Mafia Wars Facebook Review
Mafia Wars on Facebook, Worth the time?
This is a review of the popular application game on facebook, Mafia Wars.
Mafia Wars Facebook Menu Bar
Executive Summary
This review takes a look at the popular Mafia Wars game on the social network Facebook. This game involves creating a Mafia, from your friends on Facebook, and you playing an intricate role in its development. Its major strengths are the game play and the multiplayer co-op. This game suffers in terms of graphics, it is a text based game, with few pictures compared to other games in its field. It also lacks a strong story line, another aspect present in many of its competing games. This review will take a look at the game from three aspects, Gameplay, Graphics, and then Multiplayer Co-Operation.
But first, we will take a look at a brief description of the game.
Description of Mafia Wars
Mafia Wars is a simple text based number crunch game, that puts you in a Mafia with all of your friends (who play Mafia Wars, and add you to their Mafia). A player starts out by doing jobs, with energy, for cash and moves up to buying properties for sustained income. The player then uses this income to buy bigger and better weapons from the inventory screen, which then can give them the upper hand in multiplayer fights.
As the player does more jobs, they earn experience that allows them to go up levels. As a player goes up in levels, they gain more profile points which allows them to become stronger, and to better fight rival Mafia groups. As I said earlier, pretty standard. What sets this game apart from the crowd, is in its multiplayer co-operation, and a few gameplay aspects.
Attacking in Mafia Wars
Overview of Review
Gameplay rating = 7
While strong gameplay basics help this game become a winner, it suffers from some minor hold ups.
Graphics rating = 6
A text based game always suffers in this category. This one especially, since it lacks specific pictures for each mission. It has one redeeming quality, but even that, is lacking.
Multiplayer Co-Operation = 9
Fun cooperation between you and your friends on facebook is what really propels this game. That really is the reason to play a game like this.
Total = 7.33
While this game turns out to be fun, I would not have played it to that point had I not been creating this review. Now, I can't seem to stop. Ok, well maybe I can, but the game is pretty fun.
For more in depth discussion about each category and the game in general, check out each detailed section below.
Gameplay of Mafia Wars
Gameplay Rating 7
Mafia Wars gets off to a slow start. That really is one of its weaknesses. And rather than introduce you to a story line, that would capture a player and cause them to want to keep playing, the makers of this game pretty much let you stumble around to figure everything out. While they do offer a how to play section, it is pretty limited in terms of strategy, and telling you how this game differs from others like it.
Once you do figure out how to play the game and get your stats up however, the game becomes a bit more interesting.
Mafia Wars on Facebook has several cool aspects.
First of all, as a maniac, (the class I would recommend) your energy recharges relatively fast. This means that logging in multiple times during the day to play, rather than a morning nighttime ritual. This is great for someone who has quite a bit of time on their hands.
Another aspect to the game that I liked, was that it allows you travel from section to section without penalty. I really like this feature, because unlike some games, where traveling from one location to another to do missions, (only to find out that those missions cost more than you remembered) can cost you hours, and really slows down the game. Mafia Wars relies on the tiers to move users from one section to another, and lets you quickly check out your options and make the most informed choice on where to spend your energy. This was a good move by the developers.
Mafia Wars, The Gameplay
Gameplay Continued...
The "jobs" are experience gaining missions. This means, when you do a job, you gain experience overall, and within the context of doing that job. If you fill the experience bar for a mission, you gain a profile point, and if you fill all experience bars for a tier of missions, (ie Street Thug) you gain access to level two of those missions. As you fill the tiers, a player gains special items. This is a really inventive way to re-use the same missions, which would otherwise get boring, and reward the player for doing those missions. This is shown in the screenshot below.
Mafia Job Mastery
Gameplay Continued...
Things that I found missing or not up to par within gameplay in Mafia Wars were as follows.
A cohesive story line. It is my opinion, that text based games should rely heavily on story, as reading is a large portion of the game. Mafia wars should have more of a story line, than "He beat up your uncle, so its time for payback." These cliche lines do not help this game, and the game would be greatly improved if there was a story page, where all these lines could be pieced together, to form a story a player could follow. Perhaps we could even be intrigued into playing more?
A lack of ways to gain Godfather points. These are points that allow the user special privileges within the game. You can gain them (sparingly) through missions, and through buying them from Zynga. I understand that Zynga has got to make a living. But you need to give the user more of a taste of what Godfather points can buy, and make it worth their while to contribute. Other games that I have contributed to, followed this code, and earned my dough.
Graphics of Mafia Wars
Graphics Rating 6
A text based game always leaves something to be desired in the graphics section of the game. Mafia Wars is no exception to the rule, in fact, if the rule had not been created already, I would say that Mafia Wars created that rule. There are no individual pictures for the jobs, and only small graphics for the properties and guns. Large photos representing your character as he moves through the tiers would have been a nice touch, and upgrading each tier photo as you move up the levels would have been even cooler. But this game has none of that. Instead, it is marred with an almost ugly title bar, and cheesy graphics only showing up when the user exerts major effort.
The boss fights were a nice touch to the game. They are interactive, meaning when you enter a boss fight, the decision is not already made, you decide how you would like to fight. The game allows you to use items you have picked up during the missions, to attack more, or to run. This interactivity, is really cool. (Just like it was when I played Pok'emon) But again, it lacks in style. It would be cool to see the boss picture react to what you are doing, or how the battle is going. This lack of interactivity detracts from the overall styling of the game, and leaves the player wishing for more.
"Yay! I won the fight! But he still looks the same..."
Mafia Wars Boss Fight
Multiplayer Co-Operation of Mafia Wars
Multiplayer Rating 9
This is by far Mafia Wars's greatest strength. Allowing users to connect and play a game within a social network is a great way to connect with friends. You and your friends (or office buddies) already have the same template for a game, and it already is a place where all types of friends gather. It literally is gold, when talking about trying to reach an audience.
Mafia Wars allows a large amount of cooperation between you and your Mafia. It allows you to select users as your top mafia, which helps you, and helps them. They get rewards when you accomplish tasks, and in turn the best players often help you accomplish tasks that you couldn't do on your own.
The larger your mafia, the better off you are in fights as well. The more mafia members you have, the more weapons you use in a fight. Having a large mafia, can allow you to dominate other players who are actually stronger than you. This makes for the focus to shift from playing through the jobs, to recruiting more powerful mafia members. There are several groups on facebook dedicated to this, easy mafia recruits ect. A player can easily grab more members fro those places if they need them.
The only thing keeping this category from being a ten is the lack of direct cooperation. While assigning members to your top mafia is cooperation, it is indirect at best. Again when a player clicks on the main menu to help out another member of their Mafia, (I am not even sure if this is co-op or just a bonus the game gives you) it is indirect at best. There should be missions, that require you and a gathering of people from your mafia to all do the same mission. This would be like raids on World of Warcraft, but less time intensive, and just be a fun way to add cooperation.
Assigning Your Top Mafia
Summary of Mafia Wars
Mafia Wars is a fun game. It has several great aspects, decent gameplay and tries hard to make up for lousy graphics. If you are into Mafia themed games and have yet to try a text based game, this might be for you. If you are looking for a minor distraction throughout the day, something to look forward to doing on your breaks, this game might be what you are looking for. But as far as free text based games go, there are many choices, and this game would not be my favorite.
I hope you enjoyed my review, my username here on hubpages, is gregorymjason. Check out my page and other games that I have reviewed! Perhaps you will find your next gaming addiction on my page!
While Mafia Wars has many strengths, it is still far from being the best game on the Facebook market.
I prefer Bloodlines, a vampire based text game, check out my review for that game here.
Important Links!
Facebook, the social networking site can be found here.
Zynga Games, including Mafia Wars, can be found here.
Author Gregorymjason, can be found by following that link.
Mafia Wars Profile!
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Hey very helpful! I will check out your bloodlines review!
Thanks guys! I hope that you enjoy my other reviews as well!
Add me in your mafia and we shall kick some *** together!
Level growing everyday.....
Profile Link:
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=516208840
Mafia Link:
great hub!!! I like it!
that was a very pc review. This game suffers from such a thin gameplay that the ultimate fate of the player is readily evident with very little game time. That fate being a mediocre character which has no personality, and a massive waste of time. However if you choose to invest your money in your typecast character, then you have a slightly more than mediocre but equally shallow character, an equal or greater waste of time, and less money. The servers for the game are overused, probably poorly delegated, and run such a massive glut of poorly scripted flash that load errors, rollbacks, and client cpu usage are all plentiful. The obvious ways to improve the gameplay like your obsession with better pictures will likely never be realized because the support team is so overwhelmed with errors, and distributed among the many flavors of Mafia Wars any forward progress has been ground to a halt. Obvious additions to gameplay would be to open an economy within the game, or to allow the players to be able to skin their character profiles, or choose what equipment they bring to battle... these are things which take less than 10 seconds to come up with, but Zynga is so obviously consumed with inputting money into their inefficient but lucrative project that I have the expectation that nothing will be improved. The motivation behind this is frustration with the constant and annoying requests by friends who are fleeing their work to the point where reducing their perspective to the point of partial game immersion is possible with this. A sad and ultimately sad state of unbeing.
Well, well. I think Negative Nancy here is forgetting that the game is free, and allows for easy access to anyone on Facebook. This review, is taking those factors into consideration, and that games should be a fun, easy distraction. I could see your complaints being relevant if you were paying to play the game. True, Mafia Wars allows for users to buy extra items, but it is hardly needed for the casual player. I really doubt Mafia Wars is supposed to be as consuming as something like WOW. But just the same, I think a couple days away from a computer would probably do you some good. :)
Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, and I value yours. Thanks for reading my review, and giving such a well thought out comment. I hope to hear that the rest of my reviews are as dismal as this one, as long as you are reading them.
I have had trouble lately with the game locking up.. I llke the game and it is addicting.. but after I scored 16 million from being a hitman i seemed to lose interest.. I am now trying Castle Age which seems to be a little more challenging..
I never had problems with Mafia Wars being slow until I was in the beta testing for Cuba.As soon as I was it starting going so slow that it would take me an hour to fight 30 times when that used to take me 5 minutes. I used to be able to go back to NY and it was normal, then both places were retarded slow, now I can't fight at all in either spot? I tried on multiple computers, on different networks, so that isn't the issue. I am still being attacked, so obviously others can still fight. Is this my reward for helping test the beta version?
I've mastered all the jobs on mafia wars,now what?
I don't know, Play a different game? How about restaurant city, a bit of a change in pace, get away from that whole text based type of game.
you can try Fish a Fish on facebook...fun and engaging..upcoming hit!
I like Mafia Wars. I'd like to know when it was introduced on facebook.
please rob this person..
El Soldado “Heartless Harry”, level 111 Fearless
http://apps.facebook.com/inthemafia/remote/html_se
El Soldado Experto “Vinnie the Knuckler”, level 145 Fearless
Mafia Wars definitely slows your computer way down. I'm not sure how or why, but I'd like to know how to prevent or repair the problem....because I haven't made it far for fear of making my computers retarded. From what I can tell, it somehow makes pc's permanently slow!.!... Anyone know if that's accurate??? Here's why I believe this:
I have two Dell laptops at home (both of which used to be extremely fast). After I played Mafia Wars for just a few weeks on them they both slowed down considerably. I have my IE advanced options set to empty all temporary internet files each time it closes, and I've tried programs like C-cleaner to get rid of whatever your pc downloads while you play Mafia Wars. Just to see if it would make a difference I've even backed up my songs and files, deleted everything down to the operating system from one PC and completely reloaded Windows. Still, it hasn't improved the speed at all!
I had a PC at work that was never great, but has worked fine for over a year. A while back I used to play MW on it before work and at lunch... after about a week it went from slow to super sloooooooooooooow. I stopped playing it on that PC after the slow speed became unmanagable but the speed and freeze up issues just wouldn't improve no matter what my IT guys did. My IT guys eventually checked out the PC and after looking inside the tower they were really surprised and said it had 'swollen caps'. Something about the little transistors on the mother board getting hot and they eventually swell up and malfunction. My IT guys said it was likely caused by unregulated power getting into my pc....but, the problem is that it had a good surge protector attached and no one else in my office had that issue. I got a new PC at work that ran super fast. I played Mafia Wars one morning before work and I was shocked at how fast MW played. When you clicked on fight or job it took less time to perform the action than opening a word file takes. But, after a day or two the next thing I knew that PC started slowing down! So, needless to say I don't play it at all anymore.
I have no clue why it does this, or if the swollen caps issue was caused by playing it. I just know that it's caused no less than 3 pc's I've played it on basically junk. If you know why it does this, or how to repair the problem please let me know.
In the mean time I don't recommend playing Mafia Wars on any nice PC's! Thanks and good luck!
Mafia Wars Fan: That's interesting. I've only been playing MW for 3 days and it has drastically slowed down my laptop. At first I thought it was just the internet playing up, but it gets especially bad when I log on to facebook. I guess maybe because the game keeps running whether you're using the application at that time or not.
Has deleting the application solved your problems? I'm about to delete it. It's a fun game, but not that fun that I'd be willing to put up with the annoyance it causes.
hi..
i'm an addict of mafia wars.How can i still play with it not logging in Facebook?? 'Cause our administrator, blocked it.. please help!!
Mafia wars has locked up my computer, drains my vitual memeorry and windows keeps trying to restore it. I also has slowed down my PC and I just up garded the memeory card? I love the game but this is bad!
Thanks for this info!
---------------------------------
Mafia Wars Addicts
I see where everyone is asking why Mafia Wars slows there computer but I don't see where anyone is answering. I would like to know, I spend as much time restoring and cleaning the registry as I do playing the game.
I would answer, but I have no idea why that is happening to some people. I would chalk it up to coincidence, (that they might be doing more web surfing, ie more temporary files) but the better answer is I don't know. I would suggest everyone check out a few hubs on spyware, and malware cleaning, and perhaps registry cleaning. But I am in no way saying that Mafia Wars is the reason behind the computers slowing down.
Its a hard question to answer when you can't recreate the problem locally.
I also have the issues with Mafia Wars slowing my system down, though it is not possible for this game to slow down a system even after a format, and has less effect on your caps (capasitors) than turning your machine on every day or leaving it on for more than 24 hours straight... :P
I have noticed that this issue is strange, because it does not really cause an overusage of CPU or pagefile, (if you're on an old computer with less than 512MB RAM then your CPU/Pagefile will occassionally max out) but this tells me it's being stored as a gigantic messy temp file elsewhere, and being that it's built on a javascript platform that means it's all getting squeezed in to your browser's temp files, and doing system processes from that directory, so increasing your temp file space is the 1st tip, and it will slow down eventually no matter what you do if you don't eventually clear the cache, so clearing your tempfiles cache should do the trick, and then close/restart ie, but I've noticed with ie8 that if you open up your task manager (alt+ctrl+delete) even if you only have mafia wars running there are 2 ie's actively running, and when you close ie, (under processes) one is left open as a background task, so if you right click on iexplorer.exe and "end process tree" on all the currently open IE's the computer returns to normal. (it will give you a warning when u click "end process tree" but in this case it's fine, because you want to end all the associated processes as well)
So some pretty messy coding is involved... Eh whatever, I still like the game, so I would recommend just restarting or turning off your computer once your done using it. Also clear your temporary files, under tools in internet explorer. That's why I haven't seen these problems, I do this regularly.
Thanks Brian, for your watchful eye and great insight.
I meant to add one other thing to the last post. After shutting down and/or ending task on your browser rundll32 may also be another process you need to end process on, b/c that may be lagged even after your browser is completely stopped.
you can buy mafiawars loot from ebay at this link:
I find that when I use IE 7 or 8, I get drastically poorer performance on my machine. I switched over to Firefox, and the performance issues disappeared instantly. I think there is something in there code that disagrees with the IE browser.
I would bet most web stuff runs better on firefox, rather than just mafia code. But just a personal opinion.
Thanks for the tips man. Defintely useful.
Did anyone notice this in theirt Tc and Cs? Prepare to have your profile pic/anything from your profile on TV/newspaper/adverts. They can sell you!
You grant to Zynga the unrestricted, unconditional, unlimited, worldwide, irrevocable, perpetual fully-paid and royalty-free right and license to host, use, copy, distribute, reproduce, disclose, sell, resell, sublicense, di...splay, perform, transmit, publish, broadcast, modify, make derivative works from, retitle, reformat, translate, archive, store,cache or otherwise exploit in any manner whatsoever, all or any portion of your User Content to which you have contributed, for any purpose whatsoever, in any and all formats on or through any and all media, software, formula or medium now known o...r hereafter known; and with any technology or devices now known or hereafter developed and to advertise, market and promote same.
i need Influence in warmafia how
I had to get off the computer to do some stuff for an hour. I minimized everything I was doing (making senior pix), and left for an hour. My brother started playing his stupid game. When he got off, this computer was SLOOOOOOOOOOO...
I couldn't work on the stuff anymore. I was suspicious, and looked up mafia wars and slow down on google, and got tons of claims. I hope mafia wars burns! =P
How bout this. Stop using IE. Anyone that knows anything about computers will tell you that. IE is a crap browser that fails on so many levels. Get a real browser like FF or GC.
If it's worth the time, depends on who plays mafia wars. The question is: Why people are addicted with Zynga’s Mafia Wars?
When Hobbes, Rousseau, Locke and other famous thinkers coined the term social contract, we never had the chance to rationalize our “state of nature” or our natural ways of dealing with other people. The “state of nature” describes how we use our animal instincts in order to survive and out power other people.
As the social order was established to protect life, liberty, and property, a set of rules and penalties also arose that deter us from using our “state of nature” to outclass or kill our opponents.
However, underground societies still use the "state of nature" as their main defensive and offensive mechanism to survive in the social order. One of the most popularized of these societies is the mafia. Members of this famous organization or family vary from the grassroots soldiers up to the big boss or the Godfather. Yet, the purpose of being a member is to be well connected in terms of politics and power. Many members come from the marginalized members of the society to which they want to escape. The idea is logical yet unlawful: kill in order to survive.
Zynga has captured this idea in their famous game in Facebook and other social sites, Mafia Wars. Mafia Wars is a game of pure power and gratitude building attitude towards other member of the family. But why are we addicted? The answer is simple: it is but a game making it legal but the idea of killing, robbing, superiority and power is still there. Hence, we are practicing our “state of nature” unintentionally.
Wow, KayaCamilla, that's a very detailed post. Many games provide an escape and a environment to break the rules of society. To act out our fantasies. I honestly think mafia wars's main attraction is that it's on facebook and allows easy access to anyone. But hey if you actually imagine destroying other peoples' buildings when you attack, more power to you. I am just glad we are able to vent this pent up emotion in safe ways.
I think you need to revisit this game... I only started playing about 90 days ago and in that time they have change the fundamentals of the game drastically.. Gone is "robbing" and "loot" from beating people up.. It would appear the change has been moved to "plead" with other players to give you stuff (sort of like govt handouts) vs bullying your way to the top like any self respecting gangster would do...
I would devalue this game pretty drastically...
i can't get back on
Thanks for the review. Mafia Wars is my favorite game, but I don't like moving graphics so a text based game is just right for me.
fantastic review
Becoming a game of autobots against autobots
Mafia Wars by Zynga is the biggest waste of time & money that I have ever spent! After 3 years of being completely shut down by cheaters & autos, Zynga still lies & promises to stop cheating but never goes any further than that. They also destroyed over $10k worth of my computers with 100% cpu. Zynga only cares about (profits.)
iam getting realy pissed off with fasebook and zynga for not solving any complaints not just mine but eo i see complaining you must be loosing a lot of customers and about to loose me to if i dont get all my rewardpoints i havent been getting every time i pass a levelperhaps i dont spend money to buy reward points this should not be an excuse i play fair and expect the fairness in return iam rely getting fed up with the whole thing i waste alot of time playing this shit should i not receive at least 30 reward points by this friday i will not only delete bella but another 7 members of my mafia and will never play again
All the flaws your replies talk about have already been part of MafiaLife.com for years. The game play of MafiaLife will challenge, and blow you away.
I would like to share the newest, and most addictive multiplayer interactive mafia game, that blows Zynga's game play out of the water, and comes with a more up close and personal administration. I was wondering if you can do a review on the game?
What is MafiaLife?
MafiaLife is a new style of mafia-themed role-playing gaming (MRPG). MafiaLife has more features to control your player actions, and more details to challenge your game experience than any mafia game in the industry. MafiaLife is a game built around virtual life in the mafia.
You get to build your mobster's specialties, attributes, and characteristics while trying to stay out of trouble, the hospital, and jail. You work and interact with other MafiaLife players to try and keep your crime family, your crew, and yourself on top of the leader board.
How did MafiaLife get started?
MafiaLife was started by a regular “Dungeons and Dragons” fan. In “Dungeons and Dragons”, players created characters and lived imaginary lives within the world of the “Dungeon Master”. There was no end to the game—it went forever. As a fan of the digital computer age and
the mafia genre, it seemed natural to create a digital role-playing mafia world on the Internet.
Why will the mob enthusiast play MafiaLife?
Simply put, MafiaLife delivers. The graphics are attractive. The crimes are cool. You can hire other
mobsters, put other players out of business, ruin other families. This is the mobster life at its best.
How much time does it take to enjoy MafiaLife?
In MafiaLife, you can devote any amount of time to playing and still coexist with the other players
competitively. Any time you put in can be used to build your mobster and/or work with your family to do crimes. Play for 5 minutes to accept job invitations and level up, or play 10 minutes to earn mob cash and attack someone for your boss. It’s all up to you in this MafiaLife.
How do you win at MafiaLife?
One of the greatest parts of MafiaLife is that success is determined by each player’s individual goal at that moment. One player may want to clip his opponent. Another may want to help his family’s turf war by blowing up a few businesses. A third player can declare his two level movement on the leader board a win if that’s what he’s working for. There are many ways to “win” at MafiaLife, because it’s up to each player. But there is no end to the gameplay of MafiaLife.
Why will members of MafiaLife continue to play?
In MafiaLife there is a never-ending challenge to develop your character individually, build your crew cooperatively, and interact as a crime family to commit unlimited crimes. No other mafia game allows for one-on-one, crew-on-crew, and family-on-family competitions. No other mafia game caters to both the “elite everyday” and the “sometimes casual” gamer, and keeps them both addicted.
What kind of fun can you have playing MafiaLife?
In MafiaLife, unlike other games, the end user has any and all tools they need to live a virtual life in a mafia crime family.
Some of the features are as follows:
-Building mobster attributes, such as Accuracy, Intelligence, Intimidation, Luck, Respect, and Strength.
-Earning Power, Money, and Crew Respect to move up in ranks on your crime family tree.
-Earn your button to get made as a soldier, lieutenant, capo, underboss, consigliere, or even the Don of your own crime
family.
-Build 25 different specialty levels, such as Bookie, Brawler, Driver, Earner, Enforcer, Hitman, Lookout, and Muscle. Each level dictates your qualifications to organize or be invited to commit interactive crimes, and other actions.
-Finish Mob Quests to prove your worthiness for special payouts such as collectors’ items, powerful weapons, and explosives.
-Engage in player vs. player, crew vs. crew, and family vs. family attacks, such as picking pockets, beatings, shootings, and more.
-Purchase, attack, and defend businesses on your turf, while trying to control your borough in your city.
-Sell inventory on the black market to other mobsters who are in need. Make a profit selling weapons, collectors’ items, explosives, vehicles, and other tools of the trade.
-Collect dues, commit petty crimes, gamble, and hundreds of other ways to make your way in the MafiaLife.
-Leader boards display the top mobsters and families in several categories.
-And more to come!
Click here if you are interested in trying it out:
https://apps.facebook.com/themafialife/?r=avesocia
MafiaLife Affiliate Progam:
We are offering profit sharing affiliation programs to those who are interested in earning money while promoting MafiaLife. Sponsored crime families and individual referral codes are available with detailed reporting. We can create your own crime family with your own family name, and give you an affiliate link to promote 'join my crime family'. We could also give you an individual mobster affiliate link to just promote 'Join The MafiaLife'. Anyone who joins under your promo links, earns you revenue share for the life of thier membership. Contact me if your interested or have questions.
Contact Info:
MafiaLife Chris
Director of Marketing
Knockaround Media, LLC
chris@mafialife
Wisata SEO Sadau 3 years ago
What a great review.
Thanks for this information.