If you’ve ever been addicted to a social game that involves gaining levels by repeatedly clicking on “finish quest” buttons, you’ve got to try Progress Wars. Progress Wars is Jakob Skierning’s new parody game that allows you to repeatedly click on a button to finish quests and gain levels… but that’s all there is to it.
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Kirstie Alley, the very public and notoriously inconsistent dieter, has made a cameo appearance in the Zoo World Facebook game.   The game, which revolves around building a zoo and keeping your customers happy, now allows for you to either purchase a Healthy Snack Stand item that is sponsored by Kirstie Alley, or you can buy a Kirstie Alley Greeting stand, which just sits there and looks pretty.
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Playfish has launched it’s newest game, Hotel City, on Facebook. The game is a hotel management simulator, and is in fact quite different from all the other “city” games that have been released lately. The production values are great, and the gameplay is truly innovative. We’ll have more details on the game as it goes through its first week of bug-fixing and play testing.
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Yahoo today announced that they are acquiring Citizen Sports, a company that creates fantasy sports leagues for Facebook, iPhone, Android and other devices.  The acquisition is meant to enhance Yahoo’s position in social games and fantasy sports, and “strengthen Yahoo!’s social strategy of enriching, aggregating and distributing social content from across the entire Web, and offering a highly customizable social experience.”
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MetroGames, an Argentenian social games developer, has just secured a $5 million round of series A funding from social games developer Playdom.  The investment will be used to expand MetroGames existing selection of games and also further development on their games platform.  The release is available here.

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EA is promoting Saboteur, one of their newest console titles, by creating a Facebook quiz application that involves videos and content from the game. The application isn’t a full-fledged game, but does have a quiz element and leaderboards to compete with friends. There are also prizes to the top players, including an all-expenses paid trip to Las Vegas.
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With Flash Gaming Summit (FGS) and Game Developers Conference 2010 (GDC) now over, we’d like to take the opportunity to reflect on some of the key takeaways. One of the most discussed areas was career opportunities in the gaming industry, particularly in the area of social gaming. Here’s a few of the opportunities gleaned from various sessions, panels and interviews last week.
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Zynga just launched their newest title, Poker Blitz for Facebook, and from our early looks it seems to be Texas Hold ‘Em meets Farmville.  The game is a simplified version of texas hold’ em poker with cutesy graphics and powerups that affect gameplay.  The game seems to be inviting new demographics to enjoy the game of poker, and my first impressions say that they’ve succeeded.
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While we’re always trying to cover the latest news in the social web economy, sometimes it simply isn’t possible to get all of our stories out. That’s why once in a while we will provide a roundup of some of the more interesting social media stories from around the web. Below are some of the more intriguing stories that took place yesterday.
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Do you remember ICQ (”I Seek You”)? It was one of the first desktop download chat applications and was sold to AOL for $400 million in 1998. Strangely, it fell off the map after the acquisition, but has since resurfaced as a type of community-based social network that leverages Facebook and Twitter. We take a look below.
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