…Koster spoke as part of Gamasutra's latest feature, Targeted Focus, Broad Audience?, which seeks to examine the increasing necessity for carefully targeted themes in casual and social games.
His company recently released its farming game for Facebook, My Vineyard, which moves from the generalized theme of FarmVille into a much more carefully chosen niche.
"In order to appeal to wine lovers, we paid attention to the actual process of wine-making rather than sticking slavishly to the established farming model," said Koster. "And because it's a social game, players can get together for wine-tasting parties and there's a fairly significant level of user creativity in that the vineyards can be decorated and built out."…
For the complete article go here: In-Depth: Koster On The Evolution Of Social Game Genres