poll
What the forum member seems to have meant by calling both FrontierVille and FarmVille "BegVille" is that he feels too many of the requirements in both Goals and Quests involve asking our friends for various items that are essentially intangible in the game world. For instance, FrontierVille's recent "Playtime" Timed Mission requires players to ask their friends for 20 items in just 48 hours. While this is vastly easier thanks to the new Zynga Message Center, it's still a daunting quest to finish. And the same goes for the Winter Wonderland Quest in FarmVille, which asks farmers to tap their friends for items at nearly every turn.
And what does this get us? A nearly endless list of requests in our Message Center nearly every time we log into either FarmVille or FrontierVille. Games like Cafe World and Mafia Wars aren't off the hook either, but we'll get back to them.
FarmVille Quests
Unfortunately for some and a good old time for others, this is intrinsic to Zynga's quest design and, quite frankly, one of the few things that keeps the precious "social element" in its games. There is always Gifting, but is sending a generic message to your friend truly social? Without these item requests, players wouldn't interact with one another outside of random visits in FrontierVille (most of which are driven by Goals anyway) and Co-Op Jobs in FarmVille. Wait, that's it!
While some players think thousands of item requests are fine and dandy, there's a large amount of us that want something more... interactive. Cafe World has its Catering Orders, Mafia Wars has its Secret Missions and FarmVille has its Co-Op Crafting Jobs yet none of them are integral to our progress in each game. They can easily be ignored in the wake of hundreds of crops, recipes and odd jobs to master. It's only FrontierVille, the major culprit, that doesn't feature something similar.
Secret Santa
With that being said, why not make collaboration as rich a source of XP and items as personal bests like Mastery? For instance, take the recent Headless Horseman Goals for Halloween in FrontierVille. Instead of each homestead having its very own Horseman (though, he did appear in friends' homesteads, which is a start) for pioneers to defeat with the "help" of friends, why not make the Horseman a collective enemy to defeat with a progress bar much like Cafe World's Catering Jobs or FarmVille Co-Ops?
Players would rally their friends to gather the required items to contribute to a collective achievement rather than a personal one, rewarding everyone involved with coins and rare items rather than the individual. Or if you're that attached to your rare items, these Quests could easily be repeatable with a randomized loot system and Mastery (I'm looking at you, Secret Missions). And what do you know, it's a brand new way to progress through your game that actually involves your friends working toward a larger goal.
Obviously, this is far from limited to holiday events and would require some creativity from the games' respective design teams to think up new ideas for collaborative missions that fit into each game's world (bandits in FrontierVille, anyone?). Not to mention that this type of Quest would be released way less frequently than what's possible with the current Quests. But if that's what it takes to keep players from calling these games names like "BegVille," I'm willing to wait. Are you?
Alright, so it isn't Deliverance bad yet. But since quests have been recently added to FarmVille, the community has responded less than favorably, if a recent poll on the forums is any indication. With 470 votes as of this writing, 37 percent of them have claimed that Quests in FarmVille are "Not for me." While this is isn't necessarily an overwhelming majority, it most definitely speaks to how a large number of farmers might feel about the relatively new feature.
And despite a pretty small majority voting against Quests in their game, the rest of thread seems to imply a much worse situation with some commenters alluding to FrontierVille, which many claim has too many Goals. But that isn't their only beef with Quests and Goals. It seems as if a large amount of players are unhappy with how quests operate with one player writing, "Not in favour... especially if they involve constant begging from neighbours all the time. Lately, we seem to do that 90% of the time as it is. They should change the name of the game to BegVille."
"BegVille," huh? Let's get a better understanding of (and a way to stop) this interesting, chuckle-worthy moniker after the break.
FarmVille Quest Poll
What the forum member seems to have meant by calling both FrontierVille and FarmVille "BegVille" is that he feels too many of the requirements in both Goals and Quests involve asking our friends for various items that are essentially intangible in the game world. For instance, FrontierVille's recent "Playtime" Timed Mission requires players to ask their friends for 20 items in just 48 hours. While this is vastly easier thanks to the new Zynga Message Center, it's still a daunting quest to finish. And the same goes for the Winter Wonderland Quest in FarmVille, which asks farmers to tap their friends for items at nearly every turn.
And what does this get us? A nearly endless list of requests in our Message Center nearly every time we log into either FarmVille or FrontierVille. Games like Cafe World and Mafia Wars aren't off the hook either, but we'll get back to them.
FarmVille Quests
Unfortunately for some and a good old time for others, this is intrinsic to Zynga's quest design and, quite frankly, one of the few things that keeps the precious "social element" in its games. There is always Gifting, but is sending a generic message to your friend truly social? Without these item requests, players wouldn't interact with one another outside of random visits in FrontierVille (most of which are driven by Goals anyway) and Co-Op Jobs in FarmVille. Wait, that's it!
While some players think thousands of item requests are fine and dandy, there's a large amount of us that want something more... interactive. Cafe World has its Catering Orders, Mafia Wars has its Secret Missions and FarmVille has its Co-Op Crafting Jobs yet none of them are integral to our progress in each game. They can easily be ignored in the wake of hundreds of crops, recipes and odd jobs to master. It's only FrontierVille, the major culprit, that doesn't feature something similar.
Secret Santa
With that being said, why not make collaboration as rich a source of XP and items as personal bests like Mastery? For instance, take the recent Headless Horseman Goals for Halloween in FrontierVille. Instead of each homestead having its very own Horseman (though, he did appear in friends' homesteads, which is a start) for pioneers to defeat with the "help" of friends, why not make the Horseman a collective enemy to defeat with a progress bar much like Cafe World's Catering Jobs or FarmVille Co-Ops?
Players would rally their friends to gather the required items to contribute to a collective achievement rather than a personal one, rewarding everyone involved with coins and rare items rather than the individual. Or if you're that attached to your rare items, these Quests could easily be repeatable with a randomized loot system and Mastery (I'm looking at you, Secret Missions). And what do you know, it's a brand new way to progress through your game that actually involves your friends working toward a larger goal.
Obviously, this is far from limited to holiday events and would require some creativity from the games' respective design teams to think up new ideas for collaborative missions that fit into each game's world (bandits in FrontierVille, anyone?). Not to mention that this type of Quest would be released way less frequently than what's possible with the current Quests. But if that's what it takes to keep players from calling these games names like "BegVille," I'm willing to wait. Are you?
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