Zynga, hailed as the number one social gaming company, reports worth of up to $4.5 billion, with sales of virtual goods expected to exceed $2 billion by the year 2012. They are not alone in realizing the profit behind the social gaming madness, with competitors Electronic Arts and Playdom following them close behind.

But with the sudden boom of social games online and the vast selection of mobile games for those users constantly on the go, what games are really worth playing, and what games could you do without? We here at Fanscape thought we might be able to help you narrow down which of the games are worth playing.

NFL Superstars (Facebook) Free

If you’re as crazy about the NFL as we are here at Fanscape, then this game is the game for you. Madden NFL Superstars, one of the most highly anticipated social networking games to date, allows you to coach your very own team to the winning title.

The game allows users to create your own franchise, draft your own players, build up your stadium and increase your fanbase. Keep your players fit by scheduling practice sessions, and try to get them into the Super Bowl!

Ultimate Fan Game (Facebook) Free

Just launched is another awesome football-related game. Ultimate Fan is a game on Facebook, focused entirely around football fans themselves.

Ultimate Fan isn’t a football simulator or a fantasy league based game. Ultimate Fan allows fans to be fans, letting them root for their favorite team, predict game scores, and allows them to even host a virtual tailgating party with other fans from all over the country.

Plants vs. Zombies (Online/Mac/iPod/iPhone/iPad) $2.99

The love affair with this game started the minute it was downloaded.

The game Plants vs. Zombies follows a simple concept – you must protect your house from an oncoming zombie horde, using plants you plant in the ground as weapons. Each plant has a different ability, and you utilize sunshine you collect to plant more plants. As the levels get harder, you gain more plants, and more difficult situations come your way. Starting off during the day, the sunshine is more abundant, but as the levels progress, you begin to play at night, in the fog, around a pool, and eventually on the roof. Be warned though, this game is highly addictive!

Fruit Ninja (iPhone/iTouch/iPad) $.99

Slashing its way on to our favorites list is a game that will keep you occupied for days. Fruit Ninja, released by developer Halfbrick Studios, is a must have for anyone looking for a fun way to kill some time.

For only .99 cents, Fruit Ninja is a definite bargain. Players of the game slash various tasty looking 3D fruits with their fingers, trying to see how many they can slash to bits without slashing the occasional bomb. Hit multiple fruits in one slice for extra combo points! Be careful though, miss three fruits and that’s game over.

Bonsai Blast (Facebook/iPhone/iTouch/Android) Free on Facebook, $.99 as a mobile app

For those of you looking for a more classic approach to games, take a look at Bonsai Blast. This award winning puzzle game will have you addicted for hours!

The concept of the game is simple, yet takes some skill as the levels progress. Players shoot marbles to match three or more in a row which causes a chain reaction. The game features 90 different levels, the ability to swap between multiple shooters, and many other features.

Wrath (BlackBerry) $2.99

The game Wrath for the BlackBerry takes the player back to the days of retro arcade shooters.

Guide your fighters ship through space using the phone’s built in accelerometer, and take out any enemy’s that come your way. Fly over power-ups to wield more powerful weapons to ultimately take control of space!

Skies of Glory: Battle of Britain (iPhone/Android) $4.99

Although this game’s price tag is slightly higher than most, it’s well worth it. This game started out on the iPhone and became amazingly popular. Just recently, Skies of Glory has been ported over to the Android line of smartphones, and now allows iOS and Droid users to take to the skies and fight one another in real-time – something that is considered a rare feature with mobile gaming.

Must.Eat.Birds (iPhone/iTouch) $.99

Must.Eat.Birds is by far one of the most ridiculous games I’ve ever played on a mobile device. Players take turns launching what the game calls “Nomsters” at greedy birds parachuting down to eat the delicious looking cakes and sweets you’ve laid out for your picnic.

The game includes 9 different stages as well as four different challenge stages, Must.Eat.Bird will keep you entertained and occupied and is well worth the price! Check out an online version of the game here!

Ka-Glom (BlackBerry) Free

A good puzzle game worthy of downloading for your BlackBerry device is called Ka-Glom. Originally developed for BlackBerry back in 2006, Ka-Glom has remained one of the more popular games to date.

Ka-Glom is played much like Tetris. If you group four of the shapes of on color together, they are destroyed and you are awarded points.

FarmVille (Facebook/iPhone) Free

When talking about online social gaming, perhaps no game has or will ever achieve the amount of social gaming success that Zynga’s FarmVille has gotten in just one single year. Zynga is leader in online social game creation, having created of many similar titles such as PetVille, FrontierVille, YoVille, and FishVille. After is release in June of 2009, the FarmVille fan page boasts a whopping 24 million fans, and reports over 60 million active users.

The principles of the game are simple; run a farm, plant and grow crops, sell the crops, and make money to buy more farming stuff. The game, which originally started out online only but recently released an application for the iPhone, is Zynga’s most successful game to date. Seamlessly integrating into the player’s Facebook data streams, it allows users to swap, trade items, and even help each other out.

MafiaWars (Facebook/Online/iPhone) Free

Another really popular game from Zynga is Mafia Wars.Players in this social game take to the mean streets of New York City, Cuba, Moscow, Bangkok, Paris, London, South Africa, Mumbai, and more recently Las Vegas, to battle it out – Mafia style!

A highly addictive game that is seamlessly integrated with your facebook interface, players battle for control of cities by doing jobs, earning money, gaining respect, and ultimately building a large Mafia Empire.

These are some of our current faves. Feel free to share yours.

Of course, this development is hardly accidental – every major gaming platform introduced since 2003, handhelds and consoles alike, includes a significant online component to permit gamers around the world to meet and play. Every day new games are released which take advantage of these fresh horizons in innovative new ways – LittleBigPlanet’s level creation tools, for instance, or Rock Band Network’s content distribution system. And as gaming hardware becomes as inseparable from the modern lifestyle as the cell phone or the microwave, social sites such as Facebook and YouTube have raced to support interaction and playback on devices such as the DSi and the Playstation 3.

Gamers, for their part, have responded to this industry push with great enthusiasm. Research indicates that gamers are more than 10% as likely to make use of social-networking sites during any given week – and the activity on pages such as Call of Duty 4′s XBox 360 Facebook Fan page (over 300,000 fans) or GameStop’s corporate Twitter account (nearly 17,000 followers) certainly bears this trend out.

But not all socialization takes place online. As anyone who’s ever played Wii Tennis in a room full of people can confirm, motion controls are every bit as significant a social component as XBox Live; people see other people playing and instantly want to join in. It’s also apparent from sales data that social gaming such as this can be just as much of a purchase-driver as social-media outreach, as best evidenced by the success of titles such as Mario Kart Wii or Wii Play. Small wonder that both Microsoft and Sony have announced that they’ve been working on making motion controls a central feature of the XBox 360 and the PS3 – both Project Natal and Playstation 3 Motion Controller are both scheduled to be released next year.

It’s becoming rapidly obvious that “gaming” (core and casual) as an activity is migrating from consoles to handhelds. This speaks to the increased socialization of gaming – not only are these devices multifunctional and web-integrated, but people are playing games around other people rather than ensconcing themselves in high-def nerd-caves. Furthermore, it’s proof that gaming has something for everyone and will continue to expand, as our appetite for social interaction through technology grows.