FarmVille + Oregon Trail = FrontierVille?

Social gaming company Zynga, who are behind the popular Facebook games FarmVille and Mafia Wars, released a new game today called FrontierVille.

FrontierVille is, as described by Zynga chief game designer Brian Reynolds, “Oregon Trail meets Little House on the Prairie meets FarmVille.” The game seems to draw heavily from both FarmVille and Oregon Trail, as CNET describes it:

Starting with nothing but a covered wagon and a plot of land, players can explore the wilderness, build a town, or raise crops. If that sounds vaguely similar to FarmVille, it’s because the games are very close, using much of the same time-and-turn-based gameplay. Like FarmVille, you can invite friends, trade items, and, of course, purchase in-game items from Zynga (the financial engine that drives the social gaming business).

It’s believed that the new game is part of a bid to make up for declining FarmVille traffic on Facebook. FarmVille had an impressive 216 million active users last month, but that’s down from 262 million active users in late April. Along with FarmVille and Mafia Wars, FrontierVille joins Treasure Isle, Zynga Poker, YoVille, Café World, FishVille and PetVille as stuff clogging up your Facebook feed.

Are you interested in playing FrontierVille, or is it going on ignore as soon as someone pops up looking for you to pet their cows?