In your Face

Yo, listen up everybody. Facebook is NOT a gaming platform!

Honestly, guys, there are WAY better games out there! Stop this madness! I mean, sure, some of the games in Facebook can be a little fun, and the social aspect to them is pretty neat and addicting, but the whole thing has gotten out of hand!

This morning I got a "friend suggestion" from FB and decided to click the "see all" link, because at times that's how I find people I've forgotten about. What do I get? A long list of random people! And I know these are people who my friends have befriended only to have more energy on Mafia Wars or more coins on Yoville. I just know.

WHY ON EARTH would you have a stranger as a friend only for Yoville coins? This random guy from halfway across the globe will now have access to your baby pictures! Even if you carefully set all your privacy settings (or make an entirely fake profile), this person will have some sort of access to your profile, but just being "linked" to you I find disturbing.

What's even worse is when people stop using these social networks for, well, socializing, and just play these silly games. I have a couple friends that won't answer my messages or update their status, but I have to constantly "hide" the crap these applications post on their walls! Then there's the fact that sometimes it's THEM posting, not just the application, and some friends I care too much about to "hide" entirely.

All of these games have crappy graphics and little or no playability, some aren't even games. The only "fun" part is sharing with your friends and you're defeating the purpose by sharing it with strangers! And no, you will never get to know this person, you're not making friends.

When I first got into FB I tried playing Yoville only because everyone else was doing it and I figured it must be fun. I blocked the application by the time I knew what it was about. Then it was FarmTown (or was it FarmVille? same crap). I thought it'd be fun since I've always been a fan of the Harvest Moon series. I played for a few minutes and blocked the application. Slow, choppy animations, butt-ugly avatars and this game-mechanic that's obviously designed to spread like a virus: you only advance by recruiting others and logging back on at set periods of time or else you "lose" points or energy or coins or whatever. This logic is used in other web games, but when combined with social networks it becomes lethal. Last one I tried was Battle Stations, which promised to be more fun as it featured console-RPG-ish battle sequences and PVP gameplay. In the end it's the same concept with a different GUI.

So (based on this trend) here's a step-by-step review of every other Facebook game ever:

1. You make a butt-ass-ugly avatar
2. You note there is no "winning" or "losing" in this game, still you refer to it as a "game"
3. You gather resources/amass wealth/dress up real pretty/level up
4. You are told if you invite your friends you will get free gifts/more energy/cuter clothes/coins
5. You invite your friends
6. You realize you don't have enough friends
7. You begin to hate the friends that don't join your neighborhood/crew/kitchen/gang/army
8. You do some strategic googling
9. You join the "-=GET 10000 energy per hour JOIN to find out how - IT WORKS!=-" group on FB and befriend all the members
10. You start ignoring posts from family and friends as you quickly scan your wall for fish/cakes/ammo
11. You realize one of your fake friends is a pedophile
12. You realize all your efforts are still not enough and whip out your credit card for some easy coins/energy/rare items/cows
13. You run out of energy and set a timer to come play again when it's restored
14. Repeat from step 3

If you want to play cool games on your computer go to Newgrounds and check out the near infinite amount of awesome games they got that do not require you to recruit friends or get addicted. There are several such pages, just Google them up.

Here's a quick list of specific games you might wanna try:

• Tuper Tario Tros., an excellent Super Mario Bros/Tetris mash-up
• Chronotron an interesting puzzler in which you manipulate time
• First Person Tetris, Tetris to the EXTREME
• Spy Battle 2165, an addicting game that does not rely on FB

I'm stumped at the moment but these should keep you busy. Just... stay away from these FB "games"!