1）据Kotaku报道，EA在近日的GDC Game Changers大会上宣布将于2013年向PC和Mac平台发布新版《模拟城市》，该游戏将支持“Social Flow”这种社交功能，玩家将可看到自己的城市（即自己的操作）对其他玩家的城市的影响。游戏环境中的资源有限，这会考验玩家建设城市的决策能力。

simcity-game(from games)

该游戏其他社交功能包括向好友发送消防车帮助灭火，或者做出向他人城市的道路倾倒垃圾这种恶作剧。玩家也可以联合起来进行科学研究，例如共同向太空发射火箭。

2）据Kotaku报道，Epic Games副总裁Mark Rein在日前GDC大会上展示了由虚幻引擎3结合Flash技术开发的游戏视觉效果，支持Facebook、Google+等平台游戏开发者利用该引擎开发堪比PC平台3D游戏图像效果的产品。

3）时尚女性杂志《悦己》发行商Condé Nast日前宣布将推出自己的Facebook游戏《Self Workout in the Park》，以便推广其杂志在旧金山各公园举办的健康活动。

SELF Workout in the park(from games)

该游戏将于3月19日上线，支持玩家在其中创建自己的健身公园，装扮虚拟形象，参加健身挑战。据该杂志所称，这款锁定女性用户的游戏还将于4月7日推出可追踪玩家实际健身情况的手机应用，并通过玩家的游戏虚拟形象反馈其健身成果。

4）据Business Insider报道，近日有数名知情者透露，EA游戏元老、Zynga高级产品副总裁Mark Skaggs有可能在未来6至12个月内，或者在Zynga完成一个“超级神秘项目”后离职（但也有可能继续与Zynga合作开发游戏），因为“他需要挑战”。

farmville cow(from games)

观察者称，Mark Skaggs是《FarmVille》和《CityVille》这两款Zynga大作背后的核心人物，再加上《CityVille》原核心设计师已流向Idle Games，如果Mark Skaggs也要出走，Zynga定会极力挽留。

5）Digital Chocolate近日宣布与Sweetlabs旗下的Pokki平台合作，将硬核Facebook游戏《Galaxy Life》引进桌面电脑平台，以便让游戏收获更多用户。

galaxy-life(from games)

在此之前，社交游戏开发商Kabam和EA已采用同样种法，通过Pokki将Facebook游戏移植到电脑桌面。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转载，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

1）SimCity coming to PC / Mac in 2013, is social

by Brandy Shaul

Last month, gamers everywhere had their hopes raised as rumors of a new title in the classic SimCity franchise began swirling around EA’s then upcoming Game Changers event at GDC. Well, tonight those rumors came true, as the Game Changers event not only announced the existence of a new title in the SimCity franchise, but also gave us some interesting details about the game.

As reported by Kotaku, SimCity will be released on both PC and Mac sometime in 2013. The game will be social, offering a new feature called “Social Flow.” This feature will see your own city (and your actions therein) affecting the cities of other players. That is, resources within the game universe are limited (similarly to how resources are limited here in the real world) and the decisions that both you and other players make will impact the development of your own city along the way.

From a technical standpoint, this is set to be the most modern SimCity yet, both in design and appearance as we’ll finally be able to build curved roads in these cities that come in full 3D.

According to the new SimCity website, other social features include sending fire trucks to your friends’ cities to squash blazes or being more than a bit naughty by sending mass pollution their way (causing your friends’ Sims to become sick as a result). You can even combine your efforts in certain technological spaces, reaching greater heights than you may have originally been able to on your own (like launching shuttles into space).（source:games）

2）Your Facebook games could look like this someday, thanks to Unreal

by Joe Osborne

Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 3 just blew FarmVille and friends out of the water. During a panel at this year’s Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco, company VP Mark Rein showed off what it’s capable of with Flash, the technology behind most Facebook games and web-based games. And it looks absolutely stunning, like nothing you’ve ever seen before on Flash.

If a game developer ever decided to use the Unreal Engine on Facebook, Google+ or elsewhere, the results could look like this image. That said, none of what Epic depicted represents a real game or anything in the works at the studio–Epic is showing off. “This isn’t your father’s FarmVille,” Epic’s Mark Rein said, according to Kotaku, “this is immersive, 3D, beautiful environments.”

According to Kotaku, what Rein showed in full-screen looked like what players will find on PCs, game consoles and even iPhones and iPads right now. (Ahem, like in Infinity Blade Dungeons?)

Whether developers will actually be interested in bringing such graphically rich games to Facebook or Google+ is up for debate, but the fact that it’s possible right now is kind of mind-blowing.

“Our long-term goal is to be able to do Samaritan in Flash,” Rein said later in the presentation, referring to the tech demo that Epic showed to GDC goers back in 2011. Take a look at that here, and imagine that running in Facebook.（source:games）

3）Self Magazine gets its Workout in the Park on … in a Facebook game

by Joe Osborne

Maybe we’re getting ahead of ourselves, but doesn’t this defeat the purpose of, you know, getting people to work out? Condé Nast, the publisher behind Self Magazine, will put out its very own Facebook game. Titled Self Workout in the Park, the game looks to promote the magazine’s annual fitness event in city parks around the nation that takes place starting May 5 in San Francisco.

Developed in conjunction by Self and New York-based Smerc, Self Workout in the Park takes the tried and true simulator approach to branded social games. When the game launches on March 19, players will get to create and curate their very own workout park, customize their avatars and partake in fitness challenges that will reflect in their avatar’s image. Self Workout in the Park also packs a metric ton of sponsor support, with everything from in-game ads to branded virtual goods.

“SELF Workout in the Park will have a profound effect on our brand footprint as the number of female gamers has grown exponentially, now representing 55 percent of the 98 million social gamers in the U.S,” Self VP and publisher Laura McEwen said in a release. “SELF is at the right place at the right time-the game is fun, funny, engaging and captures women’s passionate interests in fitness, health and wellness.”

In case you were unclear on just who will be targeted with Self’s first Facebook game, now you know. A game platform that sees players sitting on their rumps seems like an odd choice for a fitness-themed game. But Self already has an answer to that: A mobile companion app will launch on April 7 that will track players real-life fitness and reflect those changes in their in-game avatars. Does that mean we actually have to, like, get up? Self Workout in the Park lands on Facebook March 19.（source:games）

4）The guy behind FarmVille might ditch Zynga for other projects [Rumor]

by Joe Osborne

FarmVille might have an allegedly sordid past of infringements and acquisitions, but Zynga’s flagship game still has a name behind it: Mark Skaggs. However, Business Insider reports that the EA designer turned FarmVille maestro might look elsewhere for his next big game. That is, if Zynga can’t continue to pique his interest after his work on a super secret game is through.

Business Insider claims, citing several nameless sources, that Skaggs plans to stick with Zynga for the next six to 12 months, or until work on his “huge, unannounced project” is complete. After that, the FarmVille and CityVille mastermind will look both in and out of Zynga for his next big project. Mr. ‘Ville is hungry for a challenge, based on the sound of Business Insider’s report.

Skaggs is one of Zynga’s earliest–and arguably most important–employees, having laid the foundation for the developer’s wild, multibillion dollar success on Facebook. Should the rumors be true, you can bet Zynga will do everything in its power to keep the star designer intrigued. That’s especially so considering the company already lost one of the main minds behind CityVille to Idle Games, a potential competitor that promises to revolutionize Facebook games. We’ve reached out to Zynga for comment.（source:games）   http://blog.games.com/2012/03/07/farmville-designer-leave-zynga/

5）Galaxy Life crash lands on desktops through Pokki, Digital Chocolate

by Joe Osborne

Believe it or not, but getting to your social games somehow gets easier than logging into Facebook and clicking a few icons. Well, that is if you’re a Windows user and are a fan of “core” social games. Digital Chocolate is the next social game maker to sign on with Sweetlabs’ Pokki–the platform that brings an iOS-like app experience to Windows–plopping its new game Galaxy Life there.

Galaxy Life is a “hardcore” Facebook strategy game in vein of hits like Backyard Monsters and Dragons of Atlantis hiding beneath a cutesy, casual shell. Even so, the developer feels that having its core games available in more places is vital to its success.

“Giving consumers multiple ways of accessing our content is critical to our success, and we’re excited to expand the reach of our titles through our partnership with Pokki,” Digital Chocolate COO Jason Loia said in a release. “Letting players access Galaxy Life directly from their desktop gives us strategic distribution advantages, and we’re confident that Pokki will provide added convenience and accessibility for our gamers while helping us increase engagement and retention.”

Translation: Digital Chocolate, like social game makers Kabam and EA, hope that services like Pokki will make their games easier to get into so that players will stick around for longer and come back often. If it ends up working, social game makers could have one more place to reach their audience outside of Facebook, which seems to be a trend these days.（source:games）