FarmVille creator expands options for fanatics Aiming to get even more people hooked

By BARBARA ORTUTAY

AP Technology Writer

NEW YORK

Beware, if you’re among the hordes who wonder where the time went after becoming absorbed in online games such as “FarmVille” and “CityVille.” Zynga, the hot Internet startup that created those ever-engrossing pastimes, is introducing another reason to goof off.

The lure this time is “RewardVille,” a show of appreciation aimed at getting players even more absorbed in their online farms, cities, crime rings and poker games. The program unveiled a week ago doles out game points and credits that can be used to buy more virtual goodies on Zynga’s existing games.

It’s the latest attempt to deepen people’s attachment to Zynga’s strangely addictive world at a time attention spans are becoming more fickle. Several entertainment options now bombard people on an array of digital devices.

Zynga’s success in capturing people’s free time so far has been remarkable — and profitable, according to the privately held company’s executives.

Its games are simple, but getting ahead requires time and dedication. In “CityVille,” for example, players start with a simple plot of land, roads and buildings. They can add businesses, farms and landmarks through lots of faithful dragging and clicking of the mouse. They can invite friends to play and send them virtual gifts.

All games are free to play, but players can pay real money — a few coins or dollars at a time — to buy special items or reach a higher level of play more quickly.

Since CEO Mark Pincus launched the San Francisco startup in 2007, Zynga has attracted about 250 million game players — most of whom connect on Facebook’s even larger Web hangout. Zynga’s audience is somewhere between the population of the U.S. and Indonesia, the world’s third and fourth most populous countries.

Zynga has grown so fast that it already has 1,500 employees and is moving into larger headquarters, which can accommodate several hundred more workers.

Zynga started a tradition in 2009 — ages ago in Internet time — where employees would wear red shirts for every day that “FarmVille” added another million users. There were some weeks where people would run out of red shirts, said Cadir Lee, Zynga’s chief technology officer. More recently, “CityVille” demonstrated Zynga’s drawing power by attracting 100 million players in the first seven weeks after its December introduction.

Prospective investors are clamoring for a piece of Zynga in an initial public offering of stock that could come within the next year.

But Zynga has its skeptics.

Ian Bogost, a game designer and Georgia Tech professor who studies video games, likened its games to fast food — mass- produced fare with little nutritional value. He even created a parody, “Cow Clicker,” where the sole object is to click on virtual cows. Zynga’s games, he said, are not as much about how well you can play or how much fun you have, but about how much effort or money you put in it.

And Facebook users have often complained that Zynga’s games are unimaginative and unwelcome intrusions into online banter and content sharing. Facebook last year changed the way it notifies users about games so that people who don’t play a particular game won’t continually get updates when friends send gifts of pigs or plum trees.