OK – so I have too much time on my hands.  Need to do something to keep from going insane.  Over the past couple of years I have explored a number of Facebook games with the ever addicting Mafia Wars probably being my number 1 for a long time.  Alas, I found most Facebook games to be either:

1)  Too trivial

2) Too dependent on having a 1000 friends, with “auto-friend” lists being common (Mafia Wars fell in this category as did many, many, others.  These games almost seem to exist to get you to get more people to sign up.  Most are, of course, for profit games and the more players the more likely someone will cough up real cash to play.

3) Too unoriginal like Reignage, which is a clone of a clone of a clone (two of which exist with the exact same name in Facebook with the exact same game just hosted by two different people).  Many of these are Chinese games, often advertising with sexy banners for games with no significant graphical content and NO sexy play.  They seem to exist to entice people to spend $100-$1000 to play their game.  Seriously!!!

4) Just downright addictive, but very expensive.  At least that is my impression of games like Farm Ville.  Hook you early, but want lots of real money to gain a competitive advantage.  The addiction is extreme – I know of people that scheduled work meetings around when their virtual crop needed to be harvested.

I have come across one game that seems to be reasonably well balanced.  I’ve played for awhile now, am doing well, and have not invested a cent beyond my time.  Of course, things would have gone a bit faster if I did invest money, which is ok, but I didn’t HAVE too.  That game is hosted at http://www.clicktaz.com and is called Conquest.  You can check it out by going through my portal at:

Conquest ~ Resurgence Within

http://www.clicktaz.com/?source=100002401930347

You do need a Facebook account to play, but can access it directly from the URL.