FarmVille expands reach with debut on MSN Games

FarmVille's been making moves to attract more virtual farmers without relying on Facebook -- first by launching FarmVille.com and now, on MSN Games using Facebook Connect. This new partnership will give "Tens of millions of MSN Games visitors" access to the virtual farming game, and this will be the first time the game can be played on a dedicated game site.

"Social gaming has gone mainstream," Mike Verdu, senior vice president of games at Zynga, says. "People love to connect with their friends through our games, which are broadly accessible and have universal themes. Bringing FarmVille to a major site like MSN Games is a great way to expand the reach of social games and is a logical next step in how we deliver them to consumers."

To play FarmVille in this new environment, head to MSN Games FarmVille page, and start playing. We didn't have to actively login using Facebook Connect -- it just started working. The whole experience is similar to that on FarmVille.com -- a simple page that contains the game and, below that, a Game Feed, with notifications from FV friends.

Later on this year, other Zynga games (most likely Mafia Wars, which also currently has its own site) will launch on MSN Games and Windows Live Messenger.