We were told via the Official Mafia Wars Blog that Zynga was going to improve (1). A whole page was devoted to telling the players how things were being planned to improve the game. Of particular interest is the little blurb shown below.
• The number & rate of new features and events. We have heard your feedback about there being too much to do in too short a time. We remain dedicated to keeping the game fresh, but will try to do so without making it overwhelming. In fact, you may have already noticed longer timers, fewer events, and breaks between them.
Secret District
New Chicago Districts
Limited Time Mission
Zombie Apocalypse Icing Event
Harold & Kumar Gifting Event
Harold & Kumar Boost Gifting Event
Marketplace Promotion
Marketplace Promotion
New High End Fight Loot
Limited Time Upgrade New York Property
To keep up with the game, we are still expected to do complete unfinished destinations, max out on the best loot, gift and help our mafia members, perform the tasks of Family Progression and help with the Family Boss Fights. If they wonder why the Daily Player Statistics are about to fall under 700,000, this is exactly why. Telling us they are going to do something about it and then pump out more content then ever before is not the way to improve the game. No matter how great the developers make the game in the future, it won't be any as good if there aren't many players left. I'm tired of seeing good players say good-bye.
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| Article written by Jennifer Patterson, Creator of the MW Loot Lady Blog, The Mafia Wars Loot Lady Facebook Fan Page and Co-Host of The Informant Podcast. |
You missed the christmas event that was added today too. November 1/11
ReplyDeleteYes, I too hate seeing good players leave. But much worse, with the current state of the game I can't possibly recommend it to anyone curious enough about the game to start out at ground zero. Inside 3 days they consider me an idiot clickmonkey and move on. Can't get family to turn in ices (they can't get enough in the shark/piranha atmosphere of the icing events) or the helps (no time for those because they spend all their time struggling to get the ices). Some are just flat giving up from exhaustion, citing there is no fun feature in the game anymore - every facet of the game has been turned into drudge work. Lost on zynga is the idea that no one wants to pay to work rather than play.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the PERFECT analogy. It's overwhelming for those of us at higher levels, I can't even imagine what's it like for a lower level/new player to get hit with all of this at once. I know I would probably quit. Too much work and not enough fun. I remember the good old days when players actually had time to help each other, but no more. I have reached the point that the only reason I still continue to play is because of the friends I have made. If not for them, I would have walked away a long time ago. But if they keep up this pace, even that won't keep me playing. I have friends that are saying the same thing about other Zynga games as well.
ReplyDeleteLol, what's the Windswept doing up there?
ReplyDeleteI do not think they should change timers and add time to events and other things. Those who play harder should be rewarded more than someone who plays for a couple hours a day. I have been playing since almost the start of mafia wars on fb and there are these newbies that are like lvl 800 are kicking my ass cause they are able to get same loot as me. and I have pretty good stats, so if anything I think timers for events should be shorter.
ReplyDeleteAww, it's not that bad. It's all about priorities. Forget about the boostgifting, it's useless. Forget about the new districts in Chicago for now, plenty of time to finish that later and don't even look at the marketplace event. Ignore the Zombie/Human shizzle and fight anyone to get the ices in for Family progression, you still get a few nice items of of it. Not ruby ofc, but who gives a f.. it will be obsolete by hte end of the year, anyway. Just focus on the timed stuff and it's all pretty doable for a daily player.
ReplyDeleteIronic really, everybody seems to want to finish these jobs and events as soon as possible, Jen for obvious reasons (awesome blog!), but the rest? Zynga is just pouring all this stuff out to keep you lot busy ;)
The real question is why do people feel as if they HAVE to participate in every event? I am not doing the new mission or the secret district. Too much pressure to try and keep up. Ok - so my loot stats will be a little less than other peoples but I wont allow Zynga to pressure me into trying to keep up with the Joneses. I do just fine with what I have and there will always be someone bigger and stronger than I am.
ReplyDeleteEvent overload is not why i am nolonger playing every day, it is the stupid asking for permission to access my stuff from Zynga that has caused me to move away from the game, every 30 to 40 minutes, I have to reload the game and it has become a waste of time. I don't use chat at all, so why is it sooo important that zynga has access to it??????????
ReplyDeleteEvad
I get all my family chores done every day. I have finished everything in the game except the Christmas gifts. I say bring it on.
ReplyDeleteRemember 1 year ago it was exactly the same, we were being told that there was so many new things planned they wanna release before new year, and then thev wanna slow down . BLA BLA BLA . they slow down for 14 days and then come back with full speed just like now. I bet they already have plans for a lot of new things to be released just before the holidays as usual. If somebody at Zynga reads this, her´s your new 10 commandments for saving this game
ReplyDelete1. Fix the things that are broken, before making new things.
2. Don´t fix things that are not broken.
3. Tell us what you plan to release before you release them, and no slow roll out.
4. Tell us what you plan to remove from game before you remove it, so we can use the stuff before its taken away.
5. Don´t release a lot of stuff before holidays, holidays are to be spend with family and friends so we can come back and enjoy the game after a break.
6. For Gods sake slow down, people who finish the new districts in 10 minuttes, will probably play some other games ( MW2??) and return to MW after the 8 hour limits ( crew, energy packs etc.). New players and low levels will quit the game because they din´t have the time or the things needed( Items, money, consumables, energy) to finish anything.
7. Stop the crap telling us limited time offers 30% 0ff, We all know by now that in next week we will get a 40 % off.If you can´t sell anything without special offers, then try to reduce the price permanently and maybe a few times makes special bargains (for holidays maybe???).
8. Stick to your promises, i joined a lot of surveys and email list promising me special features, beta testing, special service or special Items and all i got was a Stolen Mail Truck 2½ years ago and a lot of waiting for new things my friends already have. No insider info or prereleasing.
9. Update your blog before or at the same time as releasing things. Why is it that the official MW blog is the last place to find news?.
10. Start thinking as a player, stop thinking as a greedy moneymaker. It´s a game and if it´s a good game the money will come to you automaticly. Don´t kill the cash cow by overmilking it.
Oh well in a period that there is not enough new or too easy stuff launched, we whine about Zynga, we always do no matter what.
ReplyDeleteBe glad they consider MW important enough to launch new and funny new stuff over and over again. Not as it used to be always the same crap with just another look and rewards.
If you have a lot of stamina and lots of energy it is just much more fun to spent it and have to deal with several aspects the same time like, icings for family progress, getting new loot to improve att/def and trying to get the best loot in the Zombie event. For me fighting becomes more fun this way, instead of boring clicking around and see you just had gained wins/losses. I love this way more!
I remember times where you had to repeat useless jobs for months without any fun or usefull rewards as it was waiting and waiting for new jobs to make any valid use of energy instead of just leveling up. But hey now we have something to do, but we are not happy and whine...
As far as I can see, there is just one problem, there are too many ppl that do not want to put in any effort or choices and have no patience to obtain goals or make choices from what to achieve and what to skip.
Just a total surprise to me that so many rather do the same shit over and over again instead of enjoying many great new features.
I agree that Zynga has really shitty timing, unloading all sorts of events within 1-2 weeks when it would have been so much easier to stretch things out a little.
ReplyDeleteFor example, who needs a Chicago-based Secret District when three new districts for Chicago have JUST BEEN RELEASED? Secret Districts were fun because they gave players new jobs to complete when everything else was finished. Obviously except for a small number of players, people haven't been finished with Chicago yet, nevermind all the lower level players who are going to take forever with those high energy demands. So is this Secret District rush supposed to appeal to a small elite with too much time?
Also, why do we need TWO Harold and Kumar promotions? Just doing the Cupcake/Brownie thing surely would have netted them the same promo money.
Aside from that I would like to say though, the new FHEL and Chicago districts shouldn't necessarily be considered a "pile on". They're not limited time, there's no rush, no timer. No one's saying you need to max out on the new loot within a week, it'll still be there after all the limited time stuff has disappeared, same as the chicago districts, so why worry about that?
I think you are doing the game a disservice with this post
ReplyDelete1. You brag about how you had Cemetery almost done before they nerfed the part process. Now I bet you have it long finished
2. High end fight loot is not on a timer and drops from icing. So not like you have to focus on doing FHEL
3. market place and harold and Kumar boosts are just noise - they are not needed "to keep up with the game"
4. You bragged earlier how you had almost all the Brownies in one day of gift links.
So ZYNGA could rightfully feel the above is no big thing
so we have new Chicago districts, Traverse and mission and Zombie fights
Traverse is just another District, just on a two week timer. Any high end player would have this done in 4 or 5 days
I have the mission done and likely any reader of the blog is done or close.
Ices are harder cause they have made the fight list active but that goes to character strength more than ZYNGA shenanigans.
so sure new players would feel overwhelmed if they were not focused on just getting through Vegas and Italy and Brazil. I ignored plenty of stuff when I was new and was jealous of folks done with Moscow while I was still getting through cuba, etc..
After 3 years of playing I quit this past week. There is just too much to keep up with. I get the aspect of social gaming, but when it gets to the point of spamming your friends or be left behind its time to move on. I already have one full time job and I dont need a second. I certainly wasnt the strongest player out there but I wasnt a push over either. It sucks because I met a lot of nice people too. Best wishes to those who continue to play. And thanks for the wonderful blog !!
ReplyDeleteYes it seems zynga management is somewhat clueless and/or arrogant in their pursuit of mafia wars players who are willing to part money in the form of reward points purchases to feed their addiction at the cost of the losing the core base of its 780,000 mafia wars daily active players apparently going down to its all time low range figure of 690,000 mafia wars daily active players; question for zynga management how low is it willing to continue to sacrifice its core mafia wars active players at some point mafia wars if it continues its rate and pace of loss of its mafia wars active daily players it will start to lose its critical mass to keep the mafia wars game going; what would that number be 100K or 200K ??
ReplyDeleteI still like the game im only a baby level 900+
ReplyDeleteits script players killing the game beating on sub 600 levels that's putting people off sorry for pointing out the truth...........
Its like zynga are trying to get as much clicks as possible before this ship sinks and they distance themselves from it with their liferaft that is MW2 which I am sure will be renamed to just mafia wars in due course.
ReplyDeleteAhem to there being wayyyy too much going on within the game. Yes, Zynga does need to keep players interested, but this is ridiculous. The amount of begging/helping/clicking required has sky rocketed over the last year or more with no end in sight. User scripts are frowned upon, as are multiple accounts of course, and yet Zynga's bizarre policy of piling on the tasks is making more people have and use both in a usually vain attempt to complete something, anything, before a deadline locks them out and they end up with yet another half finished building or task. Then there's the ridiculously low limit of 5 parts for friends per 24 hours... I feel like a hamster on a wheel - always running and yet never getting anywhere - behind the curve trying to catch up. It's definitely NOT fun any more.
ReplyDeleteI've said this before and I'll say it again: somehow this has got to be working for them. Software development isn't cheap, so there has to be some compelling reason they're adding more and more. I really think it's making them more money. It could also be part of an end-of-life strategy to make as much money as possible before they shut it down.
ReplyDeleteThe more they add, the less I'm playing. After you miss finishing an event or two it becomes easier and easier to just say, "meh, whatever."
Seems to me that Zynga is groping in the dark for a strategy that will extend the life of this game. There are virtually no new players coming in. The bulk of their revenue comes from family members, and mostly the fighters who are locked in the endless struggle to be more powerful than other fighters. So...instead of improving the family battle feature, they ignore it, fail to explain the scoring systems and provide no incentives to families for using it.
ReplyDeletePlayers generally enjoy having tasks (missions, etc) to perform. Something to do besides endless clicking or watching a script run. They just need to be paced. So that reasonable numbers of players can complete them in reasonable amounts of time.
Providing rewards that self destruct or vaporize such at Harold and Kumar demonstrates that Zynga is not attempting to think things through.
As far as I can tell, there are
- Fighters
- Stats players
- Collectors
- Family players (mostly enjoying the camaraderie)
- The clueless
All of whom fall into full time and part time categories.
And one last major distinction...those that pay and those that don't.
The game should provide for all of these people (except perhaps the clueless) in some reasonable way.
Along with real communications from Zynga about what the new features are and how they work.
And lastly, a real attempt to listen to the players who, after all is said and done, are paying their salaries.
Zynga appears to remain solely focused on squeezing every last dollar it can out of the players regardless of the side effects this causes in the games.
Oh well...
Don't give up your day jobs.
I'm about to leave the game myself, after this fiasco. I have been a daily player since MW began with the exception of the 4 days I was in the hospital last year, but that's about to end. I have made a lot of friends, but in the end my time is more valuable than being a slave to clicking a mouse pad or setting up a bot to play a game that is no longer fun.
ReplyDeletePlayers are falling away very quickly, with this rate, we wont make fall of next year.
ReplyDeleteI've stopped chasing the latest and greatest event, after all, it will be obsolete in a few months time with the way the atk/def of new products are going.
Just enjoying the game as it is, stand alone, with out annoying friends
There is more going on than you list. LOL even the LootLady can't keep on top of it all ;) xxx
ReplyDeleteWhat about the family progression? Most in our family even struggle to reach the second level in ices.
Then there is the family boss fight. Our family has given up on this and the few of us who can knock big dents out the of boss don't bother anymore, as most still don't understand how to play.... yes they all go for Bruiser for some reason, despite repeated requests.
And also family battles! Does anyone do this anymore?
And I'm sure there are even more things to do. Also, how does someone who joins MW tomorrow, start building and upgrading their Sports Bar for example?
I would also add, that you might want to occasionally take the perspective of players who are sub level 1000. I can only imagine that many of the tasks are very difficult for them. It seems to me that the focus is very much on players who are beyond this, and nothing for the lower level players. No new blood, then will eventually die! Sorry for long mssg.
I choose to play the game as I enjoy it. I don't get caught up in all the worthless shit. I fight, build properties, send my gifts, and do my jobs. I've been using this formula for 3 years and it seems to work okay.
ReplyDeleteIs the game still fun? Maybe not for some. For me? Absolutely.
~ Frank
this used to be fun, now they overdid it and MW sucks.
ReplyDeleteFallout 2 and Zork are more fun now. And Zork is over 30 years old!
Zynga and FB partially make money on advertising based on clicks, right? It seems to me that they are trying to keep their click rate up on the backs of the dwindling player base. Less players = more events for more clicks.
ReplyDeleteI'm so tired of these players that are clearly serial levelers saying that the other players are whiners. If you play for strength and aren't a cc player, these tasks are very time consuming. If all you do is level and can give a crap about losing a fight, then I can see where you'd want all this new crap. With the masses of players quitting the game, you surely weren't the majority.
My big gripe was the problems with the game on top of all the events. I don't expect to play the game for 10 minutes a day, but when it takes hours just to keep up in the game, it becomes ridiculous. Add the bugs and glitches that never get fixed and it's just not worth it.
I've said this before, to all the people complaining, if you have invested your skill points properly then there should be no problems with all the stuff going on. Prioritise the timed stuff. My strategy is always to try and get things done quickly especially the begging stuff. If you're the type that just puts all their skill points on attack and defence, well there's your problem. When I was a newbie about 18 months ago I got as far as I can with events and learnt from my mistakes and weaknesses and applied my skills aCcordingly. Remember, it's not all about the win/lose!
ReplyDeleteI brought all of this up myself in the forum just hours before you wrote this (http://forums.zynga.com/showthread.php?t=1212508). Not one word from Z, as if I really expected them to answer. I even called out Nates replacement (who's been around so little that I can't even recall his name). It really is getting old.
ReplyDelete"Fallout 2 and Zork are more fun now. And Zork is over 30 years old!"
ReplyDeletePONG is more fun than Mafia Wars has become.
add a new ny property to the list
ReplyDeleteI love how people quit the game but still seems interested enough to read and post on the blog. Its too bad to see people leaving. I agree with Frank, I do my jobs, fight build properties, etc just as I did in the beginning. I enjoy trying to improve my character and seriously do not get caught up in all the events. Occasionally I don't have a chance to play but its no big deal. Recently went 20-something days without playing and I didn't even notice (as far as stats, att/def). I'll play as long as its around. I started another account a couple of months ago and have actually had fun building another character, but I also am able to gift myself a crap load of FHEL and build parts, so I can see how new players would be turned off quickly.
ReplyDelete