No joke: Pettington Park is Loot Drop and Zynga's Google+ project

Check your calendar: April Fools was months ago. Inside Social Games reports that Ghost Recon Commander creator Loot Drop has teamed up with Zynga to release a game on Google+, Pettington Park. Aside from the first four words, we'd never imagine seeing any of those words in the same sentence. Alas, Pettington Park by Loot Drop and Zynga is available now on Google+.

Players choose to side with either cats or dogs in Pettington Park, growing their park in the name of their species of choice. You can add items like buildings and decorations to your park, but its introducing items like courts and arcade cabinets that open up what the game is really about: the mini games. There seems to be several mini games to play in Pettington Park from tennis to match-3 and other casino-like experiences.

Of course, there's a player versus player component that sees players competing weekly to see which is better--cats or dogs?--by tallying players' scores based on the progress made in-game. You'll see a full review of the game soon enough, so back to this while Loot Drop-Zynga thing.

What's odd about this project is threefold. First is the fact that Zynga and Loot Drop are in cahoots at all, especially considering what the studio has alluded to as the reason for its first game, Cloudforest Expedition, effectively getting canned. Next is the fact that this project wasn't launched on Facebook or Zynga.com, the two places that we imagine Zynga would launch a published product. And finally, one of the largest social game makers just left Google+, so again: Why Google+? We've reached out to Loot Drop to have these questions answered.

Click here to play Pettington Park on Google+ Now >

Are you excited to try out Pettington Park? What do you think of this unlikely partnership? Sound off in the comments. Add Comment.