Mafia Favors

An interesting thing happened to me tonight. The place that typically holds my stats and tells me when I can get my next Energy Pack was replaced by "Mafia Favors". It basically went through my list of Mafia and told me what each one needed and gave me a chance to give it to them. I was able to hand out Energy Packs. Paintings and other collection items as well as help with jobs.

It improves the Wish List by making it quick and easy to give to your friends, but is still limited to only the three things on your wish list.

For a better wish list check out my Improved Wish List application.

Unlimited Wish List

One of my biggest peeves with MafiaWars is the anemic wish lists. They give you three items on your wish list? That is it? Those three items on the wish list will complete three of my collections, but what about the other collections where I need 4 items? I can't even broadcast those. I bet some of my friends could help me with those other items that I am missing!

Well, I thought I would do something about it. Today I would like to announce the release of MafiaWars Underground. MafiaWars Underground has the Unlimited Wish List which allows you to tell your friends about all of the items you need. It also tells your friends about the items that you have so they can send you gifts!

So go get started creating a real wish list. An Unlimited Wish List!

Super Strawberries

Super Strawberries are the same price as normal strawberries (10 coins) but pay out 100 coins in 2 hours (vs 4 for normal). I planted a TON of them.


Get them while you can!

This only lasts this weekend, so go get them while you can! It is a special offering because Farmville hit 500k fans.

Speed up harvesting and planting in Farmville

With the new tractors in Farmville, your plowing should take less time than before. But I have found a way that can speed up harvesting and planting:

Trap your farmer!

The best thing to do is to put your farmer into a small pin. Create a pin with four fences.

This prevents your farmer from walking to each plot, animal or tree. It reduces the wait time between jobs.

Give your farmer a rest and speed up your planting by pinning your farmer today!

Tractors in Farmville

Wow! What a cool upgrade!

I bought a tractor in Farmville today and boy is it cool. The tractors allow you to plow four plots at a time, so they really speed up the plowing part of the game. They consume gas so you can't just go nuts plowing everything. However, the gas is refueled every 24 hours.

So, save up, they are 30,000 coins, and get that tractor as soon as you can!

*Update* Check out this excellent overview of tractors in Farmville.

The only way to play Farmville!

I don't know if this feature has been there all along or if I just found it today, but wow is it a difference in game play.

The ONLY way to play Farmville is in FULL SCREEN mode. Especially when your farm is large and you want to see more of it at once. Dragging around the screen is, well let's face it, a drag! In full screen mode, everything is bigger and there is more room. I highly recommend playing in full screen.

The only down side of full screen mode is that you can't leave notes. For some reason you have to be in regular mode to leave a note. Wonkiest usability thing ever.

Two Browsers Required

Whenever I am fighting in MafiaWars I always have two browsers open. One browser is pointing at the fighting screen, the other is used for banking and going to the hospital. This is particularly useful when robbing.

When I am in the middle of robbing a juicy Casino and my health falls below 20 I use the other screen to heal. This means that I can continue robbing a known good target.

BTW, this may be fun...

A couple of days ago I started playing Zynga's Farmville. I avoided it for a while because it seemed like it would be tedious. Farming? Really? Reluctantly I started playing. Then I found that I was spending more time planting strawberries than fighting baddies on MafiaWars.

My little brother noticed some of the Facebook messages stating that I was playing Farmville. He inquired, "Farmville, really?" I told him I liked it and suggested he give it a try. A day later he left a note to me in my farm, "Can't wait for SC2. BTW, this may be fun..."

We are waiting until Blizzard releases StarCraft 2, but until then, we are going to play most of the games on Facebook and report back here. We plan to publish a review of the game and if we continue playing it we will provide tips and hints on how to play better.

The two games that we are currently playing are: MafiaWars (Facebook Link) and Farmville (Facebook Link)

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