raphaeline

I'm really looking forward to this! *dances*

That's so cool! I'm so jealous! I really liked the last of the four items you had to collect to get it - I don't have CC but that room makes me wish I did!

I added a screenshot to my original post! I don't know if they do change it everyday because I tried it again to no avail. But I would consider this a LOT better than the offers they usually give; you don't have to fill anything out, or give any information away. Just click and watch a commerical, save the game and you're 1 CC richer! I STILL don't like that they're making so many of the items CC items, but I think that if they keep offering this, I'm not angry like I was

Oh, it worked! I didn't think it did at first, but after I saved and closed the game, it showed up that I had 1 CC when I loaded it again. It seems I can do this every day. I like this!

Has anyone else seen this offer below the Flash game? It says if you watch a video, they'll give you a CC for it. I watched it, but I wasn't really sure if there was some kind of procedure... it opened in another tab, I muted it and let it run through while I put the baby to bed, and when I came back I closed the tab. There weren't any instructions or anything, so I don't really know what they wanted me to do. I hope that this does work out, and they offer it more, if they're going to keep making so many new CC items! I don't mind watching a few adverts instead of paying for them!

I really like some of the winning outfits but I'm also disappointed with PF/EA about the amount of CC items they've brought out recently. It takes so much fun out of the game when I check to see what's out and I realize I won't get much of the latest items because they expect me to break out my wallet!

It's beneficial for me since I don't use CC (I have in the past once or twice when my husband bought them for me as bday/xmas gifts), but I don't think it's fair.

What a cool idea!!

I wanted the wig very badly but I don't want to encourage PF/EA in their recent increase of CC items. Is it just me, or are over half the items CC these days?!

Aw, I didn't get mine! I get Playfish stuff all the time and nothing. Oh well, it wasn't my favorite looking wig anyway ... maybe I'll get it soon. *pout*

By the time I found Hideeni for the first time, I already had one friend wearing the pineapple mask XD I don't think they're a hacker, but people are going crazy over these and collecting them like mad (me included)!

*APPLAUSE* They've upped the number of Boutique items and I'm just not giving in. I don't know if it's EA trying to make it into a paid game or what, but I'll quit before I spend real money on a Flash game. I pay for World Of Warcraft because that took effort to make and TONS of work to maintain - Pet Society is in two dimensions for goodness sake. I'm not spending cash on paper dolls! :dirol:

You know, I think I realized what I was doing right after he was born. Since my husband was on family leave from work, and the baby slept all the time, I had just as much spare time as I did when I was on bed rest (I had some pretty bad toxemia). But now, I usually wait until I have all my chores done and everything off my to-do list, and the baby is down for a nap. I try not to get on Pet Society when my husband is home so we can spend some time together rather than spaced out in front of our respective computers... he's a big WoW geek and even though we play WoW together, we both have a tendency to become zombies in front of our monitors now and again.

In retrospect, maybe not so much a business... it's not like there are more than, what, twelve employees at the very most? I can't imagine what even five people would do. Plus, there's not really much cost... it's all profit....

You're welcome! Like I said, I actually enjoy the game and that's what matters - there was a time, about a year ago, that I just cycled through facebook games all day long, one right after another. I'd have it all lined up so that just as I finished harvesting crops, I could do daily trips in Pet Society, then I'd move on to feeding an aquarium and so on until the crops were done, and then I'd start all over again. It took me a while to realize what I was doing (I was pregnant at the time and on bed rest, but I could have been doing a million other productive things rather than zoning out entirely in front of the computer) and I thought... I wonder how many other people have kind of become a zombie without realizing it. But since I found this forum and playing the game got a little more social, plus I found other ways to experience it and other things to do, like mini-photo shoots and experimenting with designing outfits and rooms. And it's still a business - they have to make money somehow. As long as I'm enjoying the game and not just spacing out (like I used to!) then I'm sticking around!

I was reading through a website the other day that had an article on ways Farmville hooks their players and convinces them to spend money on the games. Because it also applies to Pet Society, I thought I would share with my fellow players! The following is basically the article re-worded because the link and quoted article can't be posted. Some quick facts: - Zynga hired a full-time behavioral psychologist to learn methods of manipulating players. - Zynga is projected to rake in $1 billion in 2011. Google has invested in them. (This makes me wonder how much Playfish makes...) The advertising for these companies is done for them by the players; because we spend a lot of the game "sharing" things like Hideeni finds, accomplishments, sending gifts, posting pictures of our characters or helping build items, we essentially are sending advertisements not only to our other friends, even if they don't play the game. In fact, that they look so different keeps our brains from ignoring them. You know, once when I was watching some South Park online, they kept playing the same Green Day commercial at every single commercial break... now, I can't STAND to listen to them even though I liked them before. Eventually we start to hate seeing the same things over and over but the Facebook games change them just enough so that we don't start to get irate over it. The way players are convinced to spend money? They make it free to play as long as possible, but over time you’re exposed to the things that cost cash and by that point, you’re invested in the game. Only a small percentage of players give in, but that's all they need - 82% of Zynga's customers pay nothing, but the company rakes in $1 million a day from the other 18%. As far as providing new content, this is a pretty interesting quote from the article: Another is to keep giving people the same things in different packages. "New" items are introduced almost weekly - new only in appearance. It's a pretty rare case when a new item actually takes new programming. But to the player, it's seven new barns! And this part applies to cooking, stadium, growing plants, and actually, it applies to daily visits... it makes you feel like you’re coming back whenever you want, but the important part to the company is that you DO come back. With dailies, there’s a little more pressure because it’s every 24 hours that it resets, but even if you feel like there isn’t a time limit with the other things, there is. Trees can’t produce any more than three fruits, so you have to come back and harvest to make room for more. It doesn’t matter if your dish is ready in 10 minutes or a day, you have to come back to rescue it from being burned. And studies have shown that people who think they chose to do something (even if they didn't) are more motivated than people who were forced to do that same thing. This next part was really helpful to notice for me because it applied to me while I was out shopping today at thrift stores where you can find things for a couple of dollars. ^_^ Apparently everyone has a dollar amount, and under that amount is what they consider small change. Since people are less likely to be concerned about small change, it feels like you’re getting a lot for practically nothing when you spend 5 or 10 bucks in game. It’s not like you’re shelling out $60 for a Playstation game, so you feel more okay about spending it. They call these "microtransactions," and it's become the next big thing in internet moneymaking. Everyone has a psychological price point and considers any amount below it "small change," and considers anything above it "enough money that I should be careful with it." This point varies from person to person and depends on what they're buying with it, but $5 usually comes in comfortably under, which gets a lot of people turning off the part of the brain that usually asks, "Do I really need this? Is this in my budget? Am I really thinking about buying fake money?" It seems iPhone applications work basically the same way. I’m not saying that everyone should quit playing - although I did delete all my applications after reading a similar article a few months ago, I get enjoyment out of Pet Society like all of us here do and I want to keep playing! I just thought that others might find this as thought-provoking as I did and give an idea of how these games make money and how they operate.

I want to CHOOSE my layers... I can't stand not being able to control what goes behind or in front of what!! But I love that they're fixing things - I'm eager to see something else in the stadium... I stopped going a long time ago.

Ohhhhhh never mind I found it!

What is the blog that everyone is referring to that is updated with new item info? I used to see it on the main page of PSFC but it's still on the jungle stuff. Also, where are the announcements that are made by PF?

I had no idea!!! I saved up the coins to buy one today and they were already CC!

I was halfway through reading your posts and was about to post this part myself. I don't understand why they want to discourage trading, though, considering they haven't gone to any trouble to allow us in game contact other then notes. Some other games allow two or more characters to be in the room and interact with each other - Farm Town has been doing that since I can remember. It makes the game far more interesting and you'd think since they aren't going to introduce something like that, they'd at least let us trade.

I can see how it would be considered cheating, but frankly, if I wanted to pay cash to play a game, I would be spending it on something like Warcraft, where I actually get to play with other people in the game (if it weren't for this forum, our characters have a lot less to do to play with each other). Finding the holes in the programming was part of the fun, and part of the benefit of being a long-time member. Besides, all this does is encourage true hacking in order to get what we otherwise couldn't - I'm a wife and mom, I don't have time to sit and wash in-game pets all day. If you're going to take away our shortcuts, PF, at least make it a little easier to play. I get that selling us PF Cash is your way of making money, but there are plenty of other games I can play for free and not have to work at it like a second job.

I dug one up and it took me forever to realize it's wearable, and not an inventory item!

We mostly went with black and white themes, didn't we?