Gangsters, guns, alco­hol, drugs, and broads galore. That’s the ever-sweet sound of the 40s and 50s with its Mafia based char­ac­ters light­ing up even today’s enter­tain­ment. Movies such as the Godfather have forever cemen­ted the Mafia in the enter­tain­ment industry. Along comes 2K with Mafia II, a game centered on a young man as he enters the under­ground world of crime. Can Mafia II achieve great­ness and join the ranks of clas­sics such as the Godfather, or sleep with fishes?

Story

The plot fol­lows Vito Scaletta, an Italian War vet­eran who has just come home from World War II. He learns that his sis­ter and mother have been stuck with the debts his father accu­mu­lated over the years. Vito recruits help from his long­time friend Joe Barbaro and the two enter a life of crime and gain rank until they are even­tu­ally recruited into the Mafia itself.

Mafia II’s story is rather good. It truly emphas­izes the American Dream and that it isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be. Vito exper­i­ences losses, revenge, and retri­bu­tion through­out his jour­ney and it is one jour­ney. All the char­ac­ters within the game are given very nice spe­cific per­son­al­it­ies, although a little cliché. Thankfully the game strays away from what other open-world games try to do which is shov­ing tons of char­ac­ters down the player’s throat. Mafia II min­im­izes the char­ac­ters to a man­age­able num­ber mak­ing sure the player can keep up.

The cam­paign is also home to some abso­lutely fant­astic cutscenes that truly help carry the game. It’s easy to force your­self through some of the games mis­sions just to get to another cutscene. The story really is that inter­est­ing, even if some of it may be a little bit pre­dict­able.

However there is a glar­ing issue within the game, because if you have to force your­self to get to the next cutscene then there’s a prob­lem. Pacing is the prob­lem here. Despite hav­ing an excel­lent tale, Mafia II makes some slip-ups in some of the chapters. Some of them are just really bor­ing and add little to the plot as a whole. In fact some of the stuff feels just like filler to pad out the games length. There is no big­ger crime to this then the Fuel stamp mis­sion, which just wastes time and brings noth­ing to the over­all tale. Plus it is these mis­sions that make it very hard to con­tinue on when it feels like you’re learn­ing noth­ing in return.

Mafia II tells a great story espe­cially with its cutscenes. The only real prob­lem is the pacing of the tale. Other than that though, it’s very easy to get sucked into the world and care about what hap­pens to cer­tain char­ac­ters.

Score: 9/10

Design

Mafia II puts on a very good first impres­sion. The game opens up with a long car-ride through Empire Bay (New York City equi­val­ent) that intro­duces you to all the fant­astic sites while you listen to 1940s Christmas music. From the very get-go the game is able to pull the player into its set­ting mak­ing them for­get that it’s just a video­game. The first set of mis­sions also give you sense of free­dom that a bunch of side-quests will open up and you could sink hours into Empire Bay. Heck, even the in-game map shows 10 square miles to enjoy.

However after spend­ing a couple of hours in the game it becomes pain­fully obvi­ous that there is noth­ing to do in Empire Bay. All the dots on the mini-map are noth­ing but gas sta­tions, mech­an­ics, and places to get a drink. It doesn’t make much sense why Mafia II even has a giant open-world when there is just noth­ing to do but drive around in the out­side, which becomes very bor­ing really quickly.

Missions within the game fol­low a very lin­ear path. A des­tin­a­tion is dis­played on the mini-map and Vito has to drive there. The mis­sions are then star­ted with each one vary­ing. Some involve intense shoot-outs while oth­ers involve being stealthy. This wouldn’t be a prob­lem at all if the mis­sions just didn’t end so quickly or go on to long. Some of the stealth mis­sions and fetch quests go on far too long past their wel­come while the shootouts never reach their full poten­tial and end right when things are start­ing to get good.

The always-bright spot is the atmo­sphere though. Empire Bay is drip­ping in it and it never fails to impress. From the many soundtracks to the pro­pa­ganda posters to the fash­ion, everything just feels authen­tic. Plus watch­ing the change from the 40s to the 50s is quite impress­ive as lit­er­ally everything changes.

Mafia II’s design is very flawed. The game always feels like a lin­ear game trapped inside a sand­box with neither man­aging to provide much to the exper­i­ence. Plus while the story spans 10-15 hours, there just isn’t much to do within the game, which is a pity since the city is so detailed.

Score: 6/10

Gameplay

Like the design, Mafia II tries to be many things with its game­play. While it isn’t broken or any­thing, it just feels unin­spired.

Mafia II splits its time between driv­ing, third-person shoot­ing, and melee com­bat. Basically the game tries to be Uncharted/Gears of War, Gran Turismo/Forza, and Tekken all in one game. This becomes a huge prob­lem in the game because none of the sec­tions are fleshed out and remain in the simplest form.

Driving is very slow and very pain­ful due to many reas­ons. A giant foray of cars, each with its own hand­ling and stats, are avail­able to drive, but these cars just aren’t made that well use of.

Cops are lit­er­ally every­where mak­ing even steal­ing a car a real pain. While it is easy to escape from them they are still every­where. They turn on you even if you tap the car in front you and they will most cer­tainly turn their sirens on should you go above the speed limit. The most glar­ing issue though is the Mini-Map. Usually mini-maps are sup­posed to help a per­son get from one spot to the other but 2K man­aged to make the mini-map as dif­fi­cult to decipher as pos­sible. At times it is lit­er­ally impossible to decipher where the red line is. Many times you may find your­self take a wrong street and when you try to cor­rect it you hit some­thing or someone and the police come at you. It is mind-numbingly frus­trat­ing to have to drive when deal­ing with the mini-map.

The next 3^rd of the game is ded­ic­ated to third-person cover shoot­ing. Here the con­trols never feel nat­ural in any way. Mafia II becomes like other open-world shoot­ers and their con­trols. It feels awk­ward to shoot and hide behind cover. Some strategy is employed with a destruct­ible cover mech­anic, but it’s never really developed enough to make use of. The mini-map is also a glar­ing prob­lem here. Vito is a pretty fra­gile man and can die very quickly, he also can’t blind-fire for some reason so he needs all the help he can get. The mini-map is sup­posed to be there to help you fig­ure out where enemies are, but some­times it doesn’t. This is very frus­trat­ing when the map shows noth­ing yet there is an enemy in a cor­ridor with a shot­gun and anni­hil­ates you espe­cially when the game employs a very crush­ing check­point sys­tem.

Melee com­bat is actu­ally pretty good des­pite being simple. You have light, heavy, dodge, and counter-attacks. While it is simple it is also extremely sat­is­fy­ing, espe­cially the excel­lent fin­ish­ers that adapt to the loc­a­tion of the player. It’s a nice detail that adds some fun to a mediocre game.

Mafia II’s mech­an­ics all work, but it just isn’t fun to play. The mini-map is a huge cul­prit in this, espe­cially when such a large por­tion of the game depends so heav­ily upon this device. Nothing is broken, but it feels very unin­spired and if they had just focused on one part, then the game could’ve been some­thing great.

Score: 5/10

Presentation

Despite prob­lems in the way the game plays, there is no deny­ing that the game is a looker. 2K really did put some time into mak­ing the games present­a­tion fant­astic and it does pay off. Models and tex­tures for the main char­ac­ters are fant­astic and the way their lips move when they talk and how their faces react are just per­fect.

Empire Bay is also a very pretty city. While there isn’t much to do, there is a lot to see. Empire Bay cer­tainly is some very good eye-candy. The atmo­sphere that comes along with the city is also very authen­tic and really provides the sense that this is a real breath­ing city.

A great cast also fills in the shoes of the char­ac­ters provid­ing very strong per­form­ances. Some of them are cliché, but you really need that cliché in this genre to really make it work.

Of course Mafia II does have some prob­lems. There is a lot of notice­able screen-tearing and frame-rate drops. There were actu­ally a couple of times where the game froze for a couple of seconds and then picked up. Pop-in is also a giant prob­lem, espe­cially with some close-up objects.

The worst prob­lem found though was that the game man­aged to crash once after a cer­tain cutscene. The screen just remained blank and the con­sole had to be restar­ted.

Mafia II is a great look­ing and sound­ing game. It has some visual prob­lems, but there isn’t much that can detract from this good-looking game, espe­cially the expertly craf­ted cutscenes.

Score: 7/10

Final Thoughts

Mafia II is a game that tries to do too much when it doesn’t have to. Anyone look­ing for a great story presen­ted in a great way should defi­antly come and give Mafia II a look if they are will­ing to over­look quite a few issues.