Farm Frenzy

Farm Frenzy is a series of downloadable casual games for the PC developed by Alawar Melesta, an internal development studio of Alawar Entertainment. The series utilizes a point-and-click arcade gameplay model that enables the player to manage the production processes on a farm using a mouse.

Gameplay
The goal in a Farm Frenzy game is to raise animals, process the goods they produce and sell the products for cash. To raise animals, the player must regularly water the grass they eat. A well with a limited capacity supplies the water and costs money to refill. Once the player buys an animal, the animal starts eating grass and dropping goods for the player to pick up. For example, chickens lay eggs, sheep produce wool and cows produce milk. The goods the player picks up are stored in a warehouse with limited capacity. From there, the player may either sell the goods by having a truck transport them to town or turn them into more valuable goods using a specific processing facility.

Predators such as bears sometimes appear on the farm. The player must cage them by quickly and repeatedly clicking on them; otherwise, the predators will toss the other animals off the farm and destroy any goods lying on the ground. In addition to purchasing animals that produce goods, the player can also buy cats and dogs. Cats collect goods that lie on the ground, while dogs chase down predators and prevent them from doing harm. Farm Frenzy 2 introduced an airplane the player can send to town to purchase items the player can't produce on the farm, such as ingredients needed to produce more valuable goods.

Each level in a Farm Frenzy game has a unique set of objectives. These might include owning so many of a particular animal, producing a certain number of goods or having a specific amount of cash on hand. The animal and money goals are checked off as soon as the player completes those objectives, and remain checked off even if the player sells the animals or spends the cash. The game also keeps track of the number of goods the player picks up. If the player uses or sells a good he's collected, the game doesn't reduce the tally. The player must complete the goals for a level within a specific time limit. Skilled players can earn Silver and Gold awards by completing levels within shorter time limits.

When a player completes a level, he earns stars with which he can unlock upgrades. Once an upgrade is unlocked, the player can purchase it while playing a level. (The only exception are the cat and dog upgrades, which make the cats and dogs permanently faster and more intelligent.) Other upgrades are connected to the items found on the farm. For example, the first few well upgrades increase the capacity of the well and reduce the cost of refilling it; the final well upgrade activates automatic watering. When upgraded, processing facilities are able to process more than one item at once, the truck and plane travel faster and can hold more cargo, and the warehouse increases in size. In order to access certain levels, the player must have already unlocked specific upgrades.

There are nine games in the series: Farm Frenzy, Farm Frenzy 2, Farm Frenzy: Pizza Party! Farm Frenzy 3, Farm Frenzy 3: American Pie, Farm Frenzy 3: Ice Age, Farm Frenzy 3: Russian Roulette, Farm Frenzy 3 Madagascar and Farm Frenzy: Gone Fishing (which was released on Thursday the 2nd of September 2010 on Alawar. Farm Freny 3  contains a number of additional features, including a central character named Scarlett, a storyline involving Scarlett's quest to help farmers around the world, reworked gameplay that gives the player more control over the operation of his farm, the inclusion of five farms around the world and additional farm animals unique to each region and Famr Frenzy: Gone Fishing also contains a story but instead of farm animals there are different sea animals and the products, machines are all different.

The visual style of the Farm Frenzy games is lighthearted, with the artists employing bright colors and humorous animation to portray the action.

To date, Alawar has translated the Farm Frenzy series into more than a dozen languages and ported it to multiple platforms, including the iPhone, the Android and the Nintendo DS.

The PC version of Farm Frenzy received the Best Casual Game award at the 2008 Russian Game Developers Conference [citation needed].

Development is already underway on Farm Frenzy 4, a hidden object adventure game set in the Farm Frenzy universe and additional Farm Frenzy titles with varying themes.

History
Farm Frenzy started to take shape when Alex Meleshkevich, CEO of Belarus-based casual game developer Melesta, met Kirill Plotnikov, vice president of publishing for Alawar Entertainment, at Casual Connect 2007. After talking for several hours over drinks, they decided to create a game in the time management genre. The business simulator Chicken Chase was their source of inspiration.

The developers of Farm Frenzy changed the setting, introduced new animals and made the trading system more complicated so the player could be involved in producing new products, such as powdered eggs and cakes. In addition, they replaced the grain the chicks in Chicken Chase ate with grass.


 * Alawar published Farm Frenzy in November 2007, topping the charts of Real Networks, MSN Games, Big Fish Games, Pogo, iWin and other portals.


 * Alawar began working on a sequel to Farm Frenzy soon after the release of the original game, with a team of 16 developers spending six months on the title. The company published Farm Frenzy 2 in July 2008. The artists included a number of secret animations for the player to discover, such as a pig playing a fiddle. The gameplay, however, remained similar to the original.


 * Alawar published Farm Frenzy: Pizza Party! in January 2009. The game allows players to make pizza by combining ingredients from the farm like cheese and dough with additional ingredients transported in from the city.


 * Alawar published Farm Frenzy 3 in July 2009. In the game, Scarlett travels to five different farms around the world and tries her hand at penguin breeding and jewelry making. Her goal is to become the president of the farmers union by earning the votes of the people she helps.


 * Alawar published Farm Frenzy 3: American Pie on November 26, 2009. In the standalone expansion to Farm Frenzy 3, Scarlett uses new advancements in technology, including robots, to grow crops, feed animals, collect produce and manufacture goods.


 * Alawar published Farm Frenzy 3: Ice Age on December 31, 2009. In the second standalone expansion to Farm Frenzy 3, Scarlett travels to the North Pole to take care of a farm she purchased through a newspaper ad. When she arrives, she not only finds the property in a state of disrepair but also meets two brothers who seek her help making ice cream. The game features penguins and other arctic animals.


 * Alawar published Farm Frenzy 3: Russian roulette on April 15, 2010. In the third standalone expansion to Farm Frenzy 3, Scarlett sets out to win a contract to supply food for a space program.