If you have Instagram or social media, then there’s a chance that you have heard of Mafia City, and how it’s becoming a meme in today’s society (either that or you play bad mobile games in your free time). The game consists of running a crime organization and working your way up the social ladder of the criminal underworld; that’s what it’s supposed to be, though. The game itself is just a mania of tapping on buildings to collect cash and revenue, then going from there to become a Level 99 Crime Boss. In other words, the game is horrible. However, there is one aspect of the game that is becoming so popular among the trends of our generation: the advertisements. With every advertisement that Mafia City creates, they somehow manage to make it so bizarre and ridiculous, more than all the shows on TLC.

Every advertisement of theirs manages to include a common theme which has become a meme in many subreddits, Instagram pages, and YouTube communities. Most of their advertisements boast this odd-enough leveling system where a Level 1 Crook shoots, steals, bribes, and sometimes romances his way to become a Level 35 Boss within a span of 15 seconds, often with random amounts of money arbitrarily going into his wallet. It’s odd enough as is. I’m serious, too; if you google “All Mafia City Ads” and click the first YouTube link with the same name, you’ll see what I mean.

As silly as it is, these ads reveal a massive fault within the algorithms of popular social media. Considering how the developers of Mafia City output so many of these ads within a week to garner massive amounts of views, it’s easy to understand why Instagram or YouTube would want to promote this content, oddly enough. Seeing that many of their users watch these ads, which keep them on the specified platform, the corporates of the platforms will endlessly promote the content to keep the interests of platform users at all costs. As fun as the meme is, this is a serious issue, as fresh, good content isn’t promoted well.