RIP, Part Three: Mafia Wars

Got the news early April: Mafia Wars, the Facebook game that I stupidly stumbled into playing, which turned into a huge timesuck that I eventually obsessed over like a Bonsai tree, is closing down.  It gave its last date as June 7, or a few days from now.  Zynga, the company that made and is killing Mafia Wars, said it had to "put their passion, energy and time into developing new games for you."  I think they're trying to not say that people don't play the game anymore.

But Mafia Wars has never been a game, really.  It's been a ... thing you tend to by clicking buttons.  Really, this is less labor- and imagination-intensive than Dungeons & Dragons.  I started playing (or "playing") in either 2009 or 2010, and I don't remember who sucked me in or why I caved in.  But I started to "play" it -- sparingly at first, but soon it became a daily thing.

I have to admit, however, that I'm not sure I had any "fun" doing Mafia Wars.  Yet I soon felt a need to tend to it.  I had an empire to build, and as I started as a young punk in New York and soon spread my wings to Brazil and Japan, I felt a sense of accomplishment to check into Mafia Wars almost every single day and click a task, or collect from one of my properties, or fight an opponent.  Right now I am at Level 435 and have a mafia of 507.  (ETA on 11:53 a.m. on June 4 that according to the number after fighting some dude to earn the Daily Task Fix I have a mafia size of 609,232.  Who knows?)  I don't know where I stand compared to others when it comes to those things, but I don't care, that's a lot!  I kind of liken it to when I played video games when I was young.  When I beat a bad guy at the end of a level, I felt a sense or relief, mostly, but it was something that, in my young, small and limited world was something that built my self-confidence.  Actually, with Mafia Wars I still need games to build my self-confidence.  Nevertheless, it made me feel good.

But I have to admit that an obsession oftentimes turns into a burden, and there were times when I would rather have not played.  Sometimes I need to do other things, and sometimes I want to do other things.  In the past year or so Mafia Wars had an incentive where if you checked in they would give you a Daily Take, and if you did it for a week straight you'd get a special one at the end of the seven days.  I actually got depressed the few times when I would forget and/or be too busy and I would have to skip checking in.  Silly, isn't it, letting a game that isn't really a game affect your mood for the entire day?  It did take an important part of my day and life that I don't regret, but I'm not totally upset that Zynga is shutting this game down because, well, I have that part of my day and life back.

To make up for it they're offering some bonus for one of two games the company is maintaining.  One of them I think is a medieval-themed game like Mafia Wars, and so long as I have an opportunity to extract myself from a "game" that would take a lot of my time, I decided to take the bonus for their poker game, which is something I feel I could play a lot less often and not feel burdened to keep up with.  I mean, I don't know if you can build up levels as a poker player, you know?

Nevertheless I'll miss playing, so I'll try and play as much as I can until Mafia Wars is put down.  The problem is is that I don't know when exactly they're going to euthanize it.  The date is June 6, which is Monday.  But is it gone as soon as the clock goes to the 6th?  I think the "day" starts at 2 a.m. Central Time, so is it done 2 in the morning on Monday?  Or do we have the entire day of June 6 to play?  Whenever it is I'll do my best to add levels and my mafia size, and blow out my fat stacks of dollars and pounds and pesos to build up my empire because hey, when it dies, you can't take it with you.

I'll miss Mafia Wars until I forget it, you know?