Diamond Dash and The Ville this week's gainer and loser among the Top 25 Facebook games of September 2012

We're three weeks into the month of September, which means we're starting to look at the top half of September’s Top 25 Facebook games. The numbers we're starting to see at this point are substantial, which means it's possible for a game's traffic to change by several hundred thousand daily active users and not see any movement on the chart itself. Here's what we've looked at so far: September 13, 2012: No. 18 (Slotomania) through No. 13 (Dragon City) This week, we’re examining at No. 12 through No. 7. 12. CityVille Zynga's CityVille is down this month, having dropped from 2.9 million DAU to 2.5 million. After launching in late 2010, the game peaked in March 2011 with 21.5 million DAU. The game started to steadily lose traffic after that point, but the fall-off has accelerated since the start of 2012. In January, the game still had 9.8 million DAU, which means the title's lost nearly 75 percent of its remaining traffic over the past nine months. If the traffic loss continues at this rate, CityVille will probably find itself around the No. 15 spot for the October Top 25 list. 11. CastleVille CastleVille began the month at 3.1 million DAU, but it's currently down at 2.8 million. The game launched in November 2011 and quickly peaked in December with 8.5 million DAU. The traffic drop-off has been steady since then, but it hasn't been as dramatic as that of CityVille. Earlier this year, Zynga engaged in celebrity promotions like having Martha Stewart appear in her own castle, but these cameos didn't seem to stymy the loss. We've heard from several players that they're leaving the game these days because the majority of quests they encounter are dependent on hard currency items or help from the dwindling pool of friends still playing. In early July, the game had 3.8 million DAU, meaning it's only fallen by 1 million users over the past two months. CastleVille's position may drop a few spots by October, but it's also possible the game won't be out of the upper half of the next Top 25 list. 10. FarmVille FarmVille is down after an initial traffic surge at the start of the month. The game wound up seeing a traffic increase last month to 3.2 million DAU, the point it started out September at. Since then, the title moved up to 3.3 million DAU, but dropped off to its current point of 3 million. The growth was likely due to all the press surrounding this month's official debut of FarmVille 2, which doesn't seem to have been fully cross-promoted by Zynga yet. FarmVille's overall audience is a far cry from its February 2010 peak of 32 million DAU, but its traffic drop isn't as severe as Zynga's other titles this week, since the game had 6.5 million DAU in January. If the game does continue to lose traffic, it will probably drop a spot or two on October's list. 9. Diamond Dash Wooga's Diamond Dash is up from 3.9 million DAU to 4.1 million. The game launched in Late 2010 but peaked in March with 6.7 million DAU, after which the game began to lose users until early July with 3.2 million. Diamond Dash has been on the rise, though, probably due to wooga's renewed focus on expanding to mobile platforms (as CEO Jens Begemann explained to us at Casual Connect). Diamond Dash will likely move up by a spot or two next month, especially if the game's upcoming Android version continues to bring in new users. 8. The Ville Zynga's The Ville continues to dramatically lose users. On Sept. 1 it had 4.1 million DAU but it's now sitting at the 2.9 million line. Since the game came to Facebook in late June, it received an initial surge from Zynga's cross-promotion power and hit a peak of 7.3 million DAU. That means the game is currently commanding 39 percent of its peak traffic only two months after hitting point. If the drop off continues at this rate, then it's possible The VIlle will be close to the 2 million line by the end of the month. Should that happen, the game will be in the bottom third of October's list. 7. Bubble Witch Saga King.com's Bubble Witch Saga saw an upswing in traffic that brought it up to 4.2 million DAU last month, where it stayed for most of the first week of September. Since then, the game's traffic began to drop off and it's now at 4 million DAU. The game launched on iOS in July, but this hasn't seemed to change the game's Facebook numbers (even though it lets players use Facebook connect to provide a cross-platform experience). Since it peaked in April with 6.7 million DAU, Bubble Witch Saga's saw a steep initial traffic loss that's begun to steady out over the past few months and even has begun to see some small gains again. If the game stays around this point, it may not actually move up or down on October's list. All data in this post comes from our traffic tracking service, AppData. Stay tuned for next week’s continuation of our Top 25 gainers and losers, when we look at No. 6 through No. 1 on the list.

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Diamond Dash and The Ville this week's gainer and loser among the Top 25 Facebook games of September 2012

Mike Thompson

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Mike Thompson