Today Facebook announced its 2014 Games of the Year. The top winner? Cookie Jam, a Candy Crush Saga clone. If this is the best Facebook has to offer, I’m done.
I realise that most of our readership was done with Facebook games from the word FarmVille. They’re bothersome, annoying, formulaic, et cetera. But I’ve seen some pretty great games come out on the social network in the past — first-person shooters, Diablo-esque action role-playing games, deep strategy titles — and I’ve held out hope that those sort of games would arrive in greater numbers.
But it’s just not happening. This 2014 Game of the Year award shows where Facebook’s gaming interests lie. Here’s its entry from Facebook’s Games of the Year blog post.
This colourful matching game proved that the genre is far from over for Facebook. Launching last May, and rising to well over 5 million players in only a matter of months, SGN’s sweets-themed title swept all others to become the Game of the Year.
That really says it all — high player counts are more important than innovation.
There are still good games on Facebook, but they’re few and far between and in incredibly poor company. Meanwhile, Apple awarded Game of the Year to Monument Valley and Threes, a pair of smart, innovative titles that own their success. It’s fairly clear which way the wind is blowing, and I’m riding it away from Facebook gaming for good.
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31 responses to “That’s It, I’m Done With Facebook Games”
Was on r/pokemon, saw many outraged pokemon fan find multiple pokemon clones on facebook, believe that facebook looks the other way on rip off clones
Mike Fahey chose the red pill.
I was bored of all mobile games a week after I bought my first smart phone.. and after watching South parks “Freemium isn’t free” episode I can’t play any F2P games not even good ones!
My friends used to think I was a grinch when I refused to play all those shitty freemium games and then closed my Facebook account. Now who’s laughing! Ha! Still them probably, because I’m lonely and have no friends… :'(
Good. Social media is actually making your life worse.
There should be some kind of app for all us people to connect who don’t use Facebook.
A friend of mine in New Zealand is working on something similar called Leaping-Tiger http://leaping-tiger.com/ should be up early next year.
Closed my Facebook account years ago, and am something of a social pariah these days – but honestly believe I’m better off for it. Trained the friends that matter to call me, SMS me, email, or just talk to me in person. I am completely social media free, and infinitely happier. I even limit my exposure to websites with comments or feedback, because it’s almost as bad, most of the time. Kotaku is about the only exception to my rule – and even then, I only comment or participate sparingly.
Same here. I used Twitter for a while which was more interesting (at least the people on it certainly were) but then found I lost interest in that too.
I was the same. Really only used Twitter to commune with TAYbies, but even then, the inevitable exposure to fuckery still happened, and I wondered why I was using it at all. Quit that, and went back to dipping my toes in TAY occasionally. Life without any idea of what gamers are up in arms about every other day is much simpler. Finding I enjoy my favorite hobby a lot more without having to endure the controversy and bullshit people seem determined to impose on it at every turn.
This echoes my thoughts precisely. 🙂
There are a lot of great games on mobile. How long ago was your week when you decided they were all bad?
It’s Facebook. What did anyone expect?
Mass Effect 4?
You shut your pretty mouth.
Exclusivity deal.
THE HORROR!!!!
Half-Life 3?
Far Cry 5?
Half Life 3?
I play this as mostly to stick it to King for being asshats about trying to copyright every word containing Saga, Candy, Crush or basically any general word that any human has ever used ever.
It’s not much of a stand, I know, but every little bit counts, I guess.
Wasn’t there a Facebook game where you could put your friends head on a stick figure body and boot it across the screen? That was a fun game!
Done with FB games? I was done with Facebook full stop about a year and half ago. I’ve been able to cope not seeing pics of peoples meals and crappy life quotes.
… yeah but I bet you are missing all those pics of kids and pets 😉
Can’t wait to play it on the Oculus Rift!!!!!
Done? I never started.
That’s a little amusingly hypocritical from a site about an industry that largely focusses on units sold/shipped, numbers out of other numbers and active subscribers (How many WOW subscriber number articles have we had?).
wait wait wait…. people still use facebook???
seems like humanity is chasing the carrot on the wrong end of the evolution road….
I have never played a facebook game.
Why does this matter? Facebook isnt a gaming platform that anyone on this site gives 2 1/2 shits about. It’s full of mum’s / Dad’s Grandparents and social retards. Gamers dont go on Facebook to play games.
Kind of ironic given that Candy Crush Saga itself is a clone of Candyswipe though, right?
http://kotaku.com/candy-crush-saga-is-ripping-me-off-says-indie-develope-1521728191