Is Zynga Planning on Taking on The Sims?

As EA and Playfish gear up for the much-anticipated release of The Sims Social on Facebook, rumors are swirling that Zynga is already working on a competitive game, which may be called FamilyVille.

As Fusible reports, this past March the URL familyville.com was purchased by the same company that has purchased other domain names for Zynga in the past, including rewardville.com. Of course, since Zynga hasn't officially announced anything, the idea that FamilyVille, if it is indeed a game at all, is a Sims-style experience, is 100 percent rumor.

That being said, it does seem rather likely. The Sims< is one of the few brands that could potentially challenge Zynga's stranglehold on Facebook, so it only makes sense that the developer would be looking to counter The Sims Social with its own game.

The Road to Facebook Credits: On the Home Stretch With New Payment Options

Facebook is requiring that Credits be the only payment option for social games as of July 1st. We've been examining the late stages of the transition process in recent weeks, including the steps that large developers and mid-market developers have taken toward the new payment system. At this point, the great majority of gaming developers on Facebook are already using Credits. It's a few regional developers who  have had challenges with the integration, which explains some of the latest updates Facebook has been making to payout options around the world. Here's a closer look at what we see going on.

Regional developers — companies with one or two games popular in a single language region — seem to have had a slower transition than others. We're aware of massively multiplayer online Facebook games in Asia that currently do not have any kind of implementation. We also recently reviewed restaurant simulation TinierCafe, which hasn't integrated Facebook Credits, suggesting that even at least a few regional developers with a good foot in the North American or European markets are still monetizing separately.

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