Podcast Transcript 2010-01-08

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= Official FarmVille Podcast – January 8th Transcript =

Hey, farmers, welcome once again to the official FarmVille podcast. My name is Lexilicious and I am the FarmVille Community Manager. As per usual, we’re going to be going over some of our newest releases, you guys are all going to get a sneak peek of things coming to FarmVille in the near future, and this week I’m really excited to announce the arrival of a new segment of the FarmVille podcast. We are now allowing users to submit questions to the FarmVille team via the official FarmVille forums. We will answer three to five user-submitted questions a week, so you guys can get to learn a little bit more about how things work in the FarmVille offices. Alright, on that note, let’s get started in discussing some of our new releases.

Uh, this week was a pretty crazy week for everybody on FarmVille. One of the biggest highlights was the start of Free Fuel Week. Free Fuel Week works in a couple of different ways, so I want to quickly go over this feature and some of the details you guys might not be aware of. When you log in to FarmVille, you will see a pop-up informing you of how many free tanks of fuel you have earned for logging in. Each consecutive day you log in, you will earn additional fuel. For example, the first day you will earn one fuel tank; the second you will receive two tanks of fuel; the third consecutive day you log in, you receive three tanks of fuel, and so on, up to a total of seven fuel tanks for each user. If you miss a day, the process will start over and you will receive one tank of fuel the next day you log in. Please remember that you must wait 24 hours before you will get another tank of gas. This means if you first logged in at 2:00 Pacific Time, you will not receive your next tank of fuel until 2:00 Pacific Time the next day. You can also gift fuel to your friends: from the free gifts page, you can send 1/5 fuel refills to your neighbors. And, lastly, clicking on the fuel icon located on the left of the application will allow you to post a feed to your wall. Once you post a feed, up to five of your friends can click on it to receive a 1/5 fuel refill. We really hope you guys have been enjoying this event so far. If you haven’t had a chance to participate yet, make sure to get out there and join in on the fun.

Um, there was also some pretty significant changes made to the Chicken Coop this week. Uh, you can now feed chickens in your neighbors’ coops to increase the chance of finding Mystery Eggs. Again, I have noticed some questions popping up on the forums about how this feature works, so here’s a quick explanation for you guys. Upon collecting from your coop, if you don’t find a Mystery Egg, a pop-up will appear informing you that you can ask your neighbors to feed your chickens in order to increase your chances of finding Mystery Eggs. If you would like to ask your neighbors to feed your chickens, clicking the “Okay” button on the pop-up will allow you to post a feed to your wall. Neighbors that visit your farm, either through the feed or when visiting normally, are able to feed your chickens once every 24 hours. You will not be able to feed your neighbors’ chickens until you have fertilized their crops as well. If your neighbor has no crops to fertilize, you will be able to feed their chickens as per normal. Users who feed their neighbors’ chickens will receive one experience point and four coins. They also have a probability to find a maximum of three Mystery Eggs per harvest period. Upon finding a Mystery Eggs in a neighbor’s farm due to feeding their chickens, you will be given the option to post a feed to your wall to share the Mystery Eggs, just the same as finding Mystery Eggs on your own farm. If no Mystery Eggs are found, you will receive a pop-up informing you of such. Upon returning to your farm after your chickens have been fed, a pop-up will appear to inform you who has fed your chickens while you away – much like the pop-up you guys receive for fertilizing. Another fun change to the Chicken Coop is that if you do not find a Mystery Egg when collecting from your own coop, never fear. Users now have a chance at receiving coin bonuses from collecting extra-nice eggs from their coops.

We also released a bunch of new limited edition cowprint items this week. We have various different cowprint buildings and decorations that can be purchased from the market for both Farm Cash and coins. In addition to this, the new Morning Glory flower crop made an appearance this week. For anyone who might be interested, the Morning Glory is available at level 13, it yields 123 coins when harvested, and it costs 60 coins to purchase. The Morning Glories are actually one of my favorite crops that have been released so far. Along with the Morning Glory crop, we have some new giftable items: the cowprint Milk Jug and the Starfruit Tree. And, last but not least, we have released two new achievements for you guys: Egg-celent Discovery and Fenced In can now both be unlocked.

So, while we had many new releases this week, along with them came some pretty serious technical issues. As we work to add additional features and enhance gameplay for our users, from time to time we will encounter various technical problems, and we would like to sincerely appologize for any inconvenience these may cause. This week, the FarmVille team spent a lot of time focusing on adressing numerous backend bug fixes. We would like to thank you all again for your continued patience, support and understanding throughout the beta process. You guys are the best fans out there, and we know that our success is because of you.

Alright, so now I think it’s time to move on to our first ever user-submitted questions segment. Our first question is from GinaBones. “What are the FarmVille developers’ favorite released animals so far?” Well, Gina, I went around the office and I took a quick poll for you. It turns out that the FarmVille team’s favorite animals are B0V1NE-09, the Orange Tabby, and the Ugly Duckling.

Our next question is from one of our resident forum moderators, Ripperz. “How many people at any one time are working to fix bugs, design new stuff, and support the players?” Well, this is actually a pretty interesting question. All of the members of the FarmVille team are responsible for various tasks that keep the game running smoothly. Because FarmVille is such a dynamic game, the number of people working on any one task can vary, depending on the situation. We allocate resources accordingly to try to ensure we are providing the best possible service for you guys.

Alright, and our last question is from Aqualad08. “What are the artistic inspirations behind the look of the FarmVille animations?” I sat down with our senior artist to pick his brain about this one. He informed me that the art team’s inspiration for both the art and the animations in FarmVille come from various things. Our senior artist originally got his inspiration for the art in FarmVille from some of the classics: Disney, Peanuts, Calvin & Hobbes; but a lot of what influenced the original art was time. Due to time restrictions when FarmVille was being created, he found himself drawing freestyle to ensure he was able to produce lots of art assets in a short amount of time. What you see now is the product of that. As far as the animations are concerned, our senior artist informed me that the art team draws inspiration from numerous things, ranging from pop culture references to personal interests. Some animations are pretty straight-forward: animals, obviously, need to mirror real life; however, some of the more fun animations are a direct result of our art team’s wonderful sense of humor.

And I think that’s about it for user-submitted questions this week. Uh, firstly I would like to thank everyone that has participated so far. If you are interested in participating in the segment, and have a question about the FarmVille team that you would like answered, please feel free to check out the official FarmVille forums for more information.

Alright, well, I think it’s time for the part of the podcast you guys have been waiting on the edges of your seats for: it’s time for a sneak peek as to what is going to be coming your way in the near future. Firstly, I want to let you guys know that soon you will have an option to do something with your unused or unwanted items. This feature is going to be pretty cool. At some point or another, we will all end up with some unwanted things on our farms. So keep on the lookout for more information about this feature in the future. We will also be providing more activities relating to planting, plowing, harvesting, and friend missions in the near future. Along with this, we are planning on releasing some general purpose buildings for you guys, including things like a general store, a post office, and a bed and breakfast. Lastly, keep on the lookout for new mystery animals. Mystery animals are a new type of mystery box that contain animals that have never before been seen in FarmVille.

Alright, before we wrap this podcast up, I want to give a quick shout out to the winners of the Winter Holiday Decorating Contest, and a big thank you to everyone who participated. We had some absolutely stunning entries, and the FarmVille team had a blast looking at the creativity of our farmers. Alright, guys, uh, that’s about it for this week. My name is Lexilicious, and thank you all so much for listening. See you guys next time. Happy farming, everybody!

= See Also =
 * Official FarmVille Podcasts
 * FarmVille Updates