As the school day finishes, for most it’s an opportunity to finish up homework and watch favored TV shows, but for junior Kristina Orlando it’s just the beginning of her daily chores. Each day she has to milk over 30 cows, sheer sheep and tend to ducks, horses and chickens. Besides caring for her animals, she has to pluck the juicy-ripe fruit from her acres of banana, cherry, orange and other assortments of trees. And, to make her life even tougher, she has to plow land, plant seeds and harvest the crops every day. Surprisingly his isn’t Idaho or Wyoming, this is Farmville, a new online farming game that has swept through the Facebook world. Farmville is a Facebook application that allows its users to own and tend to their personal virtual farms. With over a hundred options and design plans, Farmville aspires to lure in its users. The game offers an array of farm animals, seeds, trees and buildings that promise to never let users go bored. Users can do anything from plowing land and growing crops to raising animals and harvesting trees. Just like every other online “reality” game, Farmville gives its members many options to keep the fun at a seemingly nonstop level, and, just like every other game, it comes with a hidden addiction warning-label. “At first I just thought it [Farmville] was really stupid,” junior Kristina Orlando said. “Now, I love it! It’s so much fun that it might be a problem.” This systematic game isn’t just attracting teenagers, but people of all ages. According to www.telegraph.co.uk, Farmville is taking over this month’s gaming poll as the application with the most users per day and a whopping total of 30 million users per month. With such eminent statistics, Farmville is expected to emerge as Facebook’s all-time most popular application. With its cute features and easily-earned coins, it’s no wonder why students have taken a liking to this online obsession. Farmville grants users the power to control all of their possessions, for example, if they plant soybeans and don’t harvest them within the given time,
than their crops wither, and if they harvest them in time, than they are rewarded an ample amount of coins. So, for each action there is either reward or consequence. “I don’t want my stuff to die,” junior Robert Delfin said. “So, I check my farm everyday.” Although most users play Farmville for the pure thrill of it, there are some who prefer to take a more strategic view of gaming. These “faithful” players feel energized from tackling high scores, pumped up after buying new gear and successful when they advance their neighbors’ level. “I take Farmville pretty seriously,” Delfin said. “I have check my farm before I can do anything else.” With only 24 hours in a day, students spend most of it planting pumpkin seeds as opposed to doing something more productive, like homework or studying. Farmville might promise a good time, but underneath its several cheerfully colored layers, it reeks of distraction. Students have placed Farmville as number one on their list of priorities. “I do my homework in front of the computer just so that I can wait for my crops to be done,” Orlando said. Farmville’s layout and master design does much more than capture its users; once the game has you, it intends to keep you, even if it means taking time out of your daily life. Students have begun to focus more on their gaming level than their grades, and with college in view for most of them, distraction is something that certainly doesn’t help. “Now that school is getting harder I try to play less and less,” Orlando said. From the sea of students that CCHS caters to, there are a select few who have decided to take a more repugnant stand on Farmville. They aren’t as readily attached to this whole online fad that seems to be spreading like wildfire.
“I think people could use their time better on more important things,” junior Noa Shani said. “I’d rather do other things with my time than be on a virtual farm. It seems like such a waste of time.” As seasons come and seasons go they bring new obsessions and naturally take them away. With Farmville being on top of the gaming world, only time will tell if this is just another craze or a long lasting trend.