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Users seem to be struggling in finding games in the new Facebook homepage redesign. While there is a lot of promise in the newly introduced games dashboard, further education cannot overcome the fundamental design flaw of not having “games” as a persistent part of the site navigation, visible from every page.

Looking back at Facebook’s changes to how application developers could use the platform, developers have mostly complied with prohibitions forcing users to give gifts before playing the game on first and recurring visits. Yet the largest developers seem to still be allowed to gate content (like land expansions) based on the number of friends a user has – continuing to put pressure on people who do not want to spend money to extend their social graph to potential strangers in order to unlock content.

Counters are coming as a replacement to the much-abused Notifications API – how will developers use them? Zynga gives us a first clue.

With a great deal still unclear about Facebook Credits, the payment dispute process being tested provides some insight and also makes one wonder if developers will be able to manage issues with other payment options using the same API.

Facebook started enforcing a slew of application policies over the last week, forcing game developers to revamp their viral marketing. Here are three of the top changes and how top developers are revamping their viral marketing tactics.