Although our appointment with the Mafia II developers didn’t come to be because of scheduling conflicts, we did manage to get some info of the game.
Mafia was one of my favourite gangster games of all time, so I was really looking forward to the sequel. Though a lot of people labeled it as a GTA clone it was actually a very original, very good game. And to be fair, everything that had gangsters in it was labeled a GTA clone back when GTA was still new. However, Mafia was one of the first to use a GTA-style open world to tell a linear story. That’s right, though there was free roam, the main game of Mafia was linear and told a tragic, well written and believable story of a taxi driver who became a gangster, with a good cast of characters, and an atmosphere that was incredible at the time. The very reason I bought the game was because of a screenshot I saw. Yes, a single screenshot that was just filled to the brim with that 1930’s gangster atmosphere convinced me to buy the game.
Mafia II so far…looks good. The atmosphere is still there and the action looks fun, but other than that I saw few remarkable things. There are some improvements to the gameplay and the now standard cover system is implemented. To be fair, I haven’t seen anything from a gameplay perspective that really stood out. If the game manages to have unique missions like the first one, then everything should be fine. The first Mafia had a very nice selection of missions. Unlike GTA, every mission had a unique goal, scenes and story, though they were much fewer in number. Still it was this that made it different, that we could get an accurate look at all the activites a 1930’s mob did. We need more gameplay to determine this however.
As for the story, the game seems to be less original than the first, this time we’re playing an italian immigrant called Vito, who turns to crime to escape the poverty of his childhood. Basically, Vito joins to make money, which isn’t exactly unique. In Mafia, Tommy Angelo ended up with the mob after an incident beyond his control, and ultimately had little choice but to join the mob, as it was the only way to protect himself. However, 2k has stated that this will be a darker, grittier, more real story. Mafia was more of a tribute than a true story according to them, which is surprising when looking at how dark the original Mafia already was, although admittedly it was still a more or less positive story. However, the story does hold a lot of promise. Mafia II despite starting with a typical scenario does have a lot in its favor. For one thing, the game is set between 1940-1950, spanning multiple years just like the original, which seems to hint at the similar format. Also, this has interesting possibilites as we’ll see the mob during and after World War II. The characters we saw in trailers also seemed interesting, so all in all, despite the somewhat cliché start, Mafia II has a lot of promise.
Everything considered, Mafia II looks good. A lot of what made the original great is still there, most importantly the atmosphere and the accurate representation of the era. The gameplay and story seem okay, and as long as the developers deliver the same that made Mafia great, there’s no reason why Mafia II should be a great sequel. Keep an eye out for it, the release date is August 24th for North America and August 27th for the rest of the world, and being a multiplatform title, owners of PCs, PS3s and Xbox 360s will all get to enjoy it.
