Zynga's FrontierVille on Facebook: Getting Started Tips

On June 9, Zynga introduced a new game on Facebook called FrontierVille. As a pioneer in FrontierVille you can clobber critters, scare varmints, clear the land to plant crops and build your own little house on the prairie as you tame the wilderness like Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone.

The first thing to do once you join FrontierVille is to create your own avatar much like all the other Zynga games on Facebook. Once you have just the right pioneer look it is time to begin clearing the land. To get started simply follow the bouncing arrows as they show new pioneers the way things are run in FrontierVille. Dig up grass and then claim the coins, wood, food, or collectibles to be banked in your FrontierVille account before they disappear. Then move on to harvest crops, share your experience with other pioneers, and plant new crops. Be on the lookout for the Pony Express to come galloping through FrontierVille with a letter for you from that special someone you left back home. Daily chores (goals) will be assigned for new pioneers to complete. Look for the different icons on the left of your FrontierVille screen for daily chore assignments which could include planting crops, clearing the land, harvesting crops and animals just to name a few. When clearing the land, pioneers should leave some large trees on their homestead because larger trees produce saplings that will grow up into big trees. Don't forget to invite your friends to be your neighbor in FrontierVille so you will have someone to visit and send gifts back and forth with. Pioneers can perform the same chores on their neighbors homestead as they do on their own.

Pioneers should remember to click on their wagon and cabin (or other buildings once they are built) to collect a daily bonus. Also, click on the wagon or building then click "go inside" to find a crafting workbench to create new items that will be needed to perform chores later in the game.

Beside your Homestead name (on the bottom left of the FrontierVille screen) is a weather icon. Click on this icon to get daily weather reports but more importantly it tells what your daily bonus prize is and what chore to perform on your homestead and your neighbors in order to get more collectibles from performing that chore. For example, right now my weather forecast is "Warm & Windy" and I will receive a Bonus Cherry Tree (bonus trees always appear as saplings that have to be watered on order for them to grow up and produce fruit) and I will receive more collectibles when clearing the land - clearing the land of grass, rocks, skulls, trees, thorns and wildflowers. But be careful, wild animals have been known to hide around these items. When a snake, groundhog or bear pops out at you, just clobber or scare them away.

In the bottom right corner of your FrontierVille screen you will find 4 icons: My Tools, Cancel, the Market and My Stuff. In My Tools pioneers have the choice of Tend, Sell, Rotate or Move. Click on one of these choices to perform the desired task to an item on your homestead. Cancel stops any Tending actions.

In the Market, pioneers will find crops, trees, animals, buildings, decorations and energy for sale. A FrontierVille building that is bought has to be "put together" or "built" from the ground up. Pioneers buy the basic materials in the Market for a building then the building materials have to be "whacked" to make the buildings framework go up. Whacks cost cords of woods which can be gathered when trees are cut down when clearing the land. Once the required number of whacks has been performed pioneers will need to collect hammers, nails, bricks, hand drills and paint buckets to complete their building. These items can be gifted from neighbors or bought with horseshoe coins. Extra energy can be purchased in the Market using food that has been gathered from harvesting crops or trees. There is a limit as to how much extra energy can be purchased daily. Animals are bought as young ones and need tending to in order to get larger until they are fully grown.

"My Stuff" is where pioneers will find Gifts, the Family Album, Inventory and Collections. Click on the Gift box icon on the screen or the Gifts box in the My Stuff box to see who has sent you gifts today. The Gift box located on the FrontierVille game screen has options to send a free thank you to your fellow pioneer who was kind enough to send you a free gift. Or you can use the "Free Gifts" option at the top of the FrontierVille game screen to send multiple gifts. In the Family Album you can change the look of your avatar any time you'd like. The Collections box will have a list of collectables that can be found when performing chores in FrontierVille. Once a pioneer completes a collection it can be turned in for bonus awards of items, wood, coins, food, animals, energy or decorations. In the Inventory box pioneers will find a list of items that have been collected. Some items can be put on a wishlist so you can ask your fellow FrontierVille pioneer neighbors to lend a helping hand in finding (gifting) the items you desire.

Come be a pioneer and blaze a trail in Zynga's FrontierVille on Facebook, but beware of rattlesnakes and please don't feed the bears!

Caution: The FrontierVille fiddle tune could get stuck in your head.

Sources:
Personal Experience
FrontierVille