Michael Carl Ruhlman is an American author, home cook and entrepreneur.
Dinner: Impossible is an American television program broadcast by the Food Network and initially hosted by Robert Irvine. The first episode aired on January 24, 2007 and the last episode aired in 2010. Food Network began airing the eighth season on March 3, 2010.
What's Cooking? with Jamie Oliver, sometimes known as What's Cooking? Jamie Oliver, is a cooking video game for the Nintendo DS narrated by celebrity chef Jamie Oliver. It was developed by German studio keen games GmbH & Co. KG and published by Atari Europe.
Zynga Inc. is an American developer running social video game services. It was founded in April 2007, with headquarters in San Mateo, California. The company primarily focuses on mobile and social networking platforms. Zynga states its mission as "connecting the world through games".
Playfish was a developer of free-to-play social network games. Playfish was founded in 2007 by Kristian Segerstråle, Sebastien de Halleux, Sami Lababidi, and Shukri Shammas. It closed in 2013. Playfish in the past had attracted up to 55 million users a month, with over 37 million users coming from Facebook users. In October 2008, they secured US$17 million in venture capital funding from Accel Partners and Index Ventures. The company was acquired by Electronic Arts in 2009, with the last of Playfish's games being retired in 2013.
FarmVille is a series of agriculture-simulation social network games developed and published by Zynga in 2009. It is similar to Happy Farm and Farm Town. Its gameplay involves various aspects of farmland management, such as plowing land, planting, growing, and harvesting crops, harvesting trees and raising livestock. The sequels FarmVille 2 and FarmVille 3 were released in September 2012 and November 2021, respectively.
FishVille is a defunct real-time aquarium simulation game developed by Zynga, it was available as an application on the social-networking website Facebook. The game allowed members of Facebook to manage virtual aquariums by rearing fish. As of October 2011, FishVille had 1.6 million monthly active users. The game was discontinued on December 5, 2012.
Café World is a defunct multiplayer restaurant simulation social network game created by Zynga and launched in September 2009. It quickly became the fastest growing social game ever, reaching 8 million users in seven days, and peaked at over 10 million daily active users, which made it Zynga's third-largest game after FarmVille and CityVille. Available on Facebook, players strive to become master chefs and build a food empire by completing catering orders.
Friends for Sale was a massively multiplayer online business simulation game originally developed by Serious Business, available as an application on the social networking website Facebook. The game allowed players to buy and sell virtual pets representing other players. Since its launching by November 2007, Friends for Sale soared into popularity by June 2008, becoming one of the top ten Facebook applications with around 700,000 daily users and activity peaked at around 6.5 million monthly users on 2 November 2009 until Zynga acquired Serious Business on 11 February 2010. Shortly after its acquisition by Zynga, Friends for Sale underwent another transition as it was subsequently sold to Lika Games Inc on September 27, 2010. Due to financial constraints and challenges, Lika Games has made the difficult decision to discontinue the operation of Friends For Sale. Despite dedicated efforts over the past eleven months to enhance game functionality and streamline the interface, the game struggled to attract sufficient new players. Given these circumstances and uncertainties about resolving these issues in the near future, the decision has been made to cease operation on September 3, 2011.
A social network game is a type of online game that is played through social networks or social media. They typically feature gamification systems with multiplayer gameplay mechanics. Social network games were originally implemented as browser games. As mobile gaming took off, the games moved to mobile as well. While they share many aspects of traditional video games, social network games often employ additional ones that make them distinct. Traditionally they are oriented to be social games and casual games.
Facebook Credits was a virtual currency that enabled people to purchase items in games and non-gaming applications on the Facebook Platform. One U.S. dollar was the equivalent of 10 Facebook Credits. Facebook Credits were available in 15 currencies including U.S. dollars, pound sterling, euros, and Danish kroner. Facebook was hoping eventually to expand Credits into a micropayment system open to any Facebook application, whether a game or a media company application. Facebook deprecated Credits in favour of users' local currencies.
CityVille was a casual social city-building game developed by Zynga, and released in December 2010.
YoWorld is a browser-based virtual world game which was released on May 8, 2008. It is developed by Big Viking Games. The game operates on the freemium model, and is supported through microtransactions, as well as a voluntary in-game ad program. The game itself is free-to-play, however, players can purchase in-game currencies or enroll in special programs and offers to improve their game-play experience or help them progress faster, using real money.
RewardVille is Zynga’s defunct virtual in-game currency and rewards program. Launched in March 2011 and retired on 5 December 2012, the program allowed players to earn exclusive Zynga-specific points and coins that could be spent within Zynga games or used to unlock virtual goods for use in the games or to gift to other players. Players collected “zCoins” currency and “zPoints”, which could be used to upgrade a user's Zynga status. Players could earn as many as 80 zPoints per game or 300 zPoints total in one day, by playing Zynga games.
The Sims Social was a Facebook addition to the Sims series of video games. It was announced during the Electronic Entertainment Expo 2011 press conference. As with the original Sims games, The Sims Social lets the user create their own customizable character. In this version, however, the player uses their character to interact with those of their Facebook friends. The characters can develop likes or dislikes for other Sims, creating relationships that can be publicized on the user's Facebook page.
Cow Clicker is an incremental social network game on Facebook developed by video game researcher Ian Bogost. The game serves as a deconstructive satire of social games. The goal of the game is to earn "clicks" by clicking on a sprite of a cow every six hours. The addition of friends' cows to the player's pasture allows the user to also receive "clicks" whenever the player's cow is clicked. A premium currency known as "Mooney" allows the user to purchase different cow designs and skip the six-hour interval between clicks.
Zynga.org was an independent nonprofit organization started by social games developer Zynga, Inc., in October 2009. The purpose of Zynga.org was to promote and facilitate the use of social games for philanthropic initiatives. It was incorporated as a separate legal entity in March 2012. The organization was dissolved in 2016.
Bubble Safari is a defunct tile-matching social network game by Zynga. The object is to help a monkey named Bubbles reconnect with his friends. Following its May 2012 release, Bubble Safari became the fastest-growing Facebook game, with 1.9 million active users for the week of July 9. PC Magazine ranked Bubble Safari as no. 5 on its Best Facebook Games list. Arcade game designer Mark Turmell, noted for such games as NBA Jam, received credit for Bubble Safari’s development. Bubble Safari is Zynga’s first arcade game, the first Zynga game released on Zynga.com and Facebook simultaneously, and the first game from Zynga San Diego.
Zombie Cafe is a freemium mobile simulation video game created by American Capcom subsidiary Beeline Interactive, Inc. It was released for iOS platforms on January 26, 2011, and was formerly on Google Play for Android. In the game, players run a café by cooking dishes and serving customers with the help of zombies. Players can turn customers into zombies, who become employees. Players gain experience by cooking and serving dishes. There are a variety of menu items, each differing in price, number of servings, and time to cook. As the restaurant builds up savings, the player can purchase recipes and furnishings, and can infect more customers. The player can also purchase pets and expand their restaurant. Along with growing the business, players can send their zombies to raid enemy cafés to obtain new recipes.
Cook, Serve, Delicious! is a restaurant simulation video game released in 2012, developed and published by Vertigo Gaming. The player controls the menu and running of a restaurant, with in game currency being awarded by correctly filling customer orders. Directed by David Galindo, it had art from Sara Gross and music from Johnathan Geer. The game was released on 5 October 2012, for PC, and for Steam after a period on Steam Greenlight from 8 October 2013. It was later ported to iOS and Android. Cook, Serve, Delicious! drew inspiration from Japan-only 1999 game Ore no Ryouri.
