Idle Games says you can't have a social game without real-time play

Simultaneously, they acknowledge that a "purely synchronous game" is a hard sell on social networks

Most social games only let players interact in an asynchronous way, meaning that players are never directly interacting in real-time. Jeffrey Hyman, the CCO of Idle Games, contends that true social games need a real-time option.

"Fundamentally I don't believe you can have a social game without at least offering up the ability to play in real-time with others," said Hyman. "At the same time, you're kidding yourself if you think a purely synchronous game will succeed on the social networks. One of our mantras about Idle Worship is that users should 'come for the asynchronous, but stay for the synchronous'. That nicely summarizes our mindset and approach in trying to marry these two different styles of play."

"While the synchronous feature is obvious to users, there is another technical innovation that's just as cool but less obvious … namely that Idle Worship features an 'unsharded' universe," he detailed. "While that term sounds as geeky as it actually is, what it means is that no matter what server a player is on, they are free to roam about the universe and play with anyone (regardless of what server they are on). The one (and maybe only) nice thing about having to build everything from scratch is that we weren't burdened with legacy code and were able to craft a gaming platform tailor made for the social networks."

Zynga: Social games are still not truly social

*Look at what Zynga is saying .....

The company's CCO believes there's plenty ahead for Zynga to tackle

Social games have taken the industry by storm in the past few years, and Zynga's been in the driver's seat. Interestingly, the term "social game" may be a misnomer of sorts, as Zynga's chief creative officer of external studios, Bob Bates, believes that today's social titles aren't so social.
In a new interview with GamesIndustry International, the veteran designer commented, "We're still in the infancy of understanding what's possible and what it really means for a game to be social. Right now we're viral, but true social, where you feel like you're actually playing with your friends, not 'I'm playing here, he's playing there' is still ahead."

He continued, "The sense of actually playing together, that's a real challenge, and I'd like to be in a position where I can attack that challenge. I don't feel like I know enough yet to pull that off; I'm still learning the space. Finding ways to do those kinds of things would be very, very cool."
It's true that the majority of social titles are largely asynchronous experiences, where players take turns making moves in games like Words With Friends or Draw Something, but synchronous or online multiplayer gameplay certainly isn't out of the realm of possibility for the social space. There are companies out there right now, like Idle Games, who are pushing for real-time gameplay in the social space.

"Fundamentally I don't believe you can have a social game without at least offering up the ability to play in real-time with others," Jeffrey Hyman, CCO of Idle Games said recently.
The challenge will be balancing synchronous and asynchronous so that a game can still be successful on social networks or smartphones. Often, asynchronous just works better for players.