Los Angeles — Zynga, the creator behind massively popular FarmVille on the social media network Facebook has officially unveiled “Empires & Allies“, its newest and most enterprising Facebook game to date that went live early this month that emphasizes strategy, as well as social gaming brilliance of CityVille with the nation building strategy foundation of Risk.
Hoping to replicate the success of its most popular game, Farmville, Zynga’s another game out of its Los Angeles den, Empires & Allies, is also the developer’s first-ever strategy game, which allows players to conquer the world through battles, building and tough negotiations.
Empires & Allies – Zynga’s latest strategy game.
Besides, “Empires & Allies” is Zynga’s first strategy combat game that the company describes as a “CityVille Meets Risk.” The combat element departs from Zynga’s bread and butter games like FarmVille and Mafia Wars, which are mostly played by women aged 25 to 44, a Zynga executive said recently.
Empires & Allies executive producer released the following statement about the game, according to PCWorld:
“Empires & Allies is strategy combat gone social — think CityVille meets Risk,” said Amer Ajami, executive producer of Empires & Allies at Zynga. “We are concentrating on delivering our players a new form of recreation and a strategy game is definitely a new playground for us. Play is in everyone’s DNA, and this game lets you have fun and get creative by choosing your own destiny, building a nation and eventually, conquering the world.”
“Unlike FarmVille, where your goal is to build up your property through trade and commerce, Empires & Allies kicks off following a devastating assault on a peaceful tropical island, and starts building an army and protecting your empire,” Ajami said in a telephonic interview to Mashable. “Users can build army units, form alliances, secure energy and even invade other islands.”
Empires & Allies will include a full story campaign set on a sprawling multi-island game board, across 15 different enemy controlled territories, each of which has a unique leader who has some relationship with your right-hand ally, Scarlet. Through these relationships, you will come to understand more about the conflict that has led to your country’s annihilation.
Empires & Allies instills familiar game play elements from popular Zynga titles, such as CityVille and Mafia Wars, into a story-driven combat crusade.
In the wake of destruction, it will be up to players to rebuild their country and set out to punish those responsible, a villainous cadre known as the Evil Dark Alliance, who are led by the uber-villainous figure called, the Raven. To do this, players aim to build a thriving island-nation by arming themselves against enemy forces and preparing for battle.
During the entire game, players can build army units, enlist friends, and encounter helpful allies and unique villains as you battle their way across enemy-held territories on the quest to defeat the final villain. Fund your armies by collecting rent on huts and cottages, and choose your battleground: air, land, or sea.
The global release is the first of its genre for the games company, which is now reportedly worth $5.5billion only four years after founding.
Interestingly, the game will only be available on Facebook and is free to play, but users can also buy Facebook credits to purchase extra features. Empires & Allies debuts on June 1, and will be available in 12 languages — English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Indonesian, Turkish, Traditional Chinese, and, for the first time in three languages new to Zynga’s experience — Norwegian, Korean and Malay.
The internationalization will likely have a huge impact on the game’s early growth, much like we saw with CityVille, which launched globally with five languages. So far, thirty-three million people around the world have downloaded FarmVille, Zynga’s most popular game to date, and currently there are 60 million active players. Zynga’s timing seems rather poignant to us. The San Francisco-based company is rumored to be filing for an IPO this week at the latest, according to a report from All Things D.
Check out the trailer of Empires & Allies:
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