Podcast Transcript 2010-03-29

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= Official FarmVille Podcast – March 29th Transcript =

Hey Farmers and welcome to this week’s installment of the Official FarmVille Podcast! As per usual, my name is Lexilicious and I am in charge of all things community over here on the FarmVille team. This week, we will be discussing our latest releases, I will be answering some user submitted questions and you guys are all going to get a sneak peek of things coming to FarmVille in the near future.

This week proved to be another really exciting week for the FarmVille team that was jam packed with some great new features and releases.

First and foremost, we continued to release more items from our Limited Edition French Chateau theme, including the new Museum, Restaurant and Pavillion that can all be purchased from the Market for varying amounts of Farm Cash. The new Mystery Wings Box made its debut this week, introducing some very special new winged animals to FarmVille. So far, this box appears to be a big hit with you guys so if you haven’t had a chance to get this new and improved Mystery box yet, make sure to grab one from the market before they disappear.

And as things start to warm up over here at the FarmVille offices, spring themed items are slowly starting to make their way into the market, starting with the new Chick – n – egg and the Egg Fence. Both of these items can be purchased for Farm Cash and coins from the Market for a limited amount of time.

We also released our first spring themed feature this week. The new Spring Basket allows you to collect Spring Eggs from your friends and redeem them for special items.

Now, this feature works almost exactly like the Valentine’s Day Box and the Pot of Gold so many of you may be familiar with how this event works. But for any of our new users who might be looking for some guidance, here are some quick tips to get you on your way.

Upon opening your giftbox you will find a Spring Basket waiting for you. After you place the Spring Basket on your Farm, you will be able to start collecting! Now, in order to collect Spring Eggs, you’ll have to receive them from friends as gifts. Eggs can be sent to Neighbors via the free gifts page. One key difference to the Spring Basket is that you are able to find Eggs when fertilizing a Neighbors Farm. Clicking the ‘Ask for Eggs’ button will allow you to send a single Spring Egg to any of your friends (just like the Free Gifts page), and give them the chance to send you one in return. (Note: You can only Ask for or Send Love to 10 Neighbors every 24 hours.)

As stated in the message you receive when first opening the Spring Basket, new farmers that have been playing for 7 days or less can send out more Eggs at a time. New farmers can send three Spring Eggs to a single friend.

Upon receiving and accepting a Spring Egg it will appear in your gift box. Clicking "Use" will place the gift in your box automatically. As you collect gifts, each item you can unlock will be revealed as you collect the proper amount of gifts, and the "redeem" button will become available for each item. Clicking "Redeem" will award you the gift in return for the proper amount of Spring Eggs.

Every 5 Spring Eggs you collect, you’ll be able to post a Feed to your wall to alert your Friends of how well you’re doing and give them a chance to collect a free Spring Egg. 10 Neighbors will be able to collect one free Spring Egg when clicking on the feed within 24 hours.

For each notch on the meter of your Spring Egg progress bar, your basket will change appearance, overflowing with more and more gifts.

Clicking ‘Progress’ in the Spring Basket menu will show how many Spring Eggs you have in comparison to your friends. We all know that a little bit of healthy competition always makes things more fun, so make sure to keep track of your friend’s progress!

Now, before I get into answering some questions from the community, there is a quick change to Horse Stables that I want to fill you guys in on. Previously, the Pink Haired Ponies and the Brown Ponies would only produce brown foals when placed in the Horse Stable. As of March 25th, Brown Ponies and Pink Ponies will now produce Pony Foals when placed in the Horse Stable with a Stallion!

I’m sure this will make all of our pony lovers out there very happy. Ok, so let’s go ahead and get into answering some questions from the FarmVille Community!

1) Our first question comes to us from Calyr Elf and they'd like to know if they'l be able to finish their La Maison building once the materials are no longer available in the market. Once the buildable La Maison has expired, you'll no longer be able to send out its building materials, and the frame will no longer be available for purchase in the Market. If you've got any gift requests for the La Maison building materials that haven't expired yet, you can still accept them before they do. If you still can't finish the La Maison in time, you'll be able to purchase the rest of the construction for Farm Cash in the same way you can purchase an incomplete Chicken Coop expansion. The base cost to finish will be 50 and each piece of the La Maison you have in place already will subtract 1 Farm Cash from the total. So if you've already collected 25 pieces, you'll be able to purchase the rest of the construction at a cost of 25 Farm Cash.

2) Ms Nee would like to know 'What are those floaters that appear when plowing? They look like golden potatoes.' This is a question a lot of our new users have, and to answer you, the coins are a random chance for players to win 100 coins while plowing, planting or harvesting. It happens completely randomly with any kind of crop. If you see the coin above your head, 100 additional coins should be added to your balance. You can find answers to questions like this in the New User Support section of our forums, specifically tailored to help our newer Farmers get their bearings.

3) Our last question comes from IILtdesq, and they actually have a question about a feature that was mentioned in my last podcast. They want to know that if you get a foal from your stable, does that mean you'll never be able to get another consumable? Just so it's crystal clear, finding a foal does NOT affect your future chances of find any consumables. It just means that you will not find any consumables at that time. The next time you collect from your stable, you still have a chance of finding consumables as well as producing a foal.

Remember Farmers, if you have a question that you would like answered by the FarmVille team, please make sure to visit the official farmville forums or www.farmville.com for more details.

And for this week’s coming soon section, I actually have some more information for you guys about a feature I briefly discussed in last week’s podcast.

I’m sure some of you may have seen our loading screen image teasing the new “Co-op Farming”. As I said in last week’s podcast, FarmVille will soon feature new jobs that you can complete with your friends. Folks in FarmVille will ask for help completing various farming jobs. You will be able to team up with your friends and Neighbors to tackle these jobs for various rewards. Each one of these jobs will have a timer. If you and your friends finish the mission before your time expires, you will earn a Gold, Silver or Bronze Medal upon completion, depending on how quick and efficient you all were. The Faster you finish, the better the medal. In addition to this, if you and your Neighbors are savvy enough to earn a Gold Medal, you will unlock a very special prize.

This new feature is sure to add a very exciting new aspect to a game we all love. Since you guys have gotten a good peek into the details of this feature, it would be greatly appreciated if you could provide us with some feedback. Please make sure to visit the Official FarmVille forums if you have an opinion about this upcoming feature that you would like to share with us.

And lastly, we have some very cool new Limited Edition items heading your way in the coming weeks. In addition to a regularly scheduled Mystery Box, there will also be a very special April Fools Mystery Box available for a Limited Amount of time. And as mentioned last week, our Spring Themed Limited Edition items will be coming soon, including a Chocolate Cow, Egg Shaped houses and some very cute bunnies.

Alright Folks, that’s it from me this week! I will be back this coming Friday to give all of you your latest FarmVille news and updates. Again, my name is Lexilicious and I will see you guys soon! Happy Farming everybody.

= See Also =
 * Official FarmVille Podcasts
 * FarmVille Updates