Mafia Wars: Cheaters Get Rolled Back For Using Tagged Glitch
For a few hours on Tuesday June 8th, many Mafia Wars players were circulating the details of a glitch, involving the migration of Tagged members over to Facebook. The glitch involved a special code to be entered, which would reward you with up to $140 worth of Mafia Wars Reward Points.
Zynga quickly caught onto the scheme/glitch and issued the following statement early June 9th as follows:
Greetings Mafia Fans,
Yesterday for a short period of time, users were utilizing a code that granted points isolated for Tagged users to migrate to Facebook.
We have fully tracked this issue and contained all accounts. These accounts currently have two options for action.
1) Accounts that contact support and have not spent the reward points will have their accounts adjusted to reflect proper totals. support. Ticket Subject: “Tagged Code Glitch”
2) Accounts that do not contact support will have their account rolled back to a previous save. (some experience & item loss may occur for these users)
For users wishing to contact support please do so immediately, if we start the roll back process and you have not contacted support your account will be rolled back to a previous save.
We will be working to have this entire issue cleared up within the next 48 hours. Thank you for your patience and understanding while we rectify the misplaced points.
Thank you,
The Mafia Wars Team
Obviously, not all users of the cheat saw this announcement, and many chose to ignore it. The result obviously was that at approximately 3:00EDT June 10th, accounts were rolled back to a previous save. As Zynga indicated above, it could ultimately have resulted in the loss of loot, items, experience, etc that had been gained before the cheat was used.
Surprisingly, players are in an uproar about this! Many groups on Facebook are popping up, including one claiming a will be pending. These players are upset about the loss of items they actually DID pay for legitimately prior to using the glitch/cheat code.
In my personal opinion, if you cheated, you really have nothing to complain about. It is not Zynga’s responsibility to track the exact time you used the code and roll you back to that point. These players are lucky they were even rolled back. Many developers would have simply terminated the account completely.
I have even seen a player upset about the loss of 2 levels. He claims when he entered the code, it did not work, and therefore did not benefit from the cheat. He felt he should have been exempt from the rollback. He seems to be missing the fact that if you entered the code, you intended to reap the benefits. If you are caught in the act while attempting to rob a bank, the police do not care that didn’t succeed…
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I used the code. I didn’t know it was a cheat. Someone e-mailed me: “Tag–you’re it” and when I went to MW and saw “Tagged Players” I thought it was a bonus. MW has been doing special code rewards on the website all the time.
When I got it, I was shocked and e-mailed my friend, but she reminded me of an FV package that gave FV dollars, and a lot of items, so I just thought it was lucky.
(FWIW, I’d NEVER heard of a website called “tagged.” Nothing on the MW page said “This is only for users from tagged.com–don’t do it if you aren’t one of them.” If it had said “MySpace users” then I would have realized it was a cheat. But a “tagged user” can very legitimately mean “someone who has been tagged–i.e. someone who has been sent a code.)
I never saw the Zynga thing to contact them. I don’t subscribe to their web page. They never sent out an e-mail or a notification that you would see on the site.
I despise the way they’ve treated it. I’m quitting MW. it is no longer fun. If they want to treat us like truculent children, well, this truculent child will take her toys and go home. Frankly, I was spending too much time on it. But to be treated like this really leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I’m going to harvest my crops on FV tonight, so friends can always fertilize for fuel, but I think that’s it for me. I’ll wait a week, in case I might have second thoughts, but I think this time next week, I’m deleting my accounts.
All I can say is In my opinion they should have dealt harsher with those that spent the RP.
You know damn good and well that anyone over the age of 12 knew that getting $150 worth of RP from using a code that wasn’t given to them by Zynga was either a hoax or Cheating.
I feel a bit sorry for the people like me who thought it was a hoax, didn’t spend the RP and contacted Zynga right away when they found out it wasn’t..
Anyone who spent the RP though deserves a hell of a worse than just being rolled back a few days.
They should be thanking Zynga for letting them keep their accounts.
You’re missing the point Georgia. Very few people actually knew it was going to give you 650 GP. In the game of Mafia Wars, “tagged” is a legitimate term that is part of the game. You could not possibly have known that a menu item that is mixed up with several other menu items is not intended for you and part of some special project that uses the same name.
This was not a hoax, or a cheat. it was a legitimate code manufactured by Zynga, that appear no more unusual than the central mainframe or any other promotion or offer that Zynga knows players share with each other. The Central Mainframe code was CLEARLY defined and announced and perfectly stated that its unique to that player only.
They could have avoided this mess as easily as Bush could have avoided 9/11 by making one itty bitty phone call to the FAA and tell them to step up airport security. They should have published the link as tagged.com players. Tagged players clearly means you’re a tagged player. There is no crime in that interpretation, that’s what it means.
The code was valid! It was not a glitch or an exploit like Zynga is calling it just to put people who use it in a position of cheaters. It was a LEGITIMATE code that came public, and people started to use it, like I did. Is that wrong, use a LEGITIMATE code that came public? What is left behind is Zynga’s neglect on her own codes, if it was supposed to used once by only why so one player why many people could use it?
Yes, it was a legitimate code, but if it was not provided to YOU directly by Zynga, then it WAS exploited.