MTV is adding another social game to its roster, and this one is for all you homebodies out there who can’t score a date this Saturday night: I Woo You, a new casual game from the TV network and Stone Creek Entertainment.
All right, that was a little on the sarcastic side, but in some ways this Facebook game recalls gurl.com’s Make Your Own Cybersweetie game, which still miraculously exists (I recall playing this game when I was like 16 years old). Basically, I Woo You is a casual game — in the tradition of FarmVille and FrontierVille — crossed with a game show and laced with promotional tie-ins to MTV reality shows.
You start by creating a customizable avatar (That’s mine up there with my own true love, a stand-up comedian named Alex. He has two fake teeth. Score.) You can outfit said girl or guy with free duds, or you can purchase better threads by using actual money to score coins and cash via Social Gold.
After creating your avatar, you choose an MTV show and cast to play with. Shows include Disaster Date, The Real World and Downtown Girls. Within each show, there’s a cluster of made-up characters who you can play with for free, as well as actual cast members, who cost money.
The game is pretty simple: You ask other characters questions in a series of categories such as “Political Correctness” and “Dating 101,” and they ask you questions in return. If you like what the other person says and they like what you say, you’re a match! (It’s like real life… You know, with less lying, sweating and pre-gaming.) Matches can then take a photo together and go from there to other games/dates. You can share photos and updates on your Facebook Wall as you go along as well. Finally, your mom can stop asking when you’re gonna settle down… Alex and I are planning a spring wedding, ourselves.
The game has a few interesting aspects. For one thing, the MTV cast members’ answers are authentic — i.e. if you have a crush on that dude from The Real World and want to know whether or not you’d hit it off in real life, here’s your chance to give it a go (and perhaps commence desperate stalking immediately after finding out that you both really dig pasta). Also, although you do have to pay for clothing and the chance to virtually hang with actual cast members — as well as to access certain categories and game elements — it’s possible to play mostly pro bono by collecting enough coins along the way. (MTV characters can only be bought with cash — which costs money — however.)
The game also has a more concrete component; if your friends (and love interests) choose to play, you can date them virtually as well. This is kind of a cool idea, in that it’s a low-stress way to gauge someone’s interest, but it also seems like a reeeeally roundabout way to ask someone out. I mean, unless you’re addicted to FarmVille and can’t be bothered to send a text message, we still recommend picking up the phone.
This isn’t the first social game that MTV has launched. Two years ago, it came out with NextOrNot, a version of Hot or Not inspired by the dating show Next. And recently, MTV got into social gaming with the release of games like Jersey Shore and Chain of Thought, a diversion created to promote the series The Hard Times of RJ Berger. MTV Networks also recently acquired Social Express, a social game development company, in order to launch several games based on Nickelodeon and MTV shows and characters. (I Woo You was being developed before this acquisition was made.)
“Expanding our shows’ reach through social games is an excellent way for fans to get to know our shows’ casts, stay engaged and interact with their favorite MTV characters,” says Damon Burrell, vice president of marketing for MTV. According to Burrell, audiences watch MTV shows for some level of connection, and also aspiration. By interacting with characters in the virtual realm, Burrell told us, people can both relate to them and walk in their shoes.
Social games — especially branded social games — have proven to be extremely popular of late. A recent report from social gaming platform Viximo and virtual goods platform Virtual Greats even predicts that branded virtual goods will generate $150 million in 2013 and reach an annual revenue of $318 million by 2015. And, according to a recent study by videogame market research firm The NPD Group, 56.8 million people in the U.S. have played a game on social networks like Facebook in the last three months.
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