FarmVille English Countryside Sneak Peek: Downy Birch Tree & Silver Birch Tree

Two new trees will apparently be coming to the English Countryside theme in FarmVille in the very near future, or so say this newest set of unreleased images. We've found pictures of both a Downy Birch Tree (also called the European White Birch Tree) and the Silver Birch Tree (a European ornamental tree), along with their mastery signs.

These two trees have no office release date, although we expect them to show up in the game as early as Sunday evening, when FarmVille is expected to update in full next. As they are both Birch trees, it's likely that one will be the Mystery Seedling of the other, and if history tells us anything, they'll be priced at 5 and 10 Farm Cash, although we don't know which tree will be the more expensive one.

We'll make sure to give you all of the details about these trees as they officially become available in the game.

Which of these two trees do you hope is the cheaper of the two, or do you like them enough to buy both?

Extra! Extra! Read all about it! FrontierVille News Stand Collection now available!

Ok, forgive the slight journalism pun if you will, but it's a very exciting time to be a FrontierVille player, as we've discovered that a new collection has been added to the game in the form of the News Stand collection. At the time of this writing, we know that a News Stand building is coming to the game, but as usual, it seems to be on a slow rollout to users.

While the Beehive, which was released earlier this week, didn't have any missions to go along with it, we know that there will be News Stand goals released in the game, but to our understanding, they haven't been completed yet. Will the building roll out to users before the day is done, or will we have to wait until the weekend proper to start our own News Stands on our Homesteads? Only time will tell, but for now, check out the five new items in the News Stand collection as things to keep an eye out for:

Bundle Cord
Ink Roller
Newspaper
Newsie Hat
Press Pass
Once you complete this collection (likely via collecting the News Stand's daily bonus, or by simply whacking the building's frame during construction), you'll be able to turn it in for a Newspaper Stack, which is likely a new decorative item.

Remember, this collection (and this News Stand building) are incredibly new, so we'll continue to update you with everything you need to know about both as time rolls on and we know more. Keep checking back with us for the latest on this new feature.

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

Have you received the News Stand building / missions in your game?

FrontierVille News Stand Goals: Everything you need to know

As we told you earlier this afternoon, a News Stand collection has appeared in FrontierVille, and that can only mean one thing - the News Stand building will soon be rolling out to all users in the game. A lucky few of you have already received this building on your land, which lets you communicate with your friends, telling them the tasks that you'd like completed when they visit, or simply notifying them that you'd like to receive a certain item as a gift.

A series of missions goes along with this building, and we have all of the details about those missions right here. The first is fairly simple, and requires you to build a News Stand on your land, along with two other tasks.

Buy a News Stand
Visit 2 Neighbors
Chop Neighbors' Oak Trees 25 Times

Completing these simple goals rewards you with 100 XP and 100 coins. It also unlocks the second mission in this series, so make sure to meet us behind the break for all of the details you need about these other goals.
Part II of IV asks you collect items from the News Stand Collection, so make sure to check out our complete guide to that collection in order to learn how to find them on your own land.

Have 1 Bundle Cord
Have 10 Newsprints
Have Five Sets of Clothes

The Bundle Cord is the News Stand Collection item, while the Newsprints can be earned by posting a general news item to your feed asking your friends to send them to you. Clothes, meanwhile, are crafted inside your Cabin for 6 Cloth and 500 coins each. Finishing this quest gives you 150 XP, 150 coins, and a Stuffed Mailbox decoration. Unfortunately, this isn't a "stuffed animal" mailbox, but rather just a mailbox that's overflowing with mail (I know, I got excited about a Mailbox plushie decoration too).

For Part III of IV, you'll need to have finished building the News Stand, and you'll need to take advantage of its new functionality to complete two of the three required tasks.

Answer a Classified Ad
Publish a Classified Ad (also called a Daily Edition)
Chop Neighbors' Pine Trees 50 Times

The rewards for this quest are slightly increased over the last, giving you 150 XP and 200 coins. Unfortunately, you won't receive a new decorative item for this quest, but you will be able to move onto the finale, which might be a big enough prize in and of itself.

Finally, Part IV of IV requires more of the same tasks as above, although you're done with chopping trees, and will need to collect a set of items instead.

Collect 10 Photographs
Publish 10 Daily Editions
Answer 10 Classified Ads

You'll be able to collect the Photographs by sending out individual requests to those friends that you think can help you. For finishing this quest, you'll receive a Newspaper Hat clothing item for your avatar(s), 200 XP and 500 coins.

And there you have it! A goal series that is slightly shorter than most (as most goal series have five missions to complete), that also doesn't seem to be overly difficult. Of course, whether or not you'll have an easy time at answering classified ads really depends on how many active neighbors you have in your game. Either way, we wish you luck as you try to complete these goals for yourself!

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

What do you think of these News Stand missions? Are they too demanding for what they reward in the end, or will you do anything to receive new clothing items for your characters?

FrontierVille News Stand: Everything you need to know

Are you ready to make headlines on your FrontierVille Homestead? Did you take one look at the News Stand Collection and think "That's a building I simply must have on my land?"If so, this guide is for you, as we have all of the information you need to know about adding a News Stand to your Homestead, and how to use its many new features after its been built. For starters, know that this building is on a slow roll-out to users, so if you don't have the building in your game already, simply wait some time and it will show up.

Once the update has rolled around to your game, you'll be able to purchase the News Stand from the store for 1000 coins and 20 Wood. You'll then to whack the frame ten times, with each whack costing 10 additional Wood. That's 100 extra Wood, so if you're feeling a bit light on the brown stuff at the moment, simply visit a few friends and chop down some trees (how convenient, you need to do that for the News Stand goals anyway!), and you'll be good to go in no time flat.

Once the building's frame is complete on your land, you'll need to finish it off by collecting a slew of new items that work as building materials. These themed items are 10 each of Shocking Photos, Breaking News, and Weather Reports, along with 15 each of Puzzles, Editorials, and Ask Fanny columns. As you might have guessed, the Shocking Photo, Breaking News and Weather Report items are earned through general news feed posts asking all of your friends to help simultaneously, while the other three items are earned through individual gift requests to friends.

After you've completed the building's construction, you'll be introduced to a system known as "classifieds" or "daily headlines" that can be published as a way to tell your neighbors what you'd like them to do on your land. This is much more of an efficient method of communication than simply hoping "Tend Here" signs grab your neighbors' attention, so make sure to take advantage of this daily service once you can. You'll need to complete at least part II of the News Stand Goals to use this feature, so check out our complete guide to the News Stand Goals to get up to speed.

You'll be able to customize what you want to say to your neighbors via a large text box, and you'll then be able to choose which items you'd like your friends to leave you after they've completed their five tasks on your Homestead. While the image above shows Wood, Fire, and Mallets being available to request at one moment, these items will vary.

After you publish this request, your neighbors will see a similar window when they visit your Homestead. You can either leave a personalized response for your friend, or you can simply go about your activities as normal, and you don't have to send their requested item to them at the end, if you know you don't have the ability to post on a friend's wall, or simply don't want to take the time.

This feature is available to all users level 18 and above, so what are you waiting for? The quicker you finish your News Stand, the quicker you can start communicating with your neighbors in-game. Whether or not those neighbors listen to your pleas or not is another thing, but at least you have the chance to try, right?

[Top image credit: Yvonne]

[Second image credit: Zynga]

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

What do you think of this new building in FrontierVille? Do you think users will be willing to complete the tasks that their friends ask them to, or will everyone just continue to do their own thing when visiting?

FrontierVille: Make headlines with two News Stand Badges

What better way to ensure that users are excited about a new FrontierVille feature than to release a set of Badges along with it? Zynga seems to understand that perfectly, as they have done just that - releasing two new Badges that coincide with the game's newest building - the News Stand.

These two Badges reward you for taking advantage of the News Stand's two new functions - posting Classifieds (also referred to as Newspapers or Daily Editions), and responding to Classifieds. Of course, as it is much easier to post something in your own game than it is to find users that have done the same and then help them out (which is made incredibly difficult if you have few friends actually taking advantage of the feature), the Publishing Badge requires much more from you than the Response Badge.

Either way, we have all four levels to both of these Badges detailed for you behind the break, so won't you meet us there?

Publishing Classifieds Badge:

Level 1: Publish 10 Newspapers. Rewards: 250 coins and 50 XP
Level 2: Publish 100 Newspapers. Rewards: 500 coins and 200 XP
Level 3: Publish 500 Newspapers. Rewards: 1,000 coins and 500 XP
Level 4: Publish 1,000 Newspapers. Rewards: 5,000 coins, 1,000 XP, and a Rooster Mailbox decoration

Responding to Classifieds Badge:

Level 1: Respond to 10 Classifieds. Rewards: 250 coins and 50 XP
Level 2: Respond to 40 Classifieds. Rewards: 500 coins and 200 XP
Level 3: Respond to 100 Classifieds. Rewards: 1,000 coins and 500 XP
Level 4: Respond to 250 Classifieds. Rewards: 5,000 coins, 1,000 XP, and a Puddle Boat decoration

As I said, you'll need to publish 1,000 Classifieds before ever finishing that particular badge, so you'll need to be incredibly dedicated to the feature to make your way through. Still, I suppose some rewards are better than none, no matter how demanding their requirements might be.

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

Will earning these Badges keep you using the News Stand feature long after you would otherwise? What do you think of the decorative items being given away with these Badges?

FarmVille Sneak Peek: Mother's Day decorations coming soon

If we needed any more confirmation that a small Mother's Day theme will be coming to FarmVille, here it is. We've come across a small set of four new decorative items that will be launching in the game this year, with one being an absolutely adorable sign containing a mama and baby bird (get ready to say "awww").

That item looks to be called just the "Mother's Day Sign," although we imagine the name might be jazzed up before the item's official release (which could come as early as this Wednesday). The other three items are the Mother's Day Gnome (what mother wouldn't love breakfast in bed?), a lovely Flower Basket that looks to be filled with a wide variety of flowers like bright yellow daffodils, and the Dahlia Flowerbed. Personally, Dahlias are my favorite flower, so excuse me if I get a bit over excited about its release (you'll know when it launches, as you'll hear my excited "Yip" through your computer speakers... well, maybe not, but you get the idea).

If history tells us anything, for these sorts of smaller-holiday or event themes, the items don't really last that long in the store. That being the case, you'll want to keep an extra eye on your game's marketplace to know when these launch, or just keep checking back with us here, as we'll make sure you're the first to know. Just be prepared for the Mother's Day Sign to cost Farm Cash - that's the only way you'll be able to send it to your game-playing mom!

What do you think of these Mother's Day themed unreleased items? Will you send your mother a virtual Mother's Day gift in FarmVille?

FarmVille Sheep Breeding Update: Prepare to be disappointed (again)

Over the weekend, we brought you the news of a series of bugs, or (at the very least) unannounced design changes in FarmVille's Sheep Breeding feature. Since Zynga turned off (and then turned back on) breeding with dotted, chameleon, and otherwise previously "illegal" sheep patterns, things have gone from bad to worse, with users reporting a very (emphasis on very) low amount of pattern inheritance from Rams, and an overwhelming amount of plain white sheep being bred regardless of the colors of the mother and father.

Up until today, Zynga had been relatively quiet on the matter, with Community Manager Lexilicious only briefly reminding users that pattern inheritance is never guaranteed. This afternoon, however, Lexi spoke out again, giving us a detailed statement on the current state of affairs with Sheep Breeding, the white sheep "bug," and the lack of patterns being passed down from Rams. You can find the most important bits of her statement behind the break, but I warn you - it's not pretty.


First and foremost, Zynga has gone on record as apologizing for the lack of in-game communication about the lowered rate of pattern inheritance. They are accepting the fact that users might feel "confused" and "frustrated," and are offering full refunds of the Farm Cash purchase price of any Ram or Ewe that you purchased under the assumption that the color/pattern inheritance rate was 100%. They are urging users to contact Zynga Customer Support, which will take care of the refund process. Of course, you won't get to keep the Ewe/Rams that you purchased, but you will receive your purchase price back in full.

That being said, the high inheritance rate (80-100% success) that many of us experienced since the beginning of the Sheep Breeding feature has now officially been labeled as a "bug," and has been lowered accordingly. Since Zynga didn't release the actual percentage of success for sheep, and since many users are having very, very low success after multiple attempts, it really throws that explanation into question, at least in my book. Could Zynga really have intended for the inheritance rate to be so low, knowing that it would annoy players, perhaps to the point of never purchasing Ewes and Rams, thus defeating the purpose?

The same can be said for the multitude of White Sheep that are being bred. Lexi again tries to confirm that this is a normal possibility as "white is a color," and it is possible to produce white sheep "when the feature is operating normally." She throws in a kicker to this however, that Zynga is aware of the white sheep issue with Chameleon Ewes and Rainbow Rams, and will be fixing those two animals "sometime this week."

All in all, there's not a whole lot of good news here. If you're a fan of the Rainbow Ram and the Chameleon Ewe, know that your White Sheep problem will be fixed shortly. However, for the issue of pattern inheritance, our progress has basically been squashed, unless you are lucky enough to receive an actual patterned Lamb with these much lower success rates. Isn't the entire point of Sheep Breeding to produce Lambs of different patterns, and not different colors? If all we wanted was a yellow sheep, we've seen those released in past Spring events. If we wanted a gray sheep, we'd just turn in our Shovels in the Storage Cellar for a Miner Sheep, which is gray.

No, the entire point, at least in my mind, definitely is the fun patterns that can be bred. But with these new changes, that Zynga is seemingly adamant about not changing back, the entire feature loses its allure, and for me, doesn't warrant any further purchases. It will be interesting to see how many users agree with me (apparently, a lot).

What do you think of these apparently final changes to Sheep Breeding? Do you think public outcry will be enough to make Zynga reverse all of their recent changes (sans unblocking the "hackers")? Or, did Sheep Breeding just become a rather useless feature?