Jeep has a new advergame on Facebook to promote the new edition of their Liberty small SUV. In the game, called Boostin' Nuts, the player controls a flying squirrel who needs to land on acorns to stay in the air. Some give more points than others, and others take points away or knock your squirrel off course. If you don't use Facebook or don't want to log in to the application, you can play the game on Jeep's games website as well.

As a web-based casual game, Boostin' Nuts is pretty good, although the design clearly stolen straight from one of Ferry Halim's beautiful set of Orisinal games. As an advergame, it's an absurdity that says nothing about the product. The Jeep appears on the ground when you lose, and after some head-scratching I determined why. Here's the copy: "If you fall, have no fear — the Jeep® Liberty’s massive Sky Slider™ Roof is wide open." A pretty weak coupling of game to product feature. And as a Facebook game, a social game, Boostin' Nuts takes little advantage of the platform. You can "invite friends" (I'm sure they'll love that), and compare high scores. Even the creators seem to think it's a dumb idea, as the text that loads above the game's Facebook page suggests: "Yes, another application—but one of the best you could ever adopt. This game is oh-so-challenging, healthily addictive and has tons of fiber." Or maybe that's just hip advercynicism.

(speaking of social games, I'll be speaking at the Social Gaming Summit in San Francisco on Friday)

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