Posts Tagged ‘YoVille’

Zynga Discontinues Mafia Wars Game On Myspace

Published by pratyushkp on April 23rd, 2011 - in Social, Technology


It’s not a good sign for a social network when game developers begin to shut down applications all together. And it appears that Zynga is shuttering its Mafia Wars game on beleaguered social network Myspace.

According to a notice on the Mafia Wars homepage within Myspace, Zynga is discontinuing Mafia Wars on Myspace beginning today but is encouraging users to continue playing Mafia Wars at MafiaWars.com. Interestingly, Zynga leads users to its own independent gaming portal as opposed to directing users to the Facebook version of the game.

We’ve reached out to Zynga for comment, but it’s likely that the social gaming giant shut the game down because there simply weren’t enough players to justify keeping the game alive. While the page for the game says it has 13 million active users, this is unlikely considering Mafia Wars on Facebook currently has 16.8 million monthly active users. It’s no secret that Myspace is hemorrhaging users and it really doesn’t make sense for Zynga to put resources into something that has an incredibly low user count.

For those of you who still play Zynga games on Myspace, it appears that Zynga hasn’t shut down all of its titles. Zynga Poker, YoVille, Vampire Wars, Fashion Wars, Special Forces and Pirates are still alive. For now.

  • Zynga Discontinues Mafia Wars Game On Myspace (techcrunch.com) ( Source)
  • Zynga closes Mafia Wars on MySpace; more games to come? (games.com)
  • Zynga wields the ban hammer; 6,400 Mafia Wars bot accounts booted (games.com)
  • Social Gaming Roundup: Shadow Government Funding, Playfish EIR, Mafia Wars MySpace Closure, and More (insidesocialgames.com)
  • The Daily Post~weekend Edition~ April 23-25, 2011 (thedailyposthq.wordpress.com)
  • Mafia Wars: Catch up with triple mastery in Las Vegas and double loot from Fights (games.com)
  • Lady Gaga, Zynga May Join Forces On Promo Deal, Global Dominance. FameVille, Anyone? (fastcompany.com)
  • THE DAILY POST~WEDNESDAY, April 21st / 2011 (thedailyposthq.wordpress.com)
  • Zynga and Other Game Devs Abandon MySpace (escapistmagazine.com)
  • Mafia Wars Gets Super (graphicpolicy.com)
Tags: , , , , , Video game developer, ,

Lady Gaga Donates $750K To Zynga’s Japan Earthquake Relief Campaign

Published by pratyushkp on April 14th, 2011 - in Social, Technology
Image representing Zynga as depicted in CrunchBase

Image via CrunchBase

As we wrote a few weeks ago, Zynga launched a campaign with Save The Children to raise money via in-game donations in Zynga games like FrontierVille, FarmVille and CityVille for the relief efforts in Japan following the massive earthquake and tsunami a few weeks ago. Today, the social gaming giant is announcing that Lady Gaga has donated $750,000, through the sales of her Japan Prayer Bracelets, to Zynga’s fundraising initiative. She is also donating another $750,000 to the American Red Cross to support relief efforts in Japan.

And in the past two weeks, Zynga players alone have raised more than $2.5 million for Save the Children’s Japan Earthquake Tsunami Children in Emergency Fund and other causes. In a release issued by the pop singer and Zynga, Gaga said “I’m inspired that my little monsters banded together to help those affected by the terrible tragedy…What Zynga’s players have done for the cause is equally inspiring, and I’m thrilled to partner with them to raise money that will go to Save the Children and the American Red Cross.”

Through Zynga games including Café World, CityVille, FrontierVille, FarmVille, Words With Friends, Vampire Wars, YoVille and Zynga Poker, more than 250 million players had the opportunity to donate 100 percent of the purchase price of newly created virtual items to the fundraising efforts. Via Credits, Facebook donated money generated through the purchases to support the initiative.

The Japan fundraising initiative isn’t the first charitable campaign for Zynga. Since October 2009, hundreds of thousands of players have raised more than $10 million dollars for international nonprofits through Zynga.org. And Zynga was able to raise millions for the relief efforts in Haiti last year.

Lady Gaga recently sat down with Google’s Marissa Mayer for a candid talk about tech, music and YouTube.

Source -: Lady Gaga Donates $750K To Zynga’s Japan Earthquake Relief Campaign (techcrunch.com)

  • Zynga Becomes More Addictive With “RewardVille”. (blogs.vinuthomas.com)
  • Lady Gaga Donates $750K To Zynga’s Japan Earthquake Relief Campaign (techcrunch.com)
  • Lady Gaga Donates $1.5 Million to Zynga’s Fundraising Campaign For Japan (mashable.com)
  • Lady Gaga Partners with Zynga to Save The Children in Japan (connectwithyourteens.net)
  • You: Online social game star Zynga adds new lure (france24.com)
  • Zynga, Ngmoco donating to Japan through iOS games (tuaw.com)
  • Zynga Enables Donations To Tsunami Relief Through In-Game Purchases (via TechCrunch) (preternaturalpost.wordpress.com)
  • Official CityVille Game Bar launches, promises energy bonus every 8 hours (games.com)
  • Lady Gaga donates $1.5 million to Zynga’s Japan disaster relief fundraiser (sfgate.com)
  • FarmVille Crops for a Cause (blogs.wsj.com)
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