FarmVille: What Are FarmVille Dairy Farms and What's Inside Farmville Mystery Boxes?

Farmville, the highly addictive and extremely popular Facebook application that allows players to create their own mini farms complete with crops and animals, has unveiled two new features, in addition to the brand new Crop Whisperer Achievement that went live on October 16. Users can now add FarmVille dairy farms and purchase Mystery Boxes. How do FarmVille Dairy Farms work? What's inside Farmville Mystery Boxes? Are they worth the hefty pricetag? Read on for details about each.

FarmVille Dairy Farms are the newest of the new features currently offered. Here's how it works. Visit the FarmVille Market and click on the Buildings tab. Click to purchase a Dairy Farm for 10,000 coins, then place it on your farm. You'll receive 100 experience points toward leveling up after its been placed. Note that there are likely special requirements for being able to buy a FarmVille Dairy Farm for 10,000 coins; I currently have 17 neighbors and am at level 29. As a result, your mileage may vary.

The FarmVille Dairy Farm is a little smaller than the FarmVille barn, and as many as 20 cows can be placed inside, so it's a serious space-saver. To add cows to your FarmVille Dairy Farm, simply click a cow, select 'move', and place it inside the farm. The farm will 'sparkle' for a few seconds after a new cow is placed inside.

It takes 24 hours for the cows inside the FarmVille Dairy Farm to produce milk, and once they do, they're all harvested at once, with a single click. It really couldn't be much easier. The downside? You can't see the cows once they're inside the FarmVille Dairy Farm, so if you like seeing their cute little bovine faces, you might not like this feature as much as others.

Moving on to the second new FarmVille feature: Mystery Boxes. FarmVille Mystery Boxes are available for purchase for 15 FarmVille dollars in the FarmVille Market. Click on the Decorations tab to find them. I've not purchased a FarmVille Mystery Box, but have done a little research in order to answer the oft asked question: What's inside FarmVille Mystery Boxes? And the answer? It seems like most users are pretty disappointed.

Posters on the game.com blog report receiving items including a red and white striped rest tent, a hot tub, a fire pit, a golden gnome, a red bicycle and a lounge chair, along with 30 to 200 experience points good toward leveling up in FarmVille. For a complete breakdown of the experience points awarded for each FarmVille Mystery Box loot item, visit the FarmVille Lawn Jockey Weblog here.

FarmVille Mystery Boxes are a cool idea, but I'd be disappointed to wind up with any of these after spending FarmVille cash, so for now, I'll continue to take a pass until better items are discovered inside.

So there you have it: The lowdown on FarmVille's newest features. Play on!