Farmville Guide

Farmville Walkthrough 

Unofficial Farmville Guide by Chris Boots-Faubert for SuperCheats.com
Updated: 16 May 2011, V1.0

First I want to welcome you to the Unofficial SuperCheats Guide to Farmville -- the most popular and complex game on Facebook today.

G'day G'day!  Welcome to Farmville!

This guide will provide players of every skill level with useful information, tips, and hints, and can serve as a road map to attaining the highest levels of the game without spending the time and the money that most players have to spend to get there.  The objective from the start in writing this guide was to chart out a course that packs in all of the fun of playing the game while at the same time removing the burden of having to spend real-world money getting there.

According to the most recent statistics, on an average day between 30 and 50 million people spend at least some of their time tending to a farm in the Facebook game Farmville -- a web-based Flash game that features about what you would expect from a game that loosely simulates farming.  Statistically eight out of every ten players spend real-world money purchasing virtual currency and coin in the game, with the average weekly amount hovering at $20, which when you do the math, works out to over $1,000 a year.  Seriously.

Another statistic you may find startling is that it takes the average player just over one year to reach Level 50 in the game, and seven months to reach the "Plantation" Level of Farm size.  seven out of every ten players collect one or more types of animal in the game, with the most popular being the event and limited edition cows, and half of the people playing Farmville today started playing in the last year. 

The secret to the incredible success of the game has a lot more to do with instant gratification and the social aspects of its play than it does any particular special aspects about the game -- the average gamer ends up playing the game because one of their friends invited them to -- making it a near-perfect fit for the social networking platform.

What keeps gamers coming back is the easy to attain success that play provides, combined with the visual evidence -- in the form of virtual trophies -- that result from play.  These take the form of rare animals, plants, and trees, and special signs awarded for mastering a given crop, tree, or crafting item.

There are special buildings, event-based items, and holiday items that can only be acquired by playing the game daily, and a carrot in the form of new play options based upon the level the player has obtained, giving the player easy to grasp goals to strive for.

Competition plays a major role in the game, with friends competing to make their farm better than their neighbors, and recent additions to the game include a crafting system, tree orchards, and expanded buildings that add to the gaming aspects, permitting gamers to diversify their play in order to stand out in a particular area in contrast to their mates.

That sums up the technical details that contribute to the success of Farmville on Facebook, but in simple terms, the reason that the game is so successful is that it is fun. If the statistics are correct, about half of the gamers who visit our site either play Farmville, or have played it in the past, and the rest are likely to try it at some point in the future.

In spite of the clear system of play in the game, there are still many aspects that elude players, making the journey from new player to expert a long and often frustrating one.  Fortunately you decided to read this guide!  It will teach you all of the things that you need to know to go from newb to natural very quickly -- and turn your farm into the envy of all of your mates!

The SuperCheats Unofficial Guide to Farmville will provide you with a solid reference manual for every aspect of play, and includes tips, hints, and tricks that are used by players who rank in the top 1% in the game.  Bookmarking the guide is an obvious step -- printing out your own copies of the reference sections and in particular the crop and tree tables, mastery information, and the tick-lists in the Appendixes is also a very good idea. 

If you have a question about the game chances are very good that this guide already answers it, so our recommendation to you is a simple one: sit down at your computer with your beverage of choice and a nice snack, and spend a few hours reading this guide from start to finish. 

When you come out at the other end of this guide you will have acquired a level of knowledge and familiarity with the game -- and the tricks for maximizing fun, profit, and advancement -- that in the real world would be the equal to an undergraduate degree, making you not just an expert on the game, but a force to be reckoned with in the population of gamers active in Farmville!

Good luck, good fortune -- but remember that despite the science and the technique this is still just a game -- and it is a game that you are meant to enjoy and find entertainment in.  So make sure you are having fun!