The Informant Podcast

Back again. Enjoy.

Jen and Pete have the show to themselves tonight.  They spend some time chatting about the Spockholm  annual April fools joke. The also spend a good bit of time talking about the Blackjack event and the newly released SpackJack spocklet

In this episode we talk about what just pasted as events and we speculate that our reprieve will not last long. Jennifer was unable to join us, so we were not as detailed on game news.

Well finally we return for another episode.  We are still trying to work out the logistics but we will be back doing a show a week for the foreseeable future. We do play some catch up this week.  However, a lot of the same.  A few twists on new events. However, mostly a repeat of existing game features, and as usual tons of them at the same time.

Well new event hits the game at the same time as about 5 other things. The crew spends a good bit of time talking about the event Lords of Lesotho.

We have a strong belief that what makes this game what is it is the people who play it. We take some time to discuss the potential of resurrecting community style mock wars., giving players a chance to really meet new players. We also spend some time discussing the issues around event fatigue and how it does force players away. It seems more and more the events for holidays seem more geared to spending (ie marketplace) and less about just doing something a little different to break the game up.

This show it is just Pistol Pete and Jen. Jana is taking a sick day.  The discussion is mainly about the stock pile of activities Zynga has once again thrown at us. We also talk in detail about a few strategies to help tackle some of these events.  We have yet another Special News report from the Rebelman. This one will explain the title.

Apologizes lead the show. Pistol Pete has several for the crew and listeners. The game is in break mode. We have several repeat events to contend with but for the most part you can take advantage, and play as you want. Jen talks some about the Zynga growth model and purchase of a mobile gaming company.

For all the fans of the great change management book Who moved my Cheese? You will appreciate the title of this show.  It was a busy week at Spockholm contending with the url change Zynga place on its user base.  We are not criticizing or questioning the need to change it. Companies do things like it all the time. It just highlights how agile and responsive the Spock Team is. During the mad dash to change all the scripts. A new feature was accidentally released into the wild for Golden Toolbar users.  The level-me-up button. A fancy one click option to jump quickly to the next level, providing you have the right ratio to make it happen. In general Mafia Wars news we have a New Mission (released early for VIP), we have a new Operation Event, and new Ice Event.  We have also seen a correction to the level cap requirements. The increase in experience necessary drops from the approx. 50% increase to 10%.  Still making the game playable when a person hits the cap. However, making it extremely challenging. So if you are a serial leveler.  You might want to insure your ratio is as low as you can possibly get it.

Not really any deep thought provoking conversation.  Oddly, we start out with some weather talk.  Sorry we just could not help it, becuase it is COLD. Good Mafia Wars playing weather.  We delve into the NERF talk.  Yup, Zynga did it again and wait until you hear their explanation.  We discuss the maintenance and the timing. We also spend a good bit of time talking about ratio and leveling.

Here we are off starting yet another year. We have now been broadcasting the show for 3+ years. So thanks to all of you loyal listeners for keeping us motivated. There is not a lot going on, which honestly is the best thing ever.  It is nice to have a break from all the events, we experienced over the Christmas and New Year break.  It will be nice to return to a routine of our own choosing.  Not driven by what Zynga wants us to do.  So we regroup a bit in this episode and talk a little strategy and continue to make recommendations to Zynga on how to resurrect interest in the game.

Jennifer, Pete and Mike catch up to get a quick recording over the holidays break.  We attempt to cover most of the changes in the game. Since there has been a lot.

We are excited to be back in the swing of things. However, we were thwarted by Skype this episode. We had choppy audio and dropped calls. Skype is usually good to us, but this was a tough show to edit. So we ask again for you patience and understanding. Hope you enjoy, we cover a lot of MW stuff.

First, thanks in advance for you patience with us. Life is a great complicator to producing a show. We are glad to be back and hopefully will be more regular (Prune juice will help). In this episode, random talk… tattoos, TWD (very briefly), football, weather, birthdays. Pistol Pete talks about Snow in TX. The crew then dissects the new event, bugs all over, and top mafia bonus being messed up.

The woes of updating. Pistol Pete updated the recording software and low and behold it did not work as expected. Therefore, is sounds like the girls locked him in the Hopper. Apologizes, in advance, you may have to turn up the volume a little from time to time. This show is mainly about the overabundance of crap Zynga has thrown at us. Will they never learn????

Mr. Bill and Leonard Wong sorta return to the game. Which leads to good discussion about sparking interest in the game again. The crew discussed the family size of 100 and how now days it is hard to keep a family full. There is a belief players would like to see an option for both Stam and Energy jobs. The level cap has been raised again and more and more players are hitting the cap quickly. Expect some new events soon. There is also a cross promotion on the horizon, we actually thought it would have been in place already. As far as Spocklets, Inventory Grouping has really gained some traction and some dedication from players to added new groupings.

The crew is back together, sorta. Mike decided to join us from the Bar, which makes for a couple of laughs. Jen covers the new things going on in the game, like the new district in SA. We spend a lot of time discussing what is not working in SA. We discuss a little about the Cross Promotions and Zynga stock. Pistol Pete introduces the Consumator, and other Spocklet enhancements and additions.

This episode has a little dose of everything MW, ranging from Icing to Victory coins.  In addition, as the title states, the crew at Spockholm has been busy.

We are back. Apologizes for last week. Had some technical difficulties. It was a really great show, sorry you all missed it.   This week we pickup where we were.  We cover the Mob Fury and the additions to Spartacus to support it. We would be remiss if we did not talk about the new Mission and Operations.   There is going to be some Halloween Events coming up, which of course led us to quite the conversation on The Walking Dead.

Halloween soon will be upon us and Jana is all Jazzed.  The crew is also excited about the return of AMC’s Walking Dead this Sunday. So a little bit of talk occurs about that.  October is also Breast Cancer Awareness months and yes Leif we talked about you. Not that we will ever sway your opinion. I hope you can see one other side to the purpose of the Toolbar going pink and other organizations following suit.   We title the show “Is this a game to you?” becuase we are curious is it still that or is it something different now.  We would like to hear your thoughts.   We have the accomplice event still going on and I think people have drastically lost interest.  We put our way-back hats on and discuss how we got introduced to the game. We have a bit of a rant fest and bird walk talking about who knows what. Chester does that to us.