Feel the Burn...

After hearing all about your ancestors from Granny it's time to get things on the go with the traditional family chilli cookoff between Granny and Angus!

The cookoff will start with the traditional popup wanting you to place the barbecue, and start the steps to finally be able to combine Granny and Angus' chilli recipes into the ULTIMATE chill that, when cooked, will give you a massive 200 energy boost!

The barbecue includes four missions (all details HERE) and four building/crafting stages (all details HERE) to get it to its full glory...

Once it's fully built and Granny and Angus have had their big chilli cook off you get to the most exciting part of the feature, mixing the two types of chilli to craft ULTIMATE chilli, a food so hot it automatically gives you 200 energy points, and you can craft it as often as you like (which will probably be once for the mission then never again, but it's a good IDEA)!

We'll also see a brand new tree, the Olive, a brand new crop, the chilli staple of Kidney Beans, and a brand new animal, the Angus cow that drops sought after Angus beef for the best chilli.

So heat up your tongue and ready your spoons, it's chilli time!

Keep In Touch!

Slowly but surely the technical innovations are reaching the homestead and now it's time to find an alternative to the Pony Express!

Sure we all love a letter in our hands but there's also nothing quite like the speed of the electro magiggery that powers the new invention, the telegraph!

The telegraph station is a unique building, we all know there's no point having just one end of a wire so we'll be building two of them, one on the homestead, one in Prospect Falls along with three missions on the homestead (all details HERE) and three missions in Prospect Falls (see all details HERE)

Each requires three stages of build, firstly the homestead (Nickel Ore comes from rocks, Pine from Pine):

And also Prospect Falls (Copper Ore comes from rocks, Redwood from Trees).

But, what can it do, I hear you ask?

Well, the Telegraph stations both give some pretty nice rewards as you collect them each day. On the homestead they range from crops to meals and even mystery animals, and in Prospect Falls it includes Determination and Pure Water!

Best of all, finish 5 days bonuses in a row in both places and get a MEGA-bonus from a few things including a raging buffalo, a crazy cake and some all new spangly boosts for PROSPECT FALLS, including a PF fast hands and a PF Redeye!

We'll also see the Cateloupe Crop, the return of the Spicebush, this time in Prospect Falls and a new and  Gold Generator (an animated decoration)... Plus of course the obligatory Collection.

So lets hit a new age of technology, and start talking, almost instantly across the miles!

Let The Anvils Ring!

[PLEASE NOTE: Folks, I rarely do anything personal in these but with this one I will.

Give this one a chance, I know there's an instinct to dismiss all the new stuff now and Lord knows I've done it myself with some of the most recent items, but ignore the Crafting Depot etc and check this one on its own merits... I think you'll like the idea and we shouldn't castigate it for the failings of it's feature brethren.

-Andy-]

We always knew when we got to play with the Emporium and the Ranch that Zynga had three building storage buildings in their minds, and now here's the final image in the storing triptych, the Frontier Works!

Yep, this cracker of a workshop will combine NINE more Frontier Buildings into one much smaller footprint to streamline our homesteads, INCLUDING some of the "special" buildings we don't tend to use so much and many folks have stored, leading to a bigger XP and bonus haul when we use the Collect All feature that's a given for these buildings.

In this case it stores the Sawmill, Wagon, Soldier Shower, Supply Outpost, Brick Oven, Hammer Forge, Blacksmith, Stagecoach and Foundry! The space saving will be pretty impressive given the smallish footprint of the Works and the fact that although some of the buildings are small (Hammer Forge in particular) the Blacksmith and Foundry are two of the biggest buildings on the stead.

The works will have four stages of build, each with 5 of the same items so you can stock up and one craftable. (click pics for bigger versions)

Stage One

Stage Two

Stage Three

Stage Four

You'll also be guided through a series of three missions (see all details HERE) that unlocks the Collect All feature and the Customisation. As usual you'll also get to do all the building crafting from one simple menu.

For those of us who like to decorate we'll also see a new coin purchase lumber tree, the Pole Pine.

And for those of us who like collections, there's one of them as well!

So get your hammer swinging and your furnace heated up, it's time to Work...

Craft-a-thon for Trades

Well, we all know the Railroad was (and IS) used for transporting large amounts of goodies, so why not take advantage of our own to get some trading done with the Cities?

It'll all start with a popup prompting us to build a Barter Depot, the new building that will handle all the crafting and requesting through the mission thread (and there is a fair bit)

This Depot will have four build stages, as each one is upgraded you open up more crafting. Please note, you will be able to have three of these if you want to push your crafting to the max and you will be REQUIRED to have two fully upgraded for one of the missions.

[See all mission details HERE]

Inside you'll have up to four pages (depending on level) of items that will be "bartered", read crafted, to use during the mission thread.

Some items will come from the homestead, others will be requested from friends, more others will be crafted in the normal way and some will have been crafted from previous steps in the Depot...

[See Andy try to unravel the crafting requirements HERE]

Each crafting item from the Depot will have a time limit that can be bought off with horseshoes.

There will be a number of different rewards including crates that can contain special items...

...and a Victorian house... which strangely we have to build using items crafted in the depot (Think of it like getting some Lego for being good, albeit Lego where you have to make the bricks yourself from a bucket of melted plastic and some moulds.)

Finally we'll see some new market items, one crop, one animal and one lumber tree...

...and a brand new collection.

So, time to get those crafting gloves on again...