FarmVille boss ordered copying - report

By Robert Purchese Published 9 September, 2010

"I don't f***ing want innovation."

A former employee of FarmVille maker Zynga has recalled how he was told expressly by the company's boss to steal other people's ideas.

The source, speaking to SF Weekly, remembered Zynga founder Mark Pincus' exact words:

"I don't f***ing want innovation," he allegedly said. "You're not smarter than your competitor. Just copy what they do and do it until you get their numbers."

The former employee went on to reveal Zynga's unofficial company motto of "Do Evil": an adaptation of Google's "Don't Be Evil".

"I would venture to say it is one of the most evil places I've run into, from a culture perspective and in its business approach," the source said. "I've tried my best to make sure that friends don't let friends work at Zynga."

FarmVille, Zynga's flagship Facebook game, once attracted a gargantuan 84 million users a month. Zynga also owns FishVille, PetVille, Cafe World and Mafia Wars.

Zynga declined request for comment.

Ellie Gibson put on her gardening gloves for Eurogamer earlier this year to investigate the FarmVille phenomenon.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (68) Latest comment 1 year ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Bitkari #1 1 year ago

    Well, at least he's honest, I suppose...

  • thewool #2 1 year ago

    FarmVille is killing video games!!!

  • Branoic #3 1 year ago

    Hmm, the source clearly has some beef with his former employers. I wonder how credible his comments can be?

  • BabyJesus #4 1 year ago

    The companies motto is 'do evil'?

    I assume they tie orphans to train tracks on their breaks and sell uranium to Iran because I'm afraid farmville isn't very evil..

  • scottycam #5 1 year ago

    "I don't want f***ing want innovation."

    The tag line makes no sense. To many wants?

  • BillyBrush #6 1 year ago

    Not surprising...free to play games are mostly focussed on making big money.

    The really disturbing thing about this kind of gaming is the pschology behind it and the fact that social conventions can be exploited for profit. Someone gives you something for your farmville game...you feel obliged to give back, either by playing the game for a long time or spending money for a short time. It exploits people's good nature, only pikeys and spivs are immune (fortunately i'm a spiv and would rather shoot someone in their virtual face than play that peice o shit).

    I think the suits of the world are already totally convinced this is the way to go though.

  • mk-1601 #7 1 year ago

    Branoic: Considering nearly all of Zynga's major games shamelessly plagiarise the mechanics, themes and art styles of competitors' products, I'd say fairly credible.

  • IkariW #8 1 year ago

    "I don't want f***ing want innovation." ???

    This guy wants 2 much! ;)

    Well he didn't want it, and he most certainly didn't get it.

    ;)
    Edited by 1 at 09/09/10 @ 14:34

  • Sonic_D #9 1 year ago

    No they just missed a comma, he actually meant that innovation is better than sex:

    "I don't want f***ing, want innovation."

  • supermaniacs #10 1 year ago

    Sounds right up Bobby Kotick's alley !!

  • adofessex #11 1 year ago

    This is how most businesses work, they dont want to innovate, they want money.

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #12 1 year ago

    One should not always trust ex-employee sour grapes.

    Remember all those disgruntled ex Rockstar San Diego people badmouthing the studio, and the corresponding predictions that Red Dead Revolver would be awful?

  • thewool #13 1 year ago

    @Raining_Upwards

    Yeah him and Kotick could hold a hearty conversation...

    ...both speaking in their native tongue of cunt.

  • Tiger_Walts #14 1 year ago

    Ah, the age old business practice of doing what someone else does but marketing it better.

  • Bealsy #15 1 year ago

    stealing ideas eh.... I bet they stole that idea off Gameloft...

  • menage #16 1 year ago

    Like this doesn't happen all over the place. Companies just want to make money

  • Baranga #17 1 year ago

    Isn't Brian Reynolds (Rise of Nations, Alpha Centauri etc) working at Zynga?

  • wizlon #18 1 year ago

    I see a comic/film in this somewhere... "I am the head of Zynga, the 1st in the League of evil videogame executives, prepare to feel the wrath of my innovation stifling"

  • iamian #19 1 year ago

    They need to get a proper games console OR get out more

    fixed :)

  • Perfecto #20 1 year ago

    The boss sounds like a smart man, like it or not.

  • GaryHoward #21 1 year ago

    Meanwhile at the Legion of Zynga...

  • CaptainQuint #22 1 year ago

    I couldn't give a fuck about this farmville lark and I don't see it as a threat to my gaming tastes at all. It exists outside of conventional gaming and it shall continue to do so. Their business model won't work with the core gamer.

    Now please stop reporting on this shite.

  • Toothball #23 1 year ago

    Doesn't he make a great deal of money on that advice? Can't really argue with the results.

  • kangarootoo #24 1 year ago

    I would take former employee info with a pinch of salt, at least until further sources can to light.


    On general subject, at the risk of inciting riotous flaming, I can perhaps see a small wisdom in part of what was allegedly said. I see things this way-

    Do things differently to your competitor, unless that means doing things worse [sic]. In which case, do at least the same thing, until you find a way to do things better.

    Being different isn't enough in itself. You also need to be better. If you can't be better, don't be different. Seems like common sense to me. I have lost count of the number of times I've seen an menu or inventory system in a game in a game that was painful to use and thought "why have you come up with your own terrible version of something so benign, when there are countless examples of menus and inventories done well - just copy the best example you can find and get back to polishing the bits of your game that SHOULD be unique".



    Back on the specific subject, I sort of find it puzzling that if Farmville simply copied its competitors until it got its numbers, it would now be in the position of passing those numbers. Farmville is miles ahead of its direct competitors, so logic surely dictates it must be doing something different.

  • Rorsch #25 1 year ago

    They copy great features from other games so they can get a hold of their players? If I didn't know, I'd say he was working on Word of Warcraft instead of FarmVille.

  • drumbaby #26 1 year ago

    I bet he wanted to fucking wanted to punch this bastard.

  • carlitoswagon #27 1 year ago

    "I want to fucking give him a want swift kick in the balls."

    (too slow on the bastarding button, again)
    Edited by 1 at 09/09/10 @ 15:30

  • Wheatley #28 1 year ago

    From the little I've seen of Farmville, this quote makes perfect sense. It's a blatant Harvest Moon rip-off.

  • kangarootoo #29 1 year ago

    Negs without explanation. Always good in a discussion thread...

  • Andeus #30 1 year ago

    Well, doh, Farmville is just a copy of Harvest Moon with a few online features, nothing more. They just saw Harvest Moon being addictive and pushed that through a mainstream medium (that's Facebook). That's the only reason Farmville is so popular.

    The only reason Harvest Moon never achieved such fame in the first place is because it lacked that mainstream medium to push it into the masses, you had to be into video games to find it and play it. I remember getting some friends, who had nothing to do with gaming, to play the SNES Harvest Moon. They were immediately hooked.

    So, yeah, this quote makes perfect sense.

    edit: Beaten to it by Wheatley
    Edited by 4 at 09/09/10 @ 15:37

  • kangarootoo #31 1 year ago

    So what Zynga did differently was to put it on Facebook, which people seem to agree with the killing move. That was a good thing to do then, wasn't it?

  • Cherub007 #32 1 year ago

    @kangarootoo

    Despairing at negs on a perfectly reasonable and well written comment is the first step on the path to misery around here, my friend. Free yourself from the burden of caring and bathe in the milky sweet glow of not giving two fucks what the monkeys around here think.

  • JohnnyWashnGo #33 1 year ago

    I don't use facebook so haven't had the (mis)fortune of playing Farmville but it looks like the worst kind of time wasting POS.

  • nlovell #34 1 year ago

    I've taken issue with the original SF Weekly on GamaSutra and on GAMESbrief. In short, I think snobbish, arrogant and elitist attitudes to Zynga suck.

    http://www.gamesbrie f.com/2010/09/arrogant-snobbish-and-elitist-why-attitudes-to -zynga-suck/

  • Wheatley #35 1 year ago

    I'll bet the main reason for job dissatisfaction at Zynga is knowing that you're involved in a secret mission to wipe out hardcore games.

  • Wheatley #36 1 year ago

    @Cherub007

    Well put!

    Also, +1 to you

    ;)

  • Bertie Verified Senior Staff Writer, Eurogamer.net #37 1 year ago

    Ridiculous strapline typo. Sorry.

  • sneetch #38 1 year ago

    @kangarootoo
    Being different isn't enough in itself. You also need to be better. If you can't be better, don't be different. Seems like common sense to me. I have lost count of the number of times I've seen an menu or inventory system in a game in a game that was painful to use and thought "why have you come up with your own terrible version of something so benign, when there are countless examples of menus and inventories done well - just copy the best example you can find and get back to polishing the bits of your game that SHOULD be unique".

    Hear, hear, I wonder the same thing. It truly baffles me when someone changes a standard mechanic for some, poorly implemented "innovation" of their own. Again and again I see games where it seems developers have spent more time in finding ways to be different than in ensuring their game is good.

    Basically, innovation can be great but only when it's a great idea. Which is painfully obvious but that only make me wonder why so few people get it. Change for the sake of change is not normally a good idea.

  • butler` #39 1 year ago

    Sounds pretty standard. You can't assume you can out think your competitor. It's quite common in business to imitate and iterate.

  • Collymilad #40 1 year ago

    What a twat. Take farmville and any other shite you are planning to make and stick it up your arse.

  • Seoh #41 1 year ago

    What an idiot, copying other companies ideas alone doesn't make you money. Like it or not mate they were innovating when they copied harvest moon, integrated into facebook and let people play for free. They were at least being evil tho.

  • kangarootoo #42 1 year ago

    @Cherub007

    Oh, quite true. I've said as much to others. I don't mind negs, not a bit of it. I just want to know why. I'm not so preumtious to think that I am always right (not quite anyway ;) ). If someone thinks I'm wrong, I want to know why, because I might agree once I understand their pov.

  • kangarootoo #43 1 year ago

    @sneetch

    "Change for the sake of change is not normally a good idea."

    I was in a work situation some while back, which I can't go into huge detail about for obvious reasons. I was trying to explain that a concept had some issues, and that it should share more functionality with an existing solution. I was confronted with a "if its the same as the existing solution, why won't people just use the existing solution?" point of view, and had to repeatedly ask "if its different, but worse, why won't people just use the existing solution?".

    If you can be original AND well implemented, hurrah. I'm all for that. If you can only choose one though, good implementation wins every time in my book.

  • EthanWoods #44 1 year ago

    Well, that's nice.

    I come to all these gaming sites because I want to hear about actual gaming though. Zynga's market is not our market, so maybe we should all stop whining and saying that they're stealing people away from the likes of TF2 to play FarmVille.

  • chargen #45 1 year ago

    Doesn't he know that traveling down this misbegotten path of evil will only net him untold millions of dollars.

    Seriously, I would work for Zynga in a heartbeat. This ex didn't sound like he was treated badly, just that he disliked their business ethos. I would gladly take a job in a successful online software company that treated it's employees fairly. You want to pay me how much to steal the ideas of other gaming companies who've stolen their ideas from someone else? Yessir, right away sir!

  • justMe #46 1 year ago

    Untold millions of dollars and untold tons of bad karma.

  • tobsen #47 1 year ago

    Just in case anyone here hasn't noticed yet - you can block all these retarded Farmville messages from your Facebook stream once and for all with just a single click on the little [x] icon. Do it today!

  • anomagnus #48 1 year ago

    Is it wrong of me to say, that i'd actually love a boss as honest as this. I've worked for some large organistions, and work for one at the moment, and i hate all the double speak and lack of truth.

    I'd love a boss to come out and say 'lets just fucking make cash!'

    But my soul has been eroded by 10 years of multi nationals

  • Vyggo #49 1 year ago

    There is no shame in looking carefully at your competitors and copy good ideas.

  • Golgo #50 1 year ago

    good luck to him. clearly emulating the very successful policy of PopCap,

  • chiz #51 1 year ago

    Hmm., hungry horace was good when the spectrum came out then became utter shit soon after. Farmville will too, when people get better.

  • White_Waffle #52 1 year ago

    Innovation. Getting new things, doing things in a different way. I don't see why it always has to be a revolution. And for that matter why things must always change at all.
    I'm pretty sure to have knives and forks in my kitchen in the future or having a drive to collect items in games, or wanting to level up a character, or what the hell.
    In the end some things will stay for a long time and other things will go away again. Fair game to try new things but staying with a traditional approach during times where people long for the next sensation to distract can be a risk and good thing as well.

    btw. i find that boss refreshingly honest. (my first impression). and the former employe to be someone who couldn't accept to have his ideas not being realized.

  • Skurmedel #53 1 year ago

    The concept of stealing an idea is a bit dubious, at least in business. If you weren't allowed to improve on other people's ideas how would we get any competition? It is a bit cheap to carbon-copy something and bring no improvements (not even a price reduction) to the table though. On the other hand you can always vote with your wallet.

    I'm more concerned about the mechanics these games use. I deliberatly avoid them because I know I'm the personality type who will get stuck and then it'll take two very crappy months for me to escape it. I don't know if it can be considered dangerous or even immoral, but people should be aware of the mechanics.

    Maybe some people don't feel as empty as I do after 10 micro-rewards but some comparison to narcotics isn't entirely unappropriate. These things are already dripping into other conventional games wanting a piece of the cake, like Bad Company 2 which I think is a fine game, but I spent a lot of time to get those two last unlockables even though I had been worn out on the game.

    If I do get sucked in, it's my fault I'm an adult. Usually you can't blame someone else if you got addicted to blow. Kids however I'm not so sure of.

  • Skurmedel #54 1 year ago

    I just noticed the irony in having a "Like" button in this article.

  • craziii #55 1 year ago

    I know a kid who spends hours on this game everyday, I made her stop. she would literally stare at the screen waiting for something. I cannot tell you how much her parents has thanked me.

    farmville is a disease.

    facebook is also too big for it's own good.

  • alcides #56 1 year ago

    You mean copying like ripping articles off Kotaku?

  • madjim #57 1 year ago

    Why are we talking about Farmville? I thought EG was about games.

  • Bonders99 #58 1 year ago

    Farmville ?...enough said

  • Xboxfanuk #59 1 year ago

    So does this mean Activision is going to buy this company soon?

  • kangarootoo #60 1 year ago

    I think some people need to recallibrate the meaning of the word "evil" in their heads (I don't really believe in evil, but lets assume that I do for a moment).

    Evil is running a sweatshop where you beat children if they don't make enough wrist bracelets for you in a 20 hour period.

    Running a company where well paid employees develop somewhat unoriginal if very polished games, and marketing them effectively to make a huge pile of cash, is not evil.

  • levitate #61 1 year ago

    If Zynga would merge with Microsoft the world would finally see the Ultimate Evil born. Only way to stop it is to switch to BeOS, OS/2 and AmigaOS and never be able to use a computer properly again.

  • Sniper_007 #62 1 year ago

    Aren't Zynga owned by Google now... I always did suspect that Google were branching out into the evil market!!!

  • chrisjm #63 1 year ago

    do they have a giant "laser"

  • alcides #64 1 year ago

    @kangarootoo, luring users into installing trojans on their computers in exchange for free in-game cash, then joking about it, is evil. The guy even joked openly that he couldn't get rid of the thing himself. Fishing and spamming is evil. And hiring a compulsive behaviour specialist to make their games more addictive is evil too.

    As for the sweat shops of your mind, Wikipedia needs a proper reference. Please don't use clichés as argument.

  • Rack #65 1 year ago

    For a company that actually boasts it's main source of revenue is Phishing I'm amazed how many supporters of Zynga are running around here.

  • iamian #66 1 year ago

    @Kangarootoo

    Also, lets remember that it's not 'us' calling them evil, it's THEIR (admittedly unofficial) company motto!!

  • BlackKraken #67 1 year ago

    Yeah those evil bastards, not giving me a payrise and firing me for exposing myself in front of the bosses children.
    Ill make up some shit and tell eurogamer, they'll report anything!

    /sarcasm

    Really though, its entirely plausable. Whether its true or not almost doesn't matter. What most surprised me about this is that the makers of farmville are actually a legitimate organisation. I thought Zynga was the name of the malicious entity that spawned facebook games.

  • Puppaz #68 1 year ago

    Honestly couldn't give a toss whether the employee was being honest, or what the company is like, I simply despise everything they've ever produced. Unfortunately it seems to be everywhere I look *wishes there was a 'Zynga filter' option on download stores*