Frustrations on FarmVille...

I don't want interrupted when I am working, comes from computing artillery firing data and needing the correct answer in limited time. People depended on my product for years before the computers came along and no one needed to compute anymore, just push buttons in the proper sequence. I had that problem on typing into the computer at work, to get the materials done, the emails answered and having to stop to answer some fool question, or flight of fancy for one of my crew or a patron. I didn't do that well.

Now I am retired and don't have any production to fret over, so I start playing a game to support one of my sisters. the game has interest, is scored and I get my rewards. The most fascinating thing for me is the great differences in the players, the farms they build and their ideas of life expressed virtually. I think I am finished but will maintain my farm, just go to longer crop harvests. I don't think the game designers wanted my type of player, but I have noticed like Facebook itself, the game either catches you or it doesn't and you just fade away. The number of six plowed plots farms that withered to dustbowls is probably pretty high. Like not completing high school, lots of quitters in the virtual world.

The game designers really wanted players to pay for instant gratification, but allowed the free players to keep those paying helped. The more neighbors, even ones not building anything one had the larger your own farm could become. Which is why I think women win big time, or retired folks with lots of friends and time on their hands. There are too many things that require you to bother others with your farm, every time you do well, advance, find some collectible, get a reward -- you can help someone else that follows you on FaceBook to share the reward (pretty cool), which may mean that email to your account would allow you to grab a great gift quickly before someone else. I was always a bit too slow on the one of prizes, if there were a couple I could reap a gift or reward.

My frustration was when I would get a pop-up to share news, reward, gift or prize while I was trying to plow the fields, harvest or seed, take care of the stock or just wander my farm or help out the neighbors. I was on a mission and didn't need to stop my activities for the game - but the designers wanted me to stop, the designers wanted me to pay attention to the ads on the pages around my farm, and I liked it borderless as long as I was working (no ads and complete coverage of the farm). The other frustration is the need for friends to send you pieces of buildings you are building, but seemingly without a good message system, and the game designers want you to spend real money on virtual weathered boards? I don't think so, I am needing two weathered boards for my French Maison, and I don't have any FarmVille dollars left to buy two with, but if I go up two more levels and get one per level I can complete the building, which is a cool building.

It isn't as cool as the Shamrock Castle that I live in on my farm (no I haven't named the animals yet, but I do pet them for grins). Now that the real shooting season is beginning, more mad motorcycling weather coming and my wife bringing me pumpkin tea to sip this evening -- and finding other bloggers preparing to virtually retire from FarmVille farming (no virtual pension checks to worry over) maybe I am now just going to be a Gentleman Farmer. I did make level 37 Clever Farmer and can grow Asparagus, have 560,000 FV coins, and a nice laid back farm. Only a few more Blue Ribbons to win, but I have people to meet in the real world, books that tickle my mind - The Female Brain by Louann Brizendine, MD (she wrote one about the Male mind, but one mind at a time is my limit). Got to go, duty calls and I want to enjoy the pumpkin tea with wife. Night!