The Ville

The Ville was a 2012 social-simulation game developed and published by Zynga, the dominant force in Facebook gaming, launched as a browser-based life-simulation title on the social network. In it, players created and customised virtual characters, built and decorated homes, developed relationships and pursued daily activities and goals, in the dollhouse, life-management style that defined the genre, supported by the energy systems, timed tasks, collectibles and microtransactions characteristic of Zynga's social games and designed around frequent visits and interaction with friends. The Ville became notable less for its own qualities than for the major legal controversy it sparked: Electronic Arts sued Zynga in 2012, alleging that The Ville was a brazen copy of EA's The Sims Social, accusing the company of cloning its design, features and presentation. The high-profile lawsuit, which the companies eventually settled, became a defining flashpoint in long-running industry debates about cloning, originality and aggressive competition in the social-gaming market. As Facebook gaming's popularity faded, The Ville was eventually discontinued. It is remembered chiefly as the centrepiece of the EA-versus-Zynga legal battle and as a representative product of the social-gaming boom, when companies raced to capitalise on Facebook's enormous casual audience with life-simulation and management titles. The EA-versus-Zynga lawsuit it triggered became a defining flashpoint in the era's debates over cloning and originality.