Mafia City is a 2017 mobile strategy game by Yotta Games that became internet-famous through its 'Lv. 1 Crook' vs 'Lv. 35 Boss' advertising skits and the catchphrase 'That's how mafia works'.

Where did Mafia City come from?

The game launched on Google Play on March 30, 2017, and its ad campaign turned into a Reddit and YouTube joke in late 2018 after compilations by Михаил Железнов and Slazo pulled hundreds of thousands of views.

What does Mafia City mean?

In meme form, Mafia City points at the ads themselves rather than the game, using the cartoon boss and the 'That's how mafia works' line to react to anything trying to look tough or edgy.

How do you use Mafia City?

People typically pair the cartoon 'Lv. 35 Boss' image with a tough-guy moment and the 'That's how mafia works' caption, often as a deep fried macro, a Florida Man headline, or a video edit built on Slazo's greenscreen clip.

Is Mafia City still popular?

The ads and the meme peaked in late 2018 and 2019 through Slazo's audience and r/memes, and now circulate as a classic image macro rather than a trending format.

Mafia City

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Published September 5, 2026

Mafia City is a mobile strategy game whose Facebook and YouTube ads accidentally became a bigger deal than the game itself. The low-budget skits, showing a hapless 'Lv. 1 Crook' getting owned by a suave 'Lv. 35 Boss', spawned a wave of ironic reaction images and 'That's how mafia works' shitposts across Reddit in late 2018.

advertising memes mobile game memes catchphrase memes ironic memes so bad its good memes

Overview

The ads lean on the 'Lv. 1 Crook' vs 'Lv. 35 Boss' format, where a scrawny street thug tries a shakedown or a hit before a suave, sunglasses-wearing capo effortlessly turns it around2. The catchphrase 'That's how mafia works' closes each skit and became the punchline plastered across image macros, deep fried edits, and Florida Man captions5.

The cartoon boss image itself circulates as an ironic reaction, used to flag when something is being played as tougher or edgier than it really is8. Video edits recut the greenscreen version Slazo published into fake fight scenes, and exploitable comic panels swap in different antagonists while keeping the 'Lv. 35 Boss' beat intact7. Almost none of these jokes touch the game's actual clan and city management gameplay.

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Origin & Background

Platform

YouTube / Facebook (ads), Reddit (viral spread)

Creator

Yotta Games

Date

2018

Yotta Games launched Mafia City on the Google Play Store on March 30, 2017 as an Android strategy title about crime families competing for control of a city1. The ads, aggressive Facebook and YouTube spots built around the 'Lv. 1 Crook' and 'Lv. 35 Boss' characters, ran heavily in 2018 and pulled attention long before the game did.

On October 2, 2018, YouTuber Михаил Железнов posted a compilation of the ads that cleared 130,000 views, one of the earliest pieces of curated evidence that the campaign was being watched ironically6.

How It Spread

YouTuber Diego Rodriguez followed on November 23, 2018 with a 'That's How Mafia Works' edit stringing together clips where the cartoon boss appears after every gang-related beat3. The bigger break came on December 30, 2018, when Slazo released a video about the ads that passed 350,000 views and pushed the joke out of niche-YouTube territory4.

Slazo's subreddit, r/slazo, turned into the incubator. User BoinkoMan's image macro cleared 400 upvotes and hit the top of the sub's Hot page before jumping to r/memes, where user mat383 was among the earliest to repost it5. ThatCanadianJacket produced a clean .png cutout of the boss that sped up remixes, and Slazo dropped a greenscreen version of the clip on his second channel that people then cut into new video edits7. Slazo also posted a Family Guy parody of the ads to Twitter, and Reddit variants included exploitable comic strips on r/okbuddyretard.

How to Use This Meme

The template typically pairs any everyday tough-guy moment with the cartoon boss and the line 'That's how mafia works', often heavily deep fried or slapped on a Florida Man headline5. Video edits commonly cut the greenscreen boss into unrelated fights, treating the character as an unbeatable finisher7.