Facebook Adds to Appeal with Zynga Game Network

There has been buzz before about the similarities of social networks and MMO videogames. Both involve interactive screen time. Both involve use of the Internet, cooperation, and social activities. Both have also been criticized for overuse and for a variety of public ailments.

So it comes as little surprise that social sites have taken steps to integrate videogames in an effort to provide members more reasons to stay online and spend time with one another. Brad Stone has a nice article in The New York Times this week on the efforts of the Zynga Game Network to create online games for Facebook. Facebook opened up its network to developers to create third party apps, to much success (the recent award “Blog of the Week” for this blog is linked to one such app, TopNetPix).

The games are simple and traditional, such as Texas hold ’em poker, blackjack, and Boggle. Members can play with their friends, and invite others to the game. Developers keep ad revenue, so both Facebook and Zynga profit from the increased interactivity on the site from videogames. Here’s the money quote:

“People already love to play casual games,” said Fred Wilson, a partner at the venture capital firm Union Square Ventures, which led a $10 million round of financing in Zynga. “But when you take a casual game and stick it inside a social network, it becomes way more exciting. This is like pouring gasoline on fire.”

The interactive nature of games and the idea of injecting a little fun into an activity appeals to serious game makers. I can see the notion of a team inside a virtual interactive environment (VIE) engaging in a game to help solve a learning objective as a viable possibility. At its simplest levels, math can be easily game-ified, or taught within the context of other games. For instance, a learner in a VIE could engage in a virtual card game and be taught the odds of drawing to a flush versus drawing to a straight. Likewise vocabulary building, spelling, and other lower level reading skills are all easily incorporated in videogames.

One such game that might have some small educational appeal on Facebook, Scrabulous, is under legal assault by Hasbro, owner of Scrabble.

References:
Associated Press. (2008, January 17). Makers of Scrabble target Facebook version of game. The Wall Street Journal, p.B4.

Stone, B. (2008, January 15). More than games, a net to snare social networkers. The New York Times. [Online.] Available: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/15/technology/15facebook.htm