Overview: The basic game in Farmville is very simple. You prepare a plot of land, plant seeds on it, and wait minutes, hours, or even days for the plant to grow so you can harvest it. You get coins from the harvest, and spend them on new seeds and clearing more land. Played alone, it’s a cute little timewaster at best.

The social side of Farmville is where the complexity really shows. There is a huge range of buildings, decorations, and animals available to customize your farm and add to the gameplay, but they’re only available through real-world cash or by “gifting” – sending items to your friends in the hopes of getting what you want back. You can post your wishlist and check out your friends’ lists to make sure you’re sending gifts that will be appreciated, and some items must be assembled from multiple gifted parts. You can also visit your friends’ farms and help them out – fertilizing their crops will give you a bonus and also give them more experience points.

Of course, if you have more money than friends, all of these items can be purchased with Farm Cash, the real-world money you can get through the usual sources. You do get some Farm Cash through ordinary play, so if you’re not willing to open your wallet you can still get some of the premium goodies. And Zynga occasionally offers charitable items like “Sweet Seeds for Haiti” where some portion of the purchase price goes to a good cause – as always, do your research before donating through any third party to find out just how much of your money will go to the charity.

For a very simple game, there is a lot here. There is an extensive list of achievements – “ribbons” – to aim for that cover the entire range of gameplay. New seeds, gifts, and decorations are constantly being added, and seasonal items constantly rotated in and out. The downsides are few, but substantial – the time commitment is significant, for one. If you plant a crop but don’t get back in time to harvest it, you lose the whole thing, costing you not just your profit but your initial investment. There are more ways to spam your long-suffering friends than you can shake a hoe at, and the game itself is very fond of pop-up “special offers” to try to lure you into buying Farm Cash. But all in all, there’s a reason this is one of the most popular games on Facebook.