Mafia 2 review

There’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing here.

Deception through dramatic hype and history of its predecessor is the name of the game here (and a printed map to be found in the special edition.) To those wistfully unexpectant, allow the wool to be removed.

Mafia II is not a sandbox game, contrary to popular belief. Instead, the story is so focussed upon and made compulsory to the player, that after getting carried away with the story, any opportunity of free roaming is taken away.

This makes for a string of sacrifices, which sort of pays off.

The largest disappearance of substance to resign oneself to is Empire Bay itself. A beautifully recreated image of 1940/50’s New York with implied influences from the highways of Detroit and the residential of Chicago. You, as Vito Scarletta, a war veteran fresh out of Italy, start to drive through the streets of Empire Bay with your brother Joe. As he begins to speak about his life, making large sums of money through working for the mafia families, the stereo plays ‘I put a spell on you’ by Jay Hawkins. The streets in the evening are snow covered, the sidewalks are littered with pedestrians walking, talking, smoking, etc and windows illuminate street sides as you pass by. It’s at this point you realise why a literal form of free roaming has been relinquished.

The impactful nature of numerous little programmed touches of the city coming to life is superior, in this instance, compared to crossing your fingers that the AI will manage to pull off moments that bring the city to life when the player is looking. It’s the regulated spontaneity of city goings on that serves well to make you feel comfortable in your role as a citizen within a sprawling metropolis, working to become a ‘made man:’ a figure of notoriety and power amongst the populous.

 This is the crux of the plot. As you return from service, you realise that money is rather hard to come by through legal channels. Add the gruff movie announcer voice to this part: “When all he knows is violence, he takes to the streets and the mafia families of Empire Bay to support him and his family.” It’s a good set up for a great plot of action, shock betrayals and family morals.

The forfeit of a true sandbox format also masks how very little gameplay aspects you can find around the city. Sure it feels alive to look at; but when the maximum interaction you can have with Empire Bay is to buy food and rob a store, you feel like you’ve overstepped the line of what package 2K games offers you.

And this feeling is felt throughout a good amount of game playing. Beneath all of this attention to detail and near-immaculate presentation lies a pretty run-of-the-mill driving mechanic and a tired third person shooter. As soon as the game attempted to do stealth, I was not impressed at all. The cover and move mechanic’s context sensitivity is questionable, pinning you to different walls than what you were expecting. Aiming and shooting is way too simple at long range, and such a pain in the arse in close quarters. The list of quarrels could span the whole of this review; much easier to say the gameplay feels old and, well, just boring.

What we’ve reached here is a crossroad of sorts, and it’s one we’ve been striving towards at a rapid rate. The question being simple: at what point should a game have just been a movie, instead of trying to emulate particular film codes and conventions?

Mafia II has superb attention to detail in all areas of design and presentation. In turn, this creates a skilfully realised version of what you’d expect New York in the 40’s to look and feel like. And, as you play, you maintain an unsupported optimism for the fact that playing, as a member of the mafia makes you feel cool. The cut scenes are terrific, the actors play their parts wonderfully; it’s just the bits where you actually play the game…

Me thinks we’ve ran a little too far with this “interactive movie” idea.