Goodgame Farmer Review

Goodgame Farmer is a farm game similar to farmville, but still in beta. Since it's still in beta, there are a lot of improvements to be done.

Bugs:

• disappearing persona (tileeventup event bug)


• can’t modify field when persona is on field other than yourself


• can’t modify field even if no persona is on field, others most often can.


• clicking on friend popup display goes away sometimes


• clicking on field while character is near, might result in “multiple selection” causing a “radioactive effect” on persona, this is fixed when hover over.

All bugs above are “fixed” when leaving and coming back.

Recommendations:

>Animals need to be fed (each animal has specific crop to be fed): e.g. chicken needs wheat, pig needs eggplants, cow needs tullips, sheep needs havena, goat needs lilly of the valley, …
>Birds come “ruin” the fruits and crops. Scarecrow prevents this for 4 fields surround the scarecrow. Having a dog protects the whole farm.
>Building with purpose as proposed next (sequence changes, pricing the same as current sequence):

• toolshed: gives ability to harvest and plow with single click


• barn: can fill in supply of food for the animals


• cabin: can have friends do jobs on farm (clicking on cabin lists “mini market”
where open jobs are displayed for the farm, owner can “post” new jobs). Maximum of 2 jobs to be posted.

• silo: wheat rotting time reduced by 6 times, so it rots in 1hr instead of 10 minutes


• chicken coop: auto feeds chickens and boost production to 1 egg an hr/chicken (prevents chickens from being stolen)


• piggery: auto feeds pigs and boost production to 1 truffle every 2 hrs/pig (prevents pigs from being stolen)


• cowshed: auto feeds cows and boost production to 1 milk every 3hrs/cow (prevents cows from being stolen)


• windmill: boosts tree production by 24 times the normal production, so 1 day becomes 1 hr


• doghut: enables having a dog for longer than 2 days


• cottage: can have friends do jobs on farm (clicking on cabin lists “mini market” where open jobs are displayed for the farm, owner can “post” new jobs). Maximum of 6 jobs to be posted.


• greenhouse: has slots for planting, used slots seeds are boosted 5 times. So eg 32 slots to “plant” and let’s say it’s used for 32 units of wheat -> wheat will grow in 2 minutes instead of 10.


• >Buffs for certain deco:


• scarecrow as described above.


• fencing prevents animals from being stolen.


• lawnmower adds 2% to quality


• wheelbarrow reduces growth time by 2%


• mailbox enables personal messages


• feeding trough enables “auto feed” to animals by providing 12 slots to store feed which is taken one from every time an animal needs to be fed.


• water trough enables “auto feed” similar to feeding through but provides the water feeding element, which together with the “default” food item is what the animal requires, randomly.


• well is needed to get water, gives 1 unit every click.


• water pump gives faster water, gives 2 units every click. And boosts quality by 4%.


• horse plow: adds 8% to quality. If horse is on the farm.


• horse cart: reduces growth time by 8%. If horse is on the farm.


• the other deco’s give a “classiness” to the farm, which can be competed in.

Tractor:

• 
  
• Mini-tractor: can do 2 fields simultaneous a click


• Tractor: can do 4 fields simultaneous a click


• Large tractor: can do 9 fields simultaneous a click


• Giant tractor: can do 16 fields simultaneous a click

Lower price of fertilizer: to 10 dollars or 5 because there’s no real “gain” using it.

Complaints:

>marketplace is multidimensional: finding your friend is hard
Solutions:
-make “teleport to friend” option
-make list of available marketplaces

>Marketplace job offers are not clear:
-you cannot see the “size” of the job, resulting in being “fake hired”
Solution:
-Make job overviews. Either a listing or whenever a job is offered show field size and related data that goes along with the offer. E.g. fields and growth time remaining. And how many people are hired.

>Whenever you want info about a player, your persona walks to that persona… thus giving away you look up info.

>performance overhead:
Seems to be a memory hog in the coding. On my state of the art pc the game still hogs up a lot of resources.
The server can’t handle the load either. Which actions to be delayed or “ignored” and also logging in is a problem… resulting in rotten crop. (Although at the time of writing it seems to be improved in the last few updates (current version: 1.21.0)

>annoying people:
A lot of people think it’s a hook up game, and come bother you on the farm.
Solution:
-Make a “kick function”, this function just sends the user back to his farm. So the owner of the farm that gets annoyed can kick the “visitor”.

>Jobs done achievement:
You get this when other people work for you and not like how the title says, that you do the job for others…

>When your farm gets big (like me, I'm level 26 and have over 400 fields) you need to click alot... give some kinda of brushing the fields instead of clicking or a select all fields button or like vehicle suggestion.

Then for my personal opinion about this game:

It's nice game, although with still alot of improvements to be done. I think if my suggestions will be implemented, that the goodgame farmer game will be a real game, rather than a click and hookup game. At the moment I'd rate it a 6.5/10.
Feel free to give the goodgame farmer game a try at: Goodgame Farmer.