The Order of Things in YoVille

Day Twenty

For those of you new to the game, as I am, you may be interested in the order of rewards and upgrades.
When I first "moved in" to my "free" apartment on YoVille, I noticed that there was no bathroom in the apartment. I though that this was because it was a virtual community, and virtual people and animals don't have to go "potty". But as I mentioned in previous post, weird doors keep popping up from nowhere. At first I thought that I was getting even more senile in my old age, and that I just hadn't been as observant as I use to be. However, I now know that your apartment has a pre-program capacity to upgrade itself as you acquire more points.

Each level gives you prizes. They can be a new action, pose or a dance, new item or an item-upgrade, and even a new room! For every 5 levels you complete you get a new title and as you progress, also the free (Facebook) gifts are unlocked one by one.

***SPOILER***

If you don't want to know what you get on YoVille, do NOT read any further.

I have to give credit to a place called yvlounge (http://www.yvlounge.com/) for most of this information, and to the Yoville Forum at http://www.yoville.com/. It has been edited and corrected, and the errors removed.


Here is what you can expect: I have included your YoVille title, the point system, the items you are allowed to gift, the medals you will receive, and the dance moves (that eat up your energy),too.

Levels

1. New Yo in Town
2. New Yo in Town, Mood Lamp, 10pts
3. Laugh, 30pts
4. Air Guitar, Zynga shirt, 50pts
5. Rookie Royale, Master Bathroom, 80pts
6. Party Lamp, Wind up Penguin, 120pts
7. Impatient, 170pts
8. Bronze Medal, 230pts
9. Egyptian, 310pts
10. Yo Q. Public, Hall of friends, black chair and ottoman
11. Angry, 510pts
12. I’m Hot, 630pts
13. Budding Tree, Pop sneakers, 770pts
14. Running Man, 930pts
15. Prodigy, Flowering Cherrytree, 1100pts
16. Yawn, Light destroyed skinnies, 1400pts
17. 2 Kewl 4 U, 1700pts
18. In Love, 2000pts
19. CanCan, Jack-in-the-box, 2300pts
20. Upstanding Citizen, Guest Bathroom, 2700pts
21. KungFu, 3100pts
22. Be Gone!, Spherical Red Chair, 3500pts
23. Mystery Bookshelf 1/3, 3900pts
24. Moonwalk, 4400pts
25. Socialite, Mystery Bookshelf 2/3, Toy robot, 4900pts
26. Touchdown, 5400pts
27. Tough Guy, 6000pts
28. Gold Medal, Barrel Costume, 6600pts
29. Disco, 7300pts
30. Civic Centered Yo, Mystery Bookshelf 3/3Surprise...Magic Room), 8000pts
31. Shadowboxing, Toy Monkey, 8700pts
32. Model Fabulous, 9500pts
33. Wave, 10300pts
34. Krunk, 11200pts
35. Cosmopolitan, Guest Bedroom, Birthday Cake, 12100pts
36. PU!, 13100pts
37. Head Spin, 14100pts
38. Purple Medal, 15200pts
39. Pop & Lock, Sunflower Pinwheel, 16300pts
40. Local Yocal, Basic Herb Garden, 17500pts
41. Sit Ups, 18700pts
42. Sit on Ground, 20000pts
43. Herb Garden, Treasure Chest, 21300pts
44. Hip Hop Spin, 22700pts
45. Resident Yo, Swanky balcony, 24100pts
46. Backflip, 25600pts
47. Meditation, Tesla Ball, 27200pts
48. Rainbow Medal, 28800pts
49. Uber, 30500pts
50. Master Yovillian, Magical Herb Garden, 32200pts

At this point level 50 is the highest level one can attain.

Glitches, Glitches, and Still More Glitches

Day Three:


It started with a little green retro calculator that I bought for my bedroom desk. It disappeared from my bedroom in my virtual apartment. I looked everywhere. At first, I thought that it was some mistake I had made, so I checked the YoVille forum, to find out how to fix it. Then I learned that it wasn’t a thief that had burgled my apartment, but the dreaded Glitches!

Furniture that I had bought just disappeared. The server connection would demand that I refresh, and more things would disappear. Of course, the coins I had earned were gone.

In all fairness to Zynga, they definitely tell you upfront that this a Beta issue of the game. The terms of service are incredibly restrictive, in my personal opinion. So much so, that I couldn’t believe that this was an American company. And, they indicate that, basically, you agree to just take what you get. But, I still wanted my coins back.

So, I file a support ticket request, and complained in the forum. I found hundreds of other complaints, and knew that I was in good company.

The problem seems to relate to how one purchases their items. There is a drop and drag feature that allows one to test the furniture before you actually buy. I now have to forego that feature.

In the meantime, I am still playing and getting more hooked by the minute.

***

Day Five

This weird door is behind my window in my bedroom. I am not sure where it came from.

This is scary, it just popped out of nowhere.

***

Day Eight:


I am right on schedule. I reached level eight. How? By accomplishing each of the missions, each day. And, by making something called a “coin runs”. I now have a Bronze Medal.

A coin run is a visit to http://www.yoville.com/, not to play the game, but to search the profile of other players. On a good day I can find “pots of gold”, each containing five coins. In addition to which, I am asked to “turn back on the lights, on a players’ profile. There are also gifts that are given. Each coin run equates to another 100 coins.

At the end of the day, I have another 500 coin from my missions and coin runs. I either save it, or use it to buy stuff. And with each purchase, my point total elevates.

My job on YoVille is to work in a bakery. As far as I can tell, that is everyone’s job. You earn coins and points for baking certain items. Nowhere in the world does it take two days to bake a chocolate cake, except in YoVille. I think the rationale is to allow people time to go to their job and live their real life.

But for me, home recuperating from a small stroke, it allows me to bake items that take 4 hours during the day, and then return to a twelve hour schedule overnight. It helps to pull in a few more coins.
In the meantime, I am fixing up my little apartment. Did I say little... My apartment is growing!

First, this mystery door appeared behind my window in my bedroom, when I reached level 5, and now, other strange things are happening. I just hadn't noticed it before. This is getting interesting.

Living the Good Life in YoVille

Day One:

To paraphrase the singer, Madonna, I am a virtual girl living in a virtual world in YoVille.

YoVille is an interactive virtual community built by Zynga games, (http://www.zynga.com/).

According to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, “Zynga is a casual game developer located in San Francisco, California, United States. They develop browser-based games that work both stand-alone and as application widgets on social networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace.

Founded in July 2007 by Mark Pincus, Michael Luxton, Eric Schiermeyer, Justin Waldron, and Steve Schoettler. they received $29 million in venture finance from several firms lead by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers in July 2008, at which time they appointed former Electronic Arts Chief Creative Officer Bing Gordon on to the board. It was at this time that they also bought YoVille, this large virtual world social network game.

According to their website, as of December 2009, they had 60 million daily active users".

I am one of those users, and access the game through Facebook.

In YoVille, you can do almost all the things that you do in the real world, except there is no illness, no death, and no family units. Another exception is that the games give you a place to live, so no one is homeless, and a job to do, so there is no unemployment. Members of the community can communicate with each other, and participate in social activities, through the computer keyboard. One can do things that you have difficulty doing in real life. As a handicapped person in real life, in YoVille, once more I can run and walk.

The concept of the game is to accumulate items. The basics of the game are fairly straightforward…One performs specified missions (tasks) and receives payment in coins, and points. One then uses the virtual payments to buy things to decorate the apartment given you by the game, and to subsequently, buy more property (houses) and clothes. You further receive points for the things that you buy. You also use the coins received to buy food (energy) to meet the requirements of your avatar (your graphic representation of yourself).

Completing your "missions", a main feature of the game, consume a certain amount of energy. After expending energy, it slowly replenishes to the character's maximum amount. This can take minutes to several hours (energy replenishes whether or not you are logged into the game).

Your avatar can engage in additional missions, after you refill your energy. Waiting for your energy to replenish is a significant limiting factor in the games, so it is necessary to buy “food”.

There are fifty levels to the game. My goal is to reach level 50 in only 50 days.
I plan to blog about what I learn.

I invite you to follow me through this world.