EVCin

When viral marketing tactics were curtailed by Facebook’s platform and policy updates, the question wasn’t whether developers would take a hit, but how much? And whether those that thrived on aggressive viral tactics would be hurt more than those that didn’t. I look at what appears to be behind those who did well and those that took a major hit.

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.

The top games on Facebok are down 11% from their highs this month. While it looks like it might be due to the holidays, the successive declines in the peaks of the latest Zynga releases might suggest the life cycle for social games is changing.

All of the major game developers have launched a game with Facebook’s Credit payment system, with CrowdStar implementing them in all their games. This is a rundown of those implementations and the potential pros and cons for developers as we near Facebook’s official launch of their credits system.

Crowd Star’s Happy Aquarium jumped 22% over the weekend to enter the top 5, unseating former #1, Farm Town. With cross promotion of other recent games, can CrowdStar join Zynga and Playfish as a major developer in the social space?