I no longer play this game, but last summer it consumed almost all of my time! Like an easier to pick up Harvest Moon.
First off, this game is all about the gameplay. Similar to a farming tycoon, you plant crops and raise animals to gain money and grow your farm to make way for more crops and animals, etc. Now, in the past year, they have added a lot of extra stuff you can do, but this is pretty much the basics. Everything is timed, so you plant a crop and must harvest after a certain amount of time. This is the same as with animals and trees, etc. This makes the game pretty easy to play because you just log in, do your stuff, and then log back in at a later time to reap the rewards of your trials. Definitely, once your farm gets huge, it can take awhile to click on every plot of land and animal in need of harvesting or what not, but it's seriously fun for whatever amount of time you decide to play it for.
The graphics are pretty good for an online game, although I used to keep it so the animals didn't move around. I have an old mac book pro and there was some serious slow down on certain slow speed internet connections once I had a large farm going. Other than that slow down some times though, the sprites look good and everything looks bright and colorful. Has a fully cartoony look to it but that's kind of how all social games are looking now for that matter!
The music honestly is the worst part: gets so annoying to hear the repetitive loop over and over again! I shut the music off after a couple days because it was honestly that rediculous.
Also, outside of the fake money you accumulate to buy animals and crops and the like, there are also FarmVille dollars which are harder to come by which can bu you exclusive stuff. This kind of sounds rediculous to buy fake things for mostly cosmetic differences in the game, but it is pretty fun to personalize your farm how you want it. You can also spend real money to Zynga to buy more FV dollars or coins (which I did on more than one occasion to get some holiday specific items).
This is an addicting game, and while I don't play it anymore, it was fun while it lasted. The least you can do as a gamer is check it out because a lot of companies are watching how this game works and forming future business strategies around it. Social gaming is a huge new force in this modern market, so be wary that this is a large movement in the industry that could affect how we all play games in the future.