It's Official: CityVille dethrones FarmVille as Zynga's top Facebook game

Alright, so it didn't exactly happen yesterday, but CityVille has soared high above FarmVille's 56.8 million players with a massive (for these days) 61.7 million monthly players. It did what many thought was the impossible in just 22 days, according to Inside Social, and it took good old FarmVille four months to reach that size back in the day. While we've already explored what might have contributed to the game's blindingly fast rise to Zynga supremacy, it's impossible to tell how long this will last.

It will take at least another month for CityVille's numbers to stabilize--or at least slow down, for Pete's sake. These numbers are purely an accumulation of the amount of players who have logged into the game at least once in the past three weeks. Whether the game can hold the interest of its nearly 62 million players for a lengthy period of time has yet to be seen. However, if the game keeps growing at this rate, it could easily meet FarmVille's former glory of 84 million monthly players by 2011. Until then, Mark Pincus and the CityVille team can enjoy their early Christmas gift Scrooge McDuck style.

Can CityVille meet and surpass FarmVille's all-time high of 84 million players? How long do you think CityVille will last as Zynga's top game?

CityVille inventory limit raised to 2,000 - the sky's the limit!

As if the CityVille inventory cap hasn't been raised enough since the game's launch in late 2010, Zynga has announced that once again, the inventory cap has been raised. Up until this point, we've seen the inventory being raised (in multiple updates) from 100 items to the previous limit of 500 items. Now, though, since 500 items apparently doesn't allow players to store everything they could possibly need, you'll be able to store a whopping 2,000 items via the new inventory cap.

Seriously, Zynga? 2,000 items? Not that we're complaining about the extra space (which we've been given for free), but why even bother having an inventory limit at that point? Will the average player really ever have 2,000 items in their inventory at one time? Probably not, so why implement that seemingly arbitrary numerical limit on players at all?

Users don't have to deal with a tight inventory cap in FrontierVille, and in my opinion the game is better off for it. It'll be interesting to see just how far Zynga will increase the inventory cap before perhaps coming to the same conclusion that no inventory cap is better than having one, no matter how large.

What do you think of the 2,000 item limit in CityVille? Have you ever encountered a time where you ran out of room in your inventory?

CityVille Winter Clothing Quest: Everything you need to know

Brrrrr. It's cold out there in CityVille! After the release of winter snow on the landscape, your virtual little citizens have got to be freezing, walking around without coats, gloves or hats! That being the case, Zynga has released a new mission called Winter Clothing that will see you collecting such items for your city's inhabitants, of course via the help of friends.

The Winter Clothing mission requires the following:

7 Mittens
7 Winter Coats
7 Winter Hats

You'll be able to unlock any of these tasks for 45 City Cash, if you'd like to not bug your friends to help you, but for everyone else, you can click on the "Ask your friends!" button to post a news item to your wall asking your friends to help you. While you'll likely be able to receive 7 items fairly quickly through these wall posts (if you're like us and have a lot of your friends playing), you can also earn these items in the old-fashioned way - head over to the Free Gifts page and send one of these winter clothing items to your friends in the hopes that they'll send one back.

One other aspect that makes the wall posts the preferred method here is the fact that this is a "Give one, get one" situation - if you answer your friends' calls for help, you'll receive the same item in return. Two birds with one stone - gotta love it.

Make sure to take part in this new quest before your townspeople freeze in the cold! Note: If you don't see the mission appear the next time you start the game (the mission icon is a red hat and pair of mittens), refreshing the game should do the trick of forcing it to appear.

CityVille Game Updates: Holiday Tree event extended, new features are coming

A new batch of updates and bug fixes have been launched in CityVille this week, with Zynga announcing the lot of them via the game's official forums. There, we see that the game's Black Lab decorative item has been removed from the store, with the explanation being that it has been removed "in preparation for an upcoming feature."

While dogs in FarmVille is one thing, dogs in CityVille seem like they would always be decorative items, since you are playing from a true nameless, faceless perspective, and dogs are just downright tiny in the game. It will be interesting to see what this new feature Zynga speaks of turns out to be, and we'll be sure to let you know what it is, as soon as we can.

In other news, the 7th Franchise for higher level players has now been fixed, so that users can actually see, and therefore interact with, their 7th Franchise building from within the Franchise menu. Quest completion dialog boxes have been repaired, so that they will show up as expected after completing quests, rather than remaining invisible in some cases, and the overall Winter Wonderland quests have been made easier to allow those newer or lower level players (or just those players that don't have hours to dedicate to the game at once) a better chance of finishing them before they expire.

Speaking of expiration dates, the Holiday Tree event has been extended. If you've yet to reach the 80 present limit to finish the final quest, and the tree itself, you now have even more time to do so. You'll still need to hurry, however, as this extension definitely isn't permanent, and you won't want to waste any of this extra time that you've been given.

And there you have it! A complete rundown of updates and additions in the biggest game on Facebook. Enjoy!

Enter CityVille's SugarVille contest for up to 500 free City Cash

While City Cash may be one of the cheaper premium currencies in Zynga's catalog, that doesn't mean we all wouldn't like to receive some for free. Enter Zynga's new contest in CityVille called the SugarVille contest. As tons of players are likely to be covered in candy come the Easter holiday, Zynga wants users to put some of that candy to good use, by creating a real world building out of candy, whether the candy is packaged or unwrapped. The building can be a recreation of a CityVille item, a building in your home town, or something entirely created by you - the possibilities are endless, but the prizes are unfortunately not.

The prizes for this contest range from 500 City Cash for grand prize, to 50 City Cash for the final runner up. There will be five winners in all, and as this contest will take lots of time and creativity for players to participate in, it's likely that there won't be as many entries as other contests, giving you a better chance at winning. For full details, head over to the game's official forums.

Will you enter the CityVille SugarVille contest? What sorts of candies will you use to build your creation?

CityVille Level Up Giveaway #2: Enter to win City Cash or MacBook Air

If you're not the kind that wants to build a city out of real-world candy, but you still want a chance at free CityVille City Cash, why not enter CityVille's Level Up Giveaway #2? This contest doesn't require any real effort on your part, but the prizes are significantly better than in the aforementioned SugarVille contest. If the name Level Up Giveaway sounds familiar to you, remember that CityVille help a similar contest at the beginning of the year.

This time around, Zynga is hoping to raise the number of Likes on the game's official fan page to the 30 million mark, and once they reach that number, one very lucky grand prize winner will receive a free 13-inch, 256 GB MacBook Air. To enter, you'll need to first like game's fan page, and then send an email to the email address listed on the game's official forums, giving Zynga your Facebook ID number, and a way to contact you about your prize should you win.

From there, it's just a waiting game. The more fans the app's page receives, the better the prizes that will be given away. the page currently has 14.4 million likes, and here's how things play out from that number until the 30 million mark:

15 million fans - 25 players will win 100 City Cash each
20 million fans - 25 players will win 250 City Cash each
25 million fans - 5 players will each win an 8GB iPod Nano and 500 City Cash
30 million fans - 1 player will win 1,000 City Cash and the MacBook Air

Luckily, this contest has an indefinite time limit, as it will last until the game's fan page has received 30 million fans, which could take weeks or even months. Make sure to enter sooner, rather than later, though, if you want the best chance at the most prizes.

Which of these prize packages would you most like to win in this contest? What you would do with 1,000 free City Cash?

CityVille: Earn a free Tunnel decoration for playing Adventure World

While Adventure World has finally started seeing a push in its user base (to a current total of around 26 million players), that doesn't mean Zynga wants the growth to slow down. To help users discover its newest game, the developer has launched a cross-promotion between Adventure World and its largest game: CityVille. This promotion, like the FarmVille promotion that came before it, will give users some incentive to play AW by rewarding them with a prize back in CityVille at the end.

To be specific, a free Tunnel decoration (pictured at right) is up for grabs for all CityVille players that take the time to reach at least Level 7 in Adventure World. This is unfortunately two levels more than that required for the FarmVille cross-promotion, so you will need to keep chugging along until you level up two more times. To help you do that, we have guides on the game's starting Expeditions, along with the game's main story quests, so make sure to check out our guides to those events to help yourself level up as quickly as possible.

While you shouldn't have to, you should also remember to click on the "Play Now" button in the pop-up that appears in CityVille to activate this cross-promotion in your game. It's possible that Zynga will automatically track the players that have met both requirements (that is, those that play CityVille and are at least Level 7 in Adventure World), but clicking on this link should eliminate all doubt. Oh yeah, you'll need to do all of the above fairly quickly - your time limit for receiving your free Tunnel Decoration is October 6. On that date, all qualifying users will receive their prize, so don't worry if you don't receive it beforehand. Just make sure you meet the deadline if you want this free Tunnel in your town.

Will you play Adventure World to at least Level 7 to qualify for a free CityVille Tunnel? Sound off in the comments.

CityVille Metropolis items take the fun to the big city

If all of the small-scale businesses and homes in CityVille just aren't doing it for you, and you want some larger skyscrapers to sit beside your (probably) large franchises, you're in luck with the release of new Metropolis items in the game today. These items will be available for 15 days, and you'll be able to purchase either a Mystery Crate to try your luck at receiving a random item, or purchase some of these items outright. Fair warning: these items cost City Cash, so I hope you're ready to bust out your wallet.

Infinite Towers II (Home)

    * Costs: 110 City Cash
    * Population: 4000 - 7000 citizens
    * Rent: 532 coins every day


Destiny's Calling (Home)

    * Costs: 55 City Cash
    * Population: 1350 - 2650 population
    * Rent: 150 coins every two hours


Oasis Apartments II (Home)

    * Costs: 65 City Cash
    * Population: 1850 - 3650 citizens
    * Rent: 200 coins every four hours


Visual Art Academy (Community Building)

    * Costs: 70 City Cash
    * Raises maximum population cap by 5,000 citizens


In addition to these four items, the Metropolis Mystery Crate will give you a chance at one additional item - the Oasis Apartments I - along with three other items above (the Infinite Towers II, Destiny's Calling and Visual Art Academy). A single crate costs 55 City Cash, so unless you only win the Destiny's Calling, you'll really come out ahead over purchasing items individually. Keep in mind though, you might win duplicates in your quest to get all three at a "discount." As for the Oasis Apartments I, the exclusive item to this crate, it comes with a population of 2,000 - 4,000 citizens and provides 251 coins every eight hours in rent.

Again, these items, including the Mystery Crate are only available in the game for a limited time of around 15 days. We'll make sure to let you know if any themed decorations or businesses launch in this theme in the future, so keep checking back with us!

Will you purchase any of these Skyscrapers for use in your town, or will you try your hand with the Mystery Crate to see if you can walk away with an expensive item for "cheap?" Sound off in the comments.

CityVille Capital One Bank: Everything you need to know

While we already knew that Capital One would be appearing via a new bank building in CityVille, we didn't know the exact details until now. That's right - the promotion has launched in the game this evening, bringing with it the "branded business" in the form of the Capital One Bank. This bank looks like a fairly modern building, and has Capital One written along the top corner, but overall isn't overly "advertising." It costs 5,000 coins to add to your town, and must be built using four energy to build the frame.

From there, you won't be able to actually name your building, but you can operate it using Goods like other businesses. Specifically, the Bank requires 100 Goods to put into service and will reward you with 500 coins once those Goods are used. What makes this particular business special however is that it introduces "branded business mastery" to the game.

While this doesn't give us any sort of indication as to what other "branded" businesses will be coming to the game, we do know that we have just over a month to master this one. As with upgrading businesses, mastering the Capital One Bank will require you to continually stock and collect from the business whenever possible, with each round giving you a single point. Once you reach 50 points, you'll receive your reward, which we know is some form of decoration (probably a statue), but don't have the specific name as of this writing.

As for purchasing the building, it has a different time limit than that for actually earning your decorative reward. You can only purchase the Capital One Bank from the store for the next 28 days, giving you around a week to earn the decoration even after that point. Good luck!

Check out the rest of our CityVille Cheats & Tips right here.

What do you think of this Capital One Bank and the new branded business mastery feature? What sorts of branded businesses do you hope Zynga releases in the future? Sound off in the comments.

CityVille Neighborhoods: Everything you need to know

Check out our CityVille Neighborhoods Goals Guide right here.

Here we go, mayors. A new feature has been launched in CityVille that will help one of the biggest concerns I personally have with the game (and I know I'm not alone). A new Neighborhoods feature has launched to players above level 30, with at least 620 population, that will allow you to move homes (including high rises) into smaller areas to save space. This feature, you guessed it, is similar to the Mall feature, but here's a complete rundown of how this works for homes.

First and foremost, yes, you can have more than one Neighborhood in your town, and there are different types of Neighborhoods depending on the kinds of homes you'd like to store. Gated Communities cost 10,000 coins and store up to 15 Family Residences. Uptown Estates cost 15,000 coins and store 15 Apartments and finally, Palm Towers cost 20,000 coins and store 15 Vacation Home.

For our example, let's say you wanted to build a Gated Community in your town. You'd go into the store to purchase the base, as seen below, and would then need to whack that base six times to build up the frame.

From there, you'll instantly have access to two storage spots, of a possible five on the first "block," or "floor," if we're comparing this to the Mall. To fill these spaces, simply click on your empty Neighborhood and then click on "Fill" under one of the empty spaces. This will cause all of the buildings that can fit inside to glow. Click on one and voila! It's stored inside your Neighborhood, which will change shape and complexity as new buildings are added to it.

To unlock additional space inside your Neighborhoods, you'll need to ask your friends to staff extra spots, as seen above. The rate of one user per one storage slot isn't bad, really. Once your first block is full, you'll have to go through the process of asking for building materials to open up the second block. In our particular example of the Gated Community, you'll need five each of Red Bricks, Crossing Signs, Roof Tiles, Cement and Lumber. These are earned either by purchasing them outright with City Cash, or by asking your friends to send them to you.

When you've unlocked your second block, the process will repeat (and so on until you've unlocked and filled all three blocks, with more building materials being required the second time). Again, at first, these Neighborhoods may be incredibly space-consuming, but once they're full, you'll find them to be fairly space-saving, especially if you choose to place the largest homes in each category into storage. Don't worry about losing their stats, though, as you'll be able to collect rent as normal while they're inside. That is, you'll be able to click on your Neighborhood, and will then be asked to spend a larger amount of energy to collect from all "ready" buildings inside, just as you collect profits from your Mall.

All told, these are some fairly time consuming building projects, but if you're willing to go through with building them (and have plenty of friends around that are willing to help you out), you'll end up saving tons of space for future purchases, whether residential in nature or otherwise. We'll make sure to let you know when other kinds of Neighborhoods, for other kinds of homes are released, so keep checking back with us.

Check out the rest of our CityVille Cheats & Tips right here.

What do you think of the Neighborhoods feature? Is the space you saved substantial enough to warrant building them? Sound off in the comments.

CityVille Neighborhood Goals: Everything you need to know

To go along with the launch of the new Neighborhoods feature in CityVille, there's also a goal set to complete as well. If you remember, these Neighborhoods allow you to store homes for easier bulk access, and also just to generally save space (a huge factor in the game to this day). This goal series starts with one called Neighborhood Watch! (or, "On the House," if you prefer), which sees you simply placing a Neighborhood into your town to get used to the feature.

Neighborhood Watch!

    * Build a Neighborhood
    * Place 2 Residences into a Neighborhood


As we told you in our guide to Neighborhoods, they come in three varieties (currently) and range in price from 10,000 to 20,000 coins, depending on the kind of home you are trying to store (basic residences, apartments or vacation homes). Once you complete the construction of the Neighborhood, you'll be given these two storage spaces for free, so just fill them up and complete the goal! You'll receive a cute Garden Gnome decoration as a prize.

Block Party

    * Ask for 6 Neighborhood Event Posters
    * Place one more Residence into your Neighborhood
    * Place a Garden Gnome Decoration


Luckily, there's a "Place" button right next to this final task, so you don't have to search through your inventory to find the Garden Gnome manually. In the meantime, you'll need to ask a single friend to help you open up that new slot in your Neighborhood so that you can store your third residence. Finally, the Event Posters can be earned by posting a general news item to your wall. For finishing this second goal, you'll receive a Family Home residence, which gives you 90-170 population.

Movin' On Up

    * Unlock Block 2
    * Fill Block 2


As we told you in our guide, to unlock the next block of your Neighborhood, you'll need to collect building materials with the help of friends. Once you've unlocked the second block, you'll also need to gather more staff to unlock the final slots on that block, and then fill it completely with homes. Finishing this goal gives you the Neighborhood Watch item, a watch-tower that takes up a 2x2 area on your land and provides a 5% bonus to surrounding buildings.

Welcome Wagon

    * Ask for 8 Neighborhood Bake Sale Goodies
    * Build a second Neighborhood
    * Fill one Neighborhood


This goal will likely take you the longest to complete, as it requires collecting even more building ingredients than before, and even more staff to completely fill one neighborhood to its max of 15 houses. Finishing off this final goal of the series gives you the Deluxe Tree House.

All in all, these goals don't really require rushing, but as I'm sure most of you will likely want to build Neighborhoods for your own space-saving plans, you'll eventually finish them off with time.

Check out the rest of our CityVille Cheats & Tips right here.

What do you think of the Neighborhood feature in CityVille? Do you like the rewards for these goals? Sound off in the comments.