Yee-haw! Frontierville Missions tracker is 'coming soon'

Looks like FrontierVille is going to make keeping track of our many missions that much easier with a new 'Missions' option in the 'My Stuff' menu.

I will certainly welcome something like this since my missions seems to appear and disappear off the left-hand side of the screen at random. This new menu item is marked as "Coming Soon!," so that means it probably won't be much longer until we can keep better track of our in-game tasks.

FrontierVille 'Hoedown' Timed Mission: Everything you need to know

Hoedown
A big dance is just a few days away in FrontierVille, and you'll need to prepare for it in Zynga's new timed mission, "Hoedown." This task will be available for sometime, but after accepting it you will only have four days to complete it. In order to be fully prepared for the soiree, you'll need these three things:

    25 Cotton
    5 Fancy Clothing
    10 Tootin' Jugs



Harvesting the 25 Cotton should be simple enough, but in the meantime you should make and visit as many friends as possible. You're going to need quite a lot of Cloth to craft those five Fancy Clothing--30 pieces to be exact. All the while, be sure to berate your friends for those 10 Tootin' Jugs. Players who complete the Goal within four days will receive one Lunch, 100 coins and the Fiddle, a brand new musical instrument (hint: it's interactive). An interactive item just for harvesting some Cotton and making some swanky outfits? You can count us in.

FrontierVille 'Heating Your Homestead' Christmas Goal: Everything you need to know

With winter's icy bite creeping in on us, Zynga has been leaking tons of details about FrontierVille's upcoming Winter missions and Goals. However, "Heating Your Homestead" is especially interesting in that, if the rumors are true, we'll be able to complete this mission repeatedly until Christmas arrives. And after you see the requirements and the reward you'll see why this detail is vitally important:

    Chop down five Trees
    Have 10 Fire
    Collect 15 Bits of Tinder


Chopping down trees should be a normal routine for you by now while crafting Fire is done in the covered Wagon using Wood and Cloth. So, visiting friends just became a much more important part of this Goal. But you'll also need a little help from your friends on this one. Just ask your friends for the Bits of Tinder and be sure to give them out via News Feed posts too as you'll be rewarded one for doing so.

Finally, here's why you'll be doing this incessantly for the next month: turning in this rumored-to-be repeatable quest will net you a Small Gift. These Small Gifts will always contain one random item from the Christmas Collection. So, doing this quest repeatedly will reward you with both lots of XP and inch you closer to yet another completed Collection. Be on the lookout for when this Goal goes live as I'm sure you'll be first in line to take it on.

FrontierVille 'PlayTime' Timed Mission: Everything you need to know

Yet another Timed Mission will soon arrive promptly (we hope) in FrontierVille. Titled "PlayTime," this Goal requires quite a lot of begging. And, again, it should be here for a long while. Though, you'll only have two days to complete it once accepted, which makes for an intense challenge. Here's what you need to do:

    Have 20 Planks
    Get 10 Bags of Playground Sand
    Get 10 Scrap Metal Pieces


While that sounds easy enough, it's a challenge to complete in 48 hours--especially when more than half of it relies on the attentiveness of your friends. Both the Playground Sand and Scrap Metal Pieces are gifts from friends like in other Goals. Though, make sure you have enough Wood to cover crafting 20 Planks before accepting the Mission. (For you math whizzes, that's 140 pieces of Wood.) However, you should be rewarded one for gifting to friends via their News Feeds, which could help compensate for the lack of friends that even notice the News Feed.

Completing this mission within the time limit will reward you with one Dinner, 500 XP and Monkey Bars. Those should come in handy for the six kids you should have by now. Oh, the things we do for them in Facebook games.

FrontierVille Caroling Collection: Harvest things at random for success

Large WreathThat's the way to do it, folks. Along with the 12 Days of Christmas Goals in FrontierVille comes a brand new collection with absolutely no rhyme or reason. The Caroling Collection can be completed right now, but at the moment there is no solid information on how to better your chances at nabbing each item. Here are all five items that you'll essentially find at random:

    Sheet Music
    Tuning Fork
    Caroling Candle
    Hand Bell
    Music Stand


With players reporting over on FrontierVille Wiki finding the items through almost every task imaginable from tending Neighbors' Pigs to collecting the Cabin Daily Bonus, we honestly can't say how exactly to complete this Collection. Though, finding all five items will reward you with one Large Wreath (pictured right) and 100 XP. Considering its random nature, we imagine this Collection will only be around for a limited time. So, erm, go about your business as usual and the Caroling Collection should be yours... eventually.

[Via FrontierVille Wiki]

[Image Credit: Zynga]

Find the rest of our Holiday 2010 coverage right here.

Where have you found items from this limited-time Collection? Have you found and pattern to where these items are hiding?

Wishful Features: A FrontierVille animations toggle button

FrontierVille is intense
Ever visit that one Neighbor in FrontierVille who happens to be somewhat of an overachiever? You know who I'm talking about. Almost everyone has that one friend who is Level 150 with the biggest homestead available, every animated decoration out there and his legion of Chickens (see above) for all to see. Did I say "for all to see?" Sorry, what I meant to say was, "for all to cringe in horror as their browsers freeze and processors melt through the surface of their four-year-old laptops."

At least the first part of that vision should be familiar with a good lot of you. And it isn't just the sharp visuals in FrontierVille that are to blame. It's the animations. If you haven't noticed, just about every animal, building and holiday item slash decoration has an animation attached. Sure, most animations are simple one-second-long loops, but multiply that by the amount of items that litter most veteran players' homesteads and it's enough to send the average computer into hiding.

Sure, that Graphics Quality toggle helps a bit, but for those who have yet to--bear with me here--upgrade their primary Facebook-gaming machine in the past few years, Flash-based games (i.e. almost all Facebook games) are going to punish the average computer. It might sound ridiculous that we're talking about computer upgrades on Games.com, but rest assured this is all coming from someone who easily falls into the camp of "average computer" face first with a three-year-old HP Pavilion laptop. I will be the first to tell you that computers do not age like sharp cheese or fine wine, but more like mold on bread or Keith Richards.

With 250 million players, it should be safe to assume that the majority of social gamers are probably in the same boat. So, Zynga, why not add a similar option to the Graphics Quality toggle in FrontierVille? Make it so that players with less-than-favorable computing situations can actually pay their more technologically advanced friends a visit every once in a while. If players are already making liberal use of the Graphics Quality toggle in nearly every game they play (at least I need to), then turning off a few idle character animations isn't going to make the visual FrontierVille experience that much worse. Your fellow pioneers seem to agree.

FrontierVille Playtime II Timed Mission now available

Way back on the 17 of December, we brought you a sneak peek of a then unreleased time mission in FrontierVille that we believed would be coming to the game in the future. Well, the future is now, as the Playtime II Timed Mission is now available to complete for a limited time.

As we told you last month, you'll have just two days after accepting this mission to complete it on your Frontier. the mission requires three tasks to be completed:

Craft 20 Planks
Collect 10 Metal Bars
Collect 10 Wood Rasps

You must accept this mission by January 14 in order to be able to complete it in your game, and you'll receive a See-Saw decorative item, 250 XP, and 1,000 coins for completing the mission before your two days are over.

You'll of course need to have plenty of help from friends in order to finish this mission on time, but it definitely isn't impossible. Happy gaming!

FrontierVille Hearts and Flowers Missions: Everything you need to know

With Valentine's Day now only days away, it only makes sense for Zynga to truly start celebrating the season in FrontierVille by releasing a new mission series. Appropriately enough, Zynga has now released a five-part "Hearts and Flowers" goal set, which will automatically be added to your account (that is, you don't have to purchase it from the store), but can only be finished for a limited time - until February 28, according to our research.

Since these missions are limited, let's not waste any time in completing them, shall we? The first step of this mission series is called "A Romantic Rendezvous" and it will ask you to complete three, fairly simple, tasks.

Plant 30 White Roses
Have or Craft Two Presents
Harvest 25 Peach Trees on your Homestead

As you can see, these three steps likely won't take you very long. White Roses can be harvested after 10 hours, and Peach Trees are ready to harvest from every three hours. Meanwhile, Presents can be crafted inside the General Store for 2 Ribbon and 5 Cloth each. Your rewards for finishing this first step of five are 25 XP and 1 White Rose Collectible (from the White Rose Collection).

Meet us behind the break for a look at the rest of this love-filled mission series.

Part II of V asks you to collect quite a few items, so I hope you have some active neighbors on your account.

Buy the Old Time Camera
Visit 10 Neighbors
Collect 10 Handkerchiefs

As of this writing, you'll be able to receive Handkerchiefs by posting a general request to your news feed, asking your friends to send them to you. Also, it's presumable that the Old Time Camera can simply be placed from storage (where applicable) to make this part of the quest pop, so it's worth a shot doing this first to save some coins. Otherwise, you'll need to spend 1200 coins and 10 Wood to purchase one from the store. Your rewards for this part of the goal series are 50 XP and 30 food.

Part III of V might take some users a bit of time to complete, depending on whether or not you are the type of person to hold onto your coins, or sell them.

Clear 20 Wildflowers on your Neighbors' homesteads
Harvest 30 Pink Roses
Collect 10,000 coins

Unfortunately, the 10,000 coins will be taken from you at the completion of this quest, but you will make a bit of profit from harvesting those 30 Pink Roses (which take 14 hours to grow), so at least you don't be losing exactly 10,000 coins out of pocket. Finishing Part III will reward you with a new decorative item in the game called the Heart Tree, along with 25 XP.

Part IV of V is a bit of a hodgepodge of tasks, but luckily, none of them seem overly complicated, so long as you have a few friends to call on for help.

Collect 10 Valentine Cards
Tend 30 Geese
Collect 15 Ink

The Valentine Cards can be received via a wall post asking your friends for help, while it appears that you'll be able to send individual gift requests to friends for the Ink. Geese, meanwhile, can be fed once every 30 minutes - 3 hours, depending on the animal's age on your Homestead (that is, the younger the Goose, the more often it can be fed, and vice versa). Your final rewards before the finale of this mission series are 1 Hope Chest and 50 XP. The Hope Chest is a part of the Family Collection.

For your final part of this goal series, Part V of V will require you to plant the final kind of roses in the game, the Red Rose.

Harvest 50 Red Roses
Buy 1 Dinner
Have / Craft 2 Fancy Clothing

Red Roses are currently available to grow in the market, and take 1 Day and 12 Hours to grow. Dinners can be purchased for 320 Food, and finally, Fancy Clothing can be crafted inside the General Store using 2 Ribbon and 2 Clothes each. Clothes themselves are also a crafting item, available to create in the Cabin for 500 coins and 6 Cloth each. Finishing this final step in the Valentine's Day mission set will reward you with 100 XP and a Heart-Shaped Garden, another exclusive decoration that is new to the game.

And there you have it - a relatively simple mission set (all things considered - especially when compared to the newest Land Expansion goals), that rewards you with some truly lovely items for completing them. Remember, you only have a limited time to finish these missions, so start soon to ensure you'll have enough time!

Check out the rest of our Valentine's Day 2011 coverage right here.

What do you think of this newest mission set? Are you going to jump right into completing these limited time missions, or are you still trying to expand your land first?

New FrontierVille Mystery Animal Crate contains kissing animals for Valentine's Day

If you're into Valentine's Day, or just enjoy cute animals in general, be sure to check out FrontierVille new Valentine's Day themed Mystery Animal Crate, full of kissing animals (yes, I said kissing - now can I get an "awwwwww?").

This time around, there are three pairs of kissing animals available to win from each Mystery Animal Crate, with each crate being available to purchase from the store for 45 Horseshoes. For each crate you purchase, you'll have a chance of scoring either Kissing Swans, Kissing Rabbits, or Kissing Sheep.

The Kissing Animal Mystery Crate will only be available int the game's store for the next 20 days. Unfortunately, there's no guarantee that you won't receive duplicates, however, so keep that in mind before going in to purchase a second crate.

Check out the rest of our Valentine's Day coverage right here.

Will you purchase a Kissing Animal Mystery Animal Crate? Which of these animal pairs are you hoping to win?

FrontierVille Coyote and Chickens Eaten Collections arrive early

Coyote Collection
Two new Collections have snuck their way into FrontierVille today. The Coyote and Chickens Eaten Collections should be in your Collections menu right about now, but the Coyotes are nowhere to be found. This seems part of Zynga's usual strategy of leaking new features rather than releasing them all at once upon the millions of pioneers. The Coyote Collection calls for Mangled Feathers, Coyote Howling, Coyote Pelt, Coyote Pendant and a Coyote Tail. Since the Coyote feature isn't even here yet, our best guess is that we'll receive these items for fighting back against the Coyotes. Turn in all five items to receive a Stuffed Coyote.

Chickens Eaten Collection
Chickens Eaten, the second Collection, is definitely more confusing. While it's still too early to tell, we're going to say that this Collection has to do with picking up the pieces of dead Chickens. Or perhaps we're forced to use some unfortunate Chickens as bait to trap the Coyotes! Too dark? Moving right along, this Collection requires Chicken Beak, Chicken Comb, Chicken Feet, Chicken Skull and a Chicken Wing. Turning in the Collection apparently involves some sort of necromancy, because the reward is one live Chicken. Can I get a "hooray" for dark magic?

Have you seen these Collections in your game yet? When do you think the Coyotes will arrive and how will we retrieve these dead Chicken parts?

FrontierVille offers free Prairie Pox cure; no Goals necessary!

It seems that Zynga has seen the lack of pioneers that have completed the Prairie Pox Goals in FrontierVille (i.e. me) and decided to give them a freebie. Eucalypt, a FrontierVille forum contributor, was greeted by the above message upon logging in recently. Basically, taking the cure will relieve you and yours' Prairie Pox infection instantly, subverting the lengthy Goal series entirely. Several players have reported replying "No Thanks!" as they're either almost through the series or are simply purists. As for me, you better believe I'm pressing that green button!

[Image Credit: Eucalypt]

Have you seen this message appear on your homestead yet? Would you choose to take the cure or do it all the hard way?

FrontierVille Oregon Ho! Goal is here: Ready yourself for the Oregon Trail and receive exclusive items

Unlike FarmVille, which left users eagerly anticipating the English Countryside expansion for weeks or even months, Zynga's team behind FrontierVille has started the festivities relating to the Oregon Trail just hours after releasing an official trailer for the new expansion. New content has launched in the game today, in the form of the Oregon Ho! goal that we told you about just this morning.

The goal contains the same three requirements that we told you about in our sneak peek: Collect nine pages from the Medical Journal, watch the Oregon Trail video, and collect 10 Snake Bite Kits. However, you'll receive a set of decorative items along the way that we didn't know about before (and that you can learn about behind the break). But first, the Snake Bite kits are earned through a general news post asking all of your friends for help, while the Journal pages are earned by "performing various actions on your Homestead."

Indeed, I received pages of the Medical Journal by simply accepting friends' help with feeding animals, and by clearing debris on my land. This is the same sort of setup as seen back in the Rango mission released back in February. That is, as you collect Journal pages, you won't just earn progress towards the Oregon Ho! goal, you'll also earn three exclusive items as prizes along the way.

Your three items are the Weiner Campfire, the Pelt Line (earned at six Journal pages) and the Paisley Medical Kit, which is received when you've found all nine Journal pages required. On top of all of this, for completing the Oregon Ho! mission itself, you'll also receive 100 coins, 300 XP and a Camp Pack, like the one seen at right (that normally costs more than 7,000 coins in the store).

As you're told at the beginning of this quest, Doc Auburn's nephew, Doc Paisley, is headed off to the Oregon Trail on May 30, presumably the day when the entire Oregon Trail expansion will launch. Sure, that's a long time away, but as we're already receiving tasks to work on related to the Oregon Trail, we can only imagine that the next few weeks in FrontierVille will be very interesting indeed.

What are you waiting for? You don't want to be left behind when Doc Paisley heads off on the Oregon Trail, do you? Complete this goal and then head back here to learn more of what to expect from the upcoming expansion, as we bring you all of the latest news as it becomes available. Or, you can just play the old Apple II version of the Oregon Trail that has inspired it all to pass some time. It's up to you.

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

Are you excited for the Oregon Trail's release in FrontierVille? Were you hoping that the Oregon Trail would work as the English Countryside in FarmVille, giving you an entire second Homestead to build on and grow?

FrontierVille: Varmints no longer cause red areas on Homesteads

Many FrontierVille players might have already noticed that Varmints have been changed drastically in the game, but if you haven't noticed a difference, here's your heads-up. What's the change? Each time a Varmint appears on your Homestead, you will no longer see a large red area surrounding the animal, eliminating the need to confirm any actions within that area, as they cost an "extra energy" to complete - not that the extra energy was actually ever used, mind you, so the entire red area "feature" became pretty useless long ago.

What I first assumed was a bug, though, has now been confirmed via the official FrontierVille forums, as Community Specialist Miss Marme stated that "this [removal] was intentional and we are wondering if y'all like it or not..." Personally, I love this change. While it may not increase the appearance rate of Varmints on our land, I'm glad that I won't have to senselessly click through pop-up after pop-up as I try to chop down trees or remove debris (or worse, feed animals), just because a Snake or Fox happens to be in the surrounding area.

If you agree, please let the FrontierVille team know over on the game's forums, lest they think we don't and then turn it back on. No thanks!

What do you think of the removal of the red Varmint circles on your land? What other changes could Zynga make in FrontierVille that would make the game a more enjoyable experience for you?

FrontierVille: Buildings can now be stored in your Storage Shed

One of the biggest complaints many FrontierVille players have concerns an overall lack of space around the Homestead. While repeatable Storage Shed expansion missions do help us tame down the amount of decorations we have lying about, that still didn't take away the large buildings that some of no longer want on our lands, but are terrified of deleting in case we need them again in the future.

In come Zynga with a solution - some buildings can now be stored in your Storage Shed. While the list of buildings that can be stored isn't universal, Community Specialist Miss Marme was gracious enough to share with us a list of those buildings that can not be stored, so we know to not even try.


Here's the list of buildings that can't be stored currently. Unfortunately, Finkerton's Agency is on it (drats!).

Water Well
Barn
Storage Shed
Chicken Coop
General Store
School House
Barber Shop
Ponderosa Lodge
Doctor's Office
Finkerton's Detective Agency
Groundhog Trap
Beehive
New Year's Eve Dance Floor

While that list might seem pretty long, there are still quite a few buildings not on the list that we can clear off our lands (even if only temporarily, while you plant crops, or farm out Oxen for Food). Buildings like the Tailor Shop, Pony Express, Newspaper Stand, Land Office, Inn, and so on all should be able to be stored, at least by this logic (if they're not on the list, you should be able to store them, right?). Note that right now, this ability is slowly rolling out to all players, so you may not be able to store buildings for a few more hours yet.

We've also been given confirmation that this isn't part of some larger mission series or anything sinister - it will simply roll around to your land and will go into effect instantly from there on in. I personally couldn't be happier for it; well, I could, but only if I could make that darn Detective Agency disappear along with everything else. Since I can't, I'll just take happiness from the items that I can store, freeing up tons of space for new goodies. Who's with me!?

Will you clear your Homestead of all buildings not on the above list? Why do you think these particular buildings can't be stored?

FrontierVille Cheats & Tips: How to get ahead without neighbors

Look, we know social games are all about making friends and fostering relationships, but sometimes you simply don't have the time to wait around for your friends to answer that help request. Thankfully, FrontierVille Info reader Anna has come up with a solution to the problem. (And we're bummed we didn't think of it sooner.) Just make a few mock Facebook accounts.

OK, we know it sounds a bit ... off-putting. But so long as you don't abuse the power of Facebook, it's all good--especially considering how militant Facebook has become on shutting down suspicious accounts. But follow our simple two-step process and you should be just fine (and much better off for it).

1. Fraud is Fun's Best Friend

FrontierVille helpNow don't get your undies in a bunch--this is just Facebook, folks. You're not committing a felony here. Many of you likely have two accounts as is (one for standard use and the other for gaming). So, just sign up for an extra Gmail account or whatever mail service you prefer, and create a new account in your name.

Then, input some basic information and a relevant image. This can be a piece of art or whatever your heart desires, but it helps if you use your own face and ... human-sounding name. Then, install FrontierVille (this works with any Facebook game, really) and befriend your "true" account with both of the "fakes."

2. Reaping the Rewards

Now, every time you send a request in FrontierVille for a Goal or a new building, just use your brand new accounts to immediately send those items on over. Of course, this requires you to log in and out of your accounts somewhat rapidly, but anything beats waiting around for the one or two friends that actually respond to your requests. Anna also points out that these requests can be responded to almost every 20 minutes:

    When I request an item, I go to my fake account and click the accept button. Then I copied the link of the request page then after few minutes (give it 15-20 minutes), copy paste the link again in your browser and you can send the item again.

And there you have it. A way to be self-sufficient in FrontierVille--and nearly any social game--for those pivotal moments when you just can't rely on your stable of gamer friends to come through. As an added tip, it comes especially in handy for Timed Goals and to avoid wasting Energy on crop harvests required for Goals.