Zynga cross-promotion sees Village Life approach 2M DAUs

Social games company Zynga has chosen to promote a third-party game across its entire network for the first time, bolstering its Zynga Partners program to the next level. UK-based Playdemic is the first studio to be featured as part of Zynga's incentivised cross-promotion efforts, and its popular Facebook game Village Life is now being promoted alongside first-party Zynga titles like FarmVille 2 and Words With Friends. Thanks to this promotion, Playdemic notes that its daily active user count skyrocketed by over 650 percent over a single weekend, from 261,000 DAUs to nearly 2 million. The move comes as Zynga takes another giant leap toward Facebook independence, offering its browser-based games without the need for a Facebook account for the first time.