The Ville Walkthrough

Welcome to the quick start guide for Zynga’s newest game, The Ville. You will be creating a character, building and decorating your house, and interacting with your neighbors. This guide will help you familiarize yourself with the game world.

Game Introduction – The Ville

Quick Start Guide

Getting Started

Navigating the Screen

At the top of the screen you will find your balances for coins, ville cash, energy, happiness, and your level and experience.

On the left side of the screen you will find your current goals.

At the bottom of the screen you will find your friends, tools, inventory, the market, and clothes.

Terminology

Coins: Coins are the currency of The Ville. Coins are used to build additions to your home and to purchase furniture and decorations. Coins can be earned by interacting with objects and neighbors, completing goals, and by working.
Ville Cash: Ville cash is premium currency of The Ville. Ville cash can be purchased using real money. It can also be occasionally earned by leveling up.
Energy: Energy allows you to perform tasks and visit with neighbors. Once you run out of energy you will need to wait for it replenish or purchase a refill using ville cash. Neighbors can also send you energy as a gift.
Happiness: Happiness is used to complete jobs. Each job costs a certain amount of happiness. Happiness is earned by socializing with neighbors and by interacting with certain objects.

Experience: Experience is earned every time you complete an action. Experience can also be earned by completing goals. Once you have earned enough experience you will level up and unlock new items and goals.

Goals: Goals are tasks that you can perform to earn extra coins and experience. Your goals can be found on the left side of the screen. They usually involve several steps and you can track your progress by clicking on a specific goal.
Home Value: The current worth of your home. To increase the value of your home, purchase new items and place them in your home. Hover over an item to see how much it will increase the value of your house.
Tools: Your tools are located at the bottom right of the screen. From here you can move and rotate items, move rooms, edit walls, sell items, or move items to your inventory.

Inventory: You inventory is where you will find any items you have stored along with various items you can acquire while playing the game.

Market: The market is where you will find everything and anything you may need to purchase to customize your house.

Productivity: Productivity items earn you additional coins. You can click on them and select jobs. Jobs use happiness and earn coins over time.

Living Room: Here you can purchase items for your living room.

Bedroom: Here you can purchase items such as beds, nightstands, and other items for your bedroom.

Kitchen: Under this tab you can purchase kitchen items. In the kitchen you can cook and bake items. Also, items like cupboards allow you to find ingredients you can use in cooking.

Bathroom: Under this tab you can purchase bathtubs, showers, and other items for your bathroom.

Entertainment: Under this tab you will find electronics, instruments, and workout items.

Outdoor: Under the outdoor tab you will find gardening items, trees and bushes, and outdoor furniture.
Build Mode: The last tab in the market opens up build mode. This is where you will find everything necessary for expanding your home.

Room: Under the room tab you can purchase additions to your home. Each room addition has specific requirements to complete the building. The rooms come in various sizes, allowing for additional customization of your house.

Doors: If you don’t add doors to your new room your character will not be able to enter the new room.

Windows: Allow some extra light into a room by adding windows.
Walls: Customize the look of your rooms by changing the color or the walls.
Floors: Under the floor tab you can purchase carpet and other flooring options for your rooms.
Tiles: If you do not want carpet or hardwood floors, you can purchase tiling under this tab.

Creating Your Avatar

When you first begin the game you will need to create you avatar.

Select the gender of your character to begin customization.
Next you will need to determine the personality of your character. Each personality provides a unique benefit, so choose wisely. The personalities you can choose from are as follows:
- Artist

Charmer

Partier

Mogul

Scoundrel

Jock

If you do not like the personality you have chosen, you can change it later in the game by clicking on the clothes button located at the bottom right of the screen.
Once you have selected the basics it’s time to customize the look of your character.

Click on the second tab at the top of the screen (the face) to begin customizing your look.
Here you can change everything from your hair to your nose to adding scars and other distinctive marks.
You can change any of these later in the game but they will cost coins or ville cash.

Next, click on the clothing tab and select your characters starting outfit. You can purchase additional clothing later on in the game.

You can also add accessories such as glasses and jewelry under the accessories tab.
Once you are happy with your characters appearance, click the save and exit button at the bottom of the screen.

Building & Decorating Your House

Now it’s time to start building your house.

You will begin with two rooms. One room houses your living area and kitchen and the other is a small bathroom. Your first task will be adding an expansion to your house and building a bedroom.
To add an additional room, click on the market button located at the bottom right of the screen.
This will open the market window. Click on the build tab to open the build menu.
Select the first tab, labeled room.

Select the first option “My First Room”.
Choose an available area on the main screen to place the new room. It needs to be attached to your house.

Now it’s time to build the room. Click on the new room to build it and once more to complete it.

Please note that future rooms will have additional requirements, such as hiring friends to help you.
Now that you have built the new room, it’s time to make it accessible.

Return to the build menu and click on the door tab.
Choose a door from the available options and place it on the shared wall between your house and the new room.
Now your character can enter their new room.
You will notice that your new room is rather dull so let’s add some color to the walls and floor.
Return to the build menu and click on the wall tab.
Select the color you would like to paint your walls and then click on the room to paint it. The entire room will be painted at one time.
Do the same thing for floors by returning the build menu and selecting the floor tab.
Now it’s time to decorate your new room.
You have numerous options for decorating, and you are only limited by coins and space.
To purchase items specifically for the bedroom, click on the market button and select the bedroom tab.
Here you can purchase a bed for your room as well as items like nightstands, dressers, and decorations.
Select the item you wish to purchase and place it in the room.
Continue earning coins and decorating the rest of your home.
Some items require you build them and hire friends to help you. Most of these items are productivity items that allow you to craft items, cook, and work.

Expanding

After a while you will begin to run out of room to build on. This means it’s time to expand your lot.
Before you can expand you will need to craft a lot expansion permit (or five, it depends on the expansion you wish to undertake).
To craft a lot expansion permit you will need to click on your mailbox.

This will open the mailbox menu.
To craft one permit you will need five signatures.
Signatures can be sent to you by friends. The can also be earned by completing goals.
Once you have enough signatures click on the make button.
You will need to wait ninety minutes for your permit to be completed, or you can speed up time by using ville cash.

Click on the area you wish to expand into. This will open a window that will tell you how many permits you need, how many coins you need, and how high your home value needs to be.
Once you have all the necessary requirements, click the expand button to finalize the purchase.

Planting, Harvesting, and Cooking

Now it’s time to begin planting your garden.
You will notice that you have two available plots for planting when you begin the game. You can purchase additional gardening plots in the market under the outdoor tab.

The begin planting, click on the empty plot of land.

This will open the seed menu.
Select the seeds you wish to plant. You can plant the same seed multiple times or you can plant different seeds in each plot.
You will need to wait a specific amount of time for your seeds to grow, or you can use ville cash to speed up the process.

Once your crops are ready, click on them to harvest your produce.
Now it’s time to learn about cooking.

To cook items, click on your stove to open the recipe menu.
Early on you will only be able to cook simple recipes. As you advance and build new items you will unlock more complicated recipes.
The recipe menu will tell you what items you need to have to cook a certain item. Hover over the ingredients to see where you can find them.
Certain items can be found by searching items in your kitchen. For example, butter can be found by searching the fridge and flour can be found in cupboards.
You can also find these items by searching kitchen items at friend’s homes.
Once you have the items necessary to cook a recipe, click on the stove and select the recipe you wish to cook.
Each recipe takes a certain amount of time to complete. You can speed up the amount of time by using ville cash.

Once your recipe is complete, click on the stove to collect your item. It will be automatically added to your inventory.
Click on the inventory button at the bottom right of your screen and then select the crafting tab. You can then place your food somewhere in your house so that you can eat it.

Working & Earning Coins

You will need to earn coins if you are going to be successful in The Ville.

You will notice that numerous objects have coin icons over them. Clicking on any of these items will allow you to interact with the item and earn coins.
However, to make larger amounts of coins you will need to purchase and use productivity items.
You will begin with a computer that you can use. As you progress in the game you will unlock additional items like a printer and a zPad.

Click on the computer to open the job menu.
Each job will cost a certain amount of happiness.

To earn happiness, interact with items and neighbors that have a smiley face icon over them.
Each job also takes a certain amount of time to be completed.
You will need to weigh the happiness cost and time against the coins you will earn when selecting the job you wish to complete.
The higher the happiness cost and longer the time it takes to complete usually means you will earn more coins. However, if you are planning to check into the game several times a day it you may be able to earn more coins by selecting quicker jobs.

Once a job is complete, click on the job item to collect your earnings.
If you are desperate for coins, you can always sell items in your home by clicking on the tool button at the bottom right of the screen and selecting sell. Please remember that each item in your home increases your home value and selling them will decrease that value.
You can also sell crafting items by going to your inventory and clicking the sell button on the item you wish to sell. Be careful not to sell items that are hard to come by though.

Being Neighborly

It will be very difficult to be successful in The Ville without having a large array of neighbors to interact with.
Many expansions and items require you to hire help to build them. Unless you have a surplus of ville cash, you will need friends to come to your aid.
You can also visit each neighbor once per day and perform five tasks in their home. You can speed up cool downs on items, interact with them, or interact with items in their homes.
You also earn one bonus energy point by visiting them. The more neighbors you have, the more energy you can earn.
Neighbors can also send you items that you need to craft and cook.

You can also build relationships with your neighbors by interacting with them on a regular basis.
You can also interact with characters walking down the street in front of your house. However, these characters are NPC’s and will not be able to send you items and you will not be able to visit their homes.

Congratulations! You have completed the quick start guide for The Ville by Zynga. Be sure to check back often for game updates, staff and user reviews, user tips, forum comments, and much more here at Gamezebo.