Millions of online users have spent thousands of hours growing gardens, raising livestock and working as farmers-virtually at least-after FarmVille became a social media and gaming hit.
FarmVille was introduced five year ago, and millions of players continue to reap the harvest of their virtual farms. As it celebrates its fifth year anniversary this summer, it is also worth noting how the game has established real-life relationships became of the recent features it offered to its users.
The game seemed to become impossible to avoid for most Facebook users. On its first six weeks in the virtual world way back year 2009, FarmVille had more than 10 million players already and was dubbed as the most popular game on Facebook at that time. By 2015, it is expected that the player based of this popular game could pass the 80 million mark based on the data gathered by AppData. As of year 2012, FarmVille maintained its spot among the most-played game. It is on the 7th spot of most popular games online.
According to Charles London, senior creative director of FarmVille, said many players of the game today prefer to have serenity and peace in virtual gaming. He noted that many people are glad on how FarmVille has allowed them to connect with other people while feeling productive at the same time.
Makers of the game also faced a huge challenge with Time Magazine included it in the list of the 50 worst inventions in year 2010. The team just shrugged off their shoulders as there 370 million "virtual crops" being harvested each day, which means millions of players have not interest on the game. It also denotes the dedication of the players, according to the team.
Aside from providing entertainment, the makers of the game have also started supporting socially-relevant causes to provide for the needs of real-life communities. For instance, in December last year, the players of the popular game managed to raised about 1 million dollars for Feeding America. This happened through a special game launched called Holiday Lights. In total, the players of the game have raised 8 million dollars-the amount was channeled to charitable institutions in the United States.
