Publisher: 2K Games
Developer: Hangar 13
Platform: PC, PS4, XB1
Genre: Open-World Action Adventure
2K Games, these days studio like them and EA have gotten complacant, while EA is getting their act together, 2K as stubborn as they are still releasing bad sports games...and remakes like this. Am not entirely mad per say, just maybe quite disappointed in looking at what this had to offer. The game's main issues stems not from just being short but underhanded on lot of areas and execution issues on others. Hangar 13 still convinces me that even with its Hollywood level of prowess when it comes to talent, they still couldn't make an actual good sandbox game instead of game for cinema sakes.
Mafia Definitive Edition's main attraction is the story, the settings, the city and visuals. Gameplay and mission structure pretty much came second or third. Because playing this game, you can obviously tell there's this whole Specs Ops: The Line treatment going on. The gameplay however, I could argue is outdated, doesn't function well when you want it to, the movement is little jerky and guns don't shoot with much impact as they should, they lack heft and other imperfections shooting weapons from 1930s. It's Mafia 3 all over again, maybe a little better but for the most part, similarities are there.
I did appreciate playing this for the story, but one needs to point out that besides the story mode, there's the addition of Carcyclopedia and free mode. Latter which has some fun stuff to do but only in short bursts to justify its purchase price. MDE has good enough content, it's just not as good as you should expect in a year like 2020 where games have evolved past the early dilapidations of video game designs. Like how hard is it to just get a better game designer for the gameplay sections?
< Story >
You could run this town someday
Taking places in the 1930s prohibition era, you play as Thomas Angelo, a recently hired mafioso for the Salieri family. With your friends Paulie and Sam, you take on all sorts of foes from rackateers to rival mobsters. During his initial years, Tommy lay witness to lot of atrocious acts of violence while also doing the deeds for the lesser evil. In his tenure as a gangster, Tommy reflects on the choices he've made and the world that he was stuck in, bit by bit, he loses people and finally comes to a close casket where he truly realizes what he must do to protect the people he loves.
Mafia Definitive Edition is a retelling of the cult classic open-world shooter, Mafia. A remake with its own liberties taken, DE does the job of utilizing the best of Hollywood from the voice cast to story writers. The game has a continuous momentum that keeps you locked into its narrative for the most part. At times it loses grace but there's such high profile stuff going on that you'd want to go through for the ride. Though, at the cost of proper pacing at times compared to the original which did take its time with the story as much as it wanted to.
Each and every chapter gets you pumped for what happens next, if you've played the original, the game refreshes that experience with high qualit production value. A lot has changed from tweaks of the characters personalities to their voice acting and dialogues. The remake puts its own spin overall while still reminding of its predecessor.
Thanks to brilliant writing, voice performances, mocaps, cutscene directions and recreating the old with something new, Mafia Definitive enhances much of the original to the teet. The original was a huge feet at the time for storytelling with good dialogues, storywriting, score and more. And it was released in 2002. Crazy, really.
< Gameplay >
You play this game like you played Mafia II, the gameplay is really similar as you're just taking cover, shooting enemies like they're ready for you and go follow the linear path for your objectives. In fact, that's the other thing, this game is more super linear compared to the original. Driving in this game feels right, the cars have weight and if you aren't careful, can drift and skid then loses their balance before having collision. I mean in an open world game such as this, that works in realistic terms.
What doesn't work for the most part is the gunplay and movement, sometimes taking cover doesn't function well especially during stealth sections and this irritating part of the game is the one reason why I didn't like the stealth aspect of it. The gunplay is far more disappointing, bullets leave little impact, ammo is very scarce, guns at times sound like thuds which is more in line with hitting rubber hammers than actual ballistics.
The A.I in this game can be pretty brain dead and are easy targets for shooting, only reason they don't easily is because of shoddy aiming and recoil, this kind of design choice is more obvious for game designers that wants to trick the players into thinking that there's fair challenge when in fact, it's very flawed. Same for pedestrians on the road, you honk a horn they jump on your direction before police officers starts chasing you thanks to their incompetence. Had this, and the gun recoil and hit detection issue been resolved, the shooting parts wouldn't have been more of a nuisance. Then again, the guns don't always sound right either.
The driving in this game is fun, although if you're not careful like me, you could easily collide with cars, buildings or hit civilians. It doesn't help that the draw distance works against you at times. But yeah, the driving in this feels impeccable, how the weight shifts during steering and how long it takes classic cars to get the torque going. Though the camera can often get irritating at times during high speed chases, it's tolerable considering how well the cars handle.
Also nice are the additions of Bikes, these are pretty much a breeze to drive. Of course, again the camera issue but getting passed that, it feels great driving these. Especially pulling out sick corners like you're in a movie, if only you could change the camera or use a feature that could let you record footage in cinema mode of sorts. Kind of shows that there are just some things that make it feel like the game leaves something to be more desired.
Another issue is free ride mode, yes you don't have any specific missions to do or chores. You just roam around the city without any obligations that the campaign leaves you. Also, it's very vacant. There's no point in just roaming around if you can't even utilize the map or have some extra activities like the original did. Huge missed opportunity here and while the game has no problem showing off the beautiful artstyle and city scapes of Lost Heaven, it is pretty much empty. There are missions of course, this requires you finding notes hidden around places which is tedious, then there's taxi riding services which kind of gets boring later on.
Mafia Definitive Edition is an improvement, for Hangar of course. Still leaves you pondering if the game could have been handled by someone who knew how a game can be fun rather than just something to go through for sake of the story, this isn't 2011 anymore. The game is also short, like 10-13hrs of playthroug to finish it. But also, there's stuff like carcyclopedia and free roam but those components don't make the game anymore enticing than say the campaign does. Even at a lackluster note.
< Production Value >
Visually this is something to behold upon, a technical marvel in terms of presentation. There's great screen space reflections, light blooms, texture details and clear present skybox that's of course better than what Mafia 3 concocted. Lost Heaven will leave you awestruck, that's how gorgeous this city looks.
Besides the lackluster gun audio, the game has lot of sound variety with top-notch production from Hollywood studios. The music recreates most of the original score leaving out a few of course and creating some to its own adding to their uniqueness. The voice acting is very stellar, you're convinced that the characters are real.
Mafia Definitive Edition tells me that in this day and age, video games make as much as money, sometimes more than streaming series and films alike. High value production with great cast, breathtaking visuals and incredible ambiance puts it all in high cylinders for me.
< Verdict >
This game comes short in the places that matters most as a video game, it basically just up and decided to be another Order 1886 or Days Gone of video games. But the story being retold in such beautiful way with so much effort put into narrative and visual presentation, it is acceptably recommendable, with caveats of course.
Pros
- Beautiful retelling of the original
- Great characters
- City of Lost Heavens is breathtaking
- So many car models to look at
Cons
- Gunplay and movement is mostly wearisome
- Braindead AI
- There isn't much in terms of extra content
- Some cases of lost opportunities gets bit unnerving