Futurology: FarmVille on Facebook

Nothing bad ever happens in FarmVille. At least, that's what I'm told by one friend and dedicated player.

Perhaps that is the attraction of the agricultural Facebook application, which has somehow managed to attract more than 49 million users since it was launched in June — proving that if you're anybody worth knowing on Facebook, you must be a farmer.

FarmVille, produced by Zynga (the same people who produced the popular game MafiaWars), is a simple social game in which players create and manage virtual farms. Tending to crops, growing (which actually takes real-time hours and days), harvesting and selling them earns users money and experience points. Then, you can buy more crops, animals, farm equipment and outbuildings.

You can also invite your friends to come and farm in the plot next to yours, and help them out by watering or harvesting their crops for them. If you're feeling really generous, you can even buy them a cow as a gift.

It's addictive. So addictive, in fact, that the makers cunningly tempt you — if you're too impatient to wait for your crops to grow — to pay for extra "farm coins" via credit card (well, they had to be making money somehow).

Anyone who is a fan of Facebook gaming will probably have noticed FarmVille's similarity to Farm Town — a predecessor which does pretty much all the same things, except with a few extra features such as a marketplace and a saloon where you can meet other players and even get a job on one of their farms. But Farm Town is languishing at 18.8 million users.

It is, frankly, just not the trendy town to farm in. It's like Bromley to FarmVille's Shoreditch. No, if you want to be seen in the right place this season, you'll be heading to FarmVille.