Mafia is a new franchise to me I didn’t play the first two but I have heard good things about them and I think that’s a huge reason this was such a huge disappointment to everyone because everyone really liked the first two, and one huge reason I picked this game up was because of the praise I heard about the first two I thought hey this actually looks like a great game, but instead what we got was a steaming pile of horse shit!
Story: When It comes to story you start off with the main character Lincoln Clay he has just gotten back from war and is meeting his family for the first time since he left everybody’s happy and having a good time but what keeps getting mentioned by Lincoln’s brother Ellis is that their father Sammy is in a lot of debt and owes a lot of money to the mob Sammy shrugs it off but Ellis continues to press the matter eventually Lincoln goes to talk to Sal the godfather of the mob and he says if Lincoln will do a job for him he will forget the debt and that will be it, Lincoln agrees, Sal also asks one more important thing, he asks Lincoln after this heist if he would be willing to take Sammy’s place as he is a huge drug lord of the city and he thinks he is too weak to do it, Lincoln says no because he loves and respects his father. Lincoln gets the heist done and has plenty of money for Sal and also for his father and everyone one is having a good time until all of a sudden Sal and his goons pull out a gun and shoots Lincoln and his family. Lincoln miraculously survives but his father and brother aren’t so lucky, Lincoln after healing for quite a while now is set on complete revenge against Sal Marcano, he gets together with his CIA handler John Donovan to exact revenge on Sal. The rest of the story is basically taking down the big drug lords in the town and then going after Sal, the way it’s played in the game is like an old TV version of C-Span where Donovan is telling the story about Lincoln Clay to a bunch of Senators, its actually quite a nice touch, There was actually a lot of effort done when it came to the games story and it’s actually pretty good the voice acting’s great and the story is actually pretty good, too bad they couldn’t have made the rest of the game good.
Presentation: When it comes to Mafia threes presentation it can be a bit of a mixed bag, the cut scenes look fantastic and at the time was one of the ps4 best looking games, but the graphics when you are actually playing are a different story, but to be fair they do look pretty good most of the time, however there are some times when things aren’t rendered properly and the game doesn’t look so great but for the most part this game does look good. When it comes to the soundtrack the original soundtrack is ok but the actual soundtrack for the radio is one of the best soundtracks they have had so far in gaming at least in my opinion you have classics from Sam Cooke, Beach boys, Cream, Etc. The over world for the game definitely feels very much like the fifties or sixties they did a really good job at making the look and feel of New Bordeaux and it definitely is another high point to this game. The presentation as a whole in this game is not flawless but definitely pretty good.
Game play: You’re probably wondering right now after reading my story and presentation segment so what’s so bad about this game then? Well here it is this is the biggest problem when it comes to this game, the game play. Let’s start with the positive there’s not much but I might as well before I massacre this game. First off I thought the design choice for driving was good the handling for the cars were pretty good but I also liked that they added the mirror on the screen which is great for seeing behind you and also they added a speedometer which shows how fast you are actually going and adds a red area to show that cops will come after you if you are going this fast, and while this is small I still thought it was a good idea and I think more games should implement this small change into driving. What else... What else... I think that’s all I can really compliment the game play for theirs not much else that I can think of that is great in this game I mean you can find playboy magazines in the game… or you could go on the internet… or go get the real thing… lol but anyways the rest of the game play for this game is the most repetitive shit! I have ever seen in a video game I mean the word repetitive does not do this game justice you do literally the same thing in this game over and over again literally the same thing! And I know what you’re thinking a lot of games can become repetitive if you play them a lot, and that’s a fair assessment however Mafia three is way beyond that let me tell you the whole game, First go get your mission assigned from one of the people in that district then go over to certain locations and raise hell kill people destroy shit do whatever it takes to take money from Sal income sounds pretty awesome huh? I mean how could raising hell like that be boring? It just is doing it throughout the whole game just makes this game so tedious it does seem like a fun concept but it isn’t it’s just the same thing every time no depth to it literally the same thing! And I know I keep saying that but if you have played this game you know what I am talking about. Besides that their our certain other things when it comes to this games game play, as you go through the game taking over districts you end up having three under bosses to take care of them for you or overlooking them for you, Cassandra, Thomas Burke, and Vito Scaletta each one has certain perks they give you as you give them districts and the more districts you give them the more perks you get but you also want to try and even them out with them also because if you don’t give them anything they start to turn against you, while this seems like a cool idea it isn’t executed well first off the under bosses while voice acted well, just have no depth to them they aren’t really very interesting and you won’t find yourself getting attached to these characters, and not only that but while some of these perks are useful the majority of them really don’t seem that great. As you go through the game you also have a cell phone? I don’t know actually what it is something where you are able to call people with you can put money in your bank which I think is pretty stupid in any game I don’t understand the purpose of this what’s the point? If I have the money I should just keep it why do I have to have someone come over and take it, it’s stupid! You can also buy weapons if you want to call it that there is no customization at all when it comes to this games weapons you’ve got your basic weapons and that’s it and what really sucks about that is you can only get certain weapons from giving districts to your under bosses weapons like grenades, are they serious?! Grenades are one of the most basic weapons in any game and your going to make me go through hurdles to get them? Unbelievable! The other features can help like calling on your gang to come help you this can be helpful and you can also call for cars that you have, again this seems so tedious, I mean I realize you can just steal one but it takes so long just to get the car you want to come over. This is basically the main game play of the game and it’s absolute garbage! it’s like they didn’t even try, the game would have actually been good for it’s story and its presentation but they couldn’t figure out that doing the literal same thing over the whole entire game is not fun, its absolutely baffling.
(Spoiler Alert)After taking all of Sal’s family out it is finally time to take Sal himself out you go through a bunch of people to get him to end up shooting him yourself or walking away and I guess he kills himself for some reason, I don’t know, After that it’s time for Lincoln to make one last decision keep going as a mobster or leave town and become a new person their our a lot of different outcomes when it comes to this decision and I will admit that I do commend Hangar 13 for having so much but is the choice really that great I mean think about it the whole point of doing this was to kill Sal and end this madness does Lincoln really want to do what Sal was doing all along? I guess that’s your choice albeit not a very good one at least in my opinion. The endings all right if you choose to go away Lincoln chooses a whole new life and then the person you gave the most districts too takes over and has their own little story ending which I will admit is kind of cool, if you choose to stay you have two choices you can actually kill all of your under bosses and be your own man or just get them to help you whatever you choose still ends up with what happens when Lincoln takes over when it comes to the ending it’s not bad I just find the choice kind of stupid.
Overall Mafia three with the few things it has going for it is not worth getting, it’s just bad like one of the worst games of 2016 bad, the game play is just so horrid I could not see anyone picking this game up and enjoying it, but for some reason if you have just got to play it wait till it’s at least down to twenty buck I still think that’s expensive but as shitty as it may be at least there is a lot to do in the game. Nothing any fun but if you like watching paint dry it might be your thing.