It wasn’t that difficult. I just stopped clicking on the icon in my quick launch bar.
The reason behind my quitting is simple. The game doesn’t end, it doesn’t progress, it doesn’t have a compelling storyline. For awhile it was fun to see how many levels I could progress through – to try and catch my friends. But once I got into the 125-130+ range, the fun just stopped. So now the game sits at my current level:
I know the revelation that nothing happens in the game & that it doesn’t progress are not earth shattering. In fact I knew that going into it. For that matter I’m impressed that millions of other people have played & will play [progress] much farther than I will.
The game makes money & people want to play it. Good for them. I quit.
I can’t stop playing…
Well, that’s not entirely true…
At level 32 the fun for me has started to ebb. It’s not that the gameplay has changed – it hasn’t. It’s not that it’s even any less addictive. What has changed is how obvious the lack of balanced gameplay is…
There’s ONE HUGE AREA that I think needs to be reexamined from the ground up.
MAFIA SIZE
Now I get this from a marketing position. By constantly offering RARE items & other power-ups to Mafia’s that ALWAYS seem to be 1-3 members above where I am – the game is trying to encourage me to get my other friends who are not playing to get in on it. I get it – it’s trying to spread like a VIRUS. Now that mechanic is established here’s why it SUCKS…
I don’t have very many friends. I have even fewer friends who play Mafia Wars. So my little MAFIA of 19 has hard time competing with any mafia with even 2-3 more people in it. So while I may be evenly matched from a LEVEL perspective with MANY other players – that number is ultimately TRUMPED by the size of the Mafia.
Again – I get this too. There’s an ATTACK/DEFENSE bonus that’s built into MAFIA SIZE. But – there’s is NO APPARENT level restrictions or mafia size restrictions when attacking people. What this ultimately leads to is that with VERY FEW EXCEPTIONS I will always – ALWAYS – attack someone lower than me. Both in LEVEL & MAFIA SIZE. I’ve also noticed this happens to me when I’m attacked. It’s almost ALWAYS someone from higher level & bigger Mafia.
Ultimately this mechanic is a COLOSSAL FAILURE from a game balance perspective. The ONLY reason for this mechanic’s existence is to grow the amount of people playing the game. Otherwise I cannot imagine a designer would not think – WAIT – this. does. not. work.
That’s all. Mafia size being tied to ATTACK/DEFENSE stats creates unbalance problems that make the game less & less fun the higher I get with a SMALL mafia.
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