Mafia III – What We Would Like to See

Mafia II came this past Summer, but we are already looking forward to what we want in the next installment.  We know what you are asking – when is it coming out?  Well…

…we don’t know because it hasn’t been announced yet.  Zing!  It took eight years but last August we got the sequel to the 2002 PC smash success Mafia.  At the time, Mafia was considered to be one of the more groundbreaking games on the PC, with stunning visuals, smooth gameplay, and a great mob-headlined theme.  After numerous delays, the game eventually saw forgettable life on the PS2 and Xbox; the console version lacked the quality and artistic creativity of the PC counterpart.  I dare you, tolerate more than 10 minutes of the game on the PS2, it is insane on how torturous it can be.  What did you expect though?  PC gaming advances every few months, console gaming advances every few years.

Mafia II may not have had the same amount of success as its predecessor original, but it did quite a few things right.  Firstly, the console versions (PS3 and Xbox 360) were of similar quality of that of the PC version, though one cannot deny that the PC version still bleeds the best presentation value the game offers.  The story, though not as compelling as the first, was both entertaining and gave off a good movie-like vibe with fans.  It wasn’t Goodfellas, but it was far better than anything that Mobsters (1991) could have ever produced.

Mafia II also stands out from other open world games, like that of one of its influences - Grand Theft Auto, as it takes place in an untouched era.  With so many games these days focusing on modern events and a modern theme, it’s nice to see a game focusing on a different era.  Mafia II takes place in various times of the 1940s an ’50s, and being able to listen to the music of that era is both welcome and a change of pace from other games.  A modern Mafia game just doesn’t seem to be a realistic thought.  The Mafia influence is still around but we all know that the mob had a distinctive presence in the ‘old days.’ of the 1930s, ’40s, ’50s.

Empire Bay is a great city to drive around in, with a unique take on vehicle controls and well sculpted out terrain.  It was a delight to sit back and drive around the town between missions are when you were planning your next go at getting the ‘robbing five stores in five minutes’ trophy/achievement.  It was a gorgeous city, with realistic weather, variations of roads, and a few solid varieties of automobiles from two different eras.

With that said, Mafia II wasn’t perfect and there are a handful of fixes we hope to see if and when Mafia III comes out.  While we sure hope we don’t have to wait another eight years (heck we are all supposed to be dead or coming to an end next year), so here’s a wishlist we have generously created for the fine folks at 2K Czech to take into consideration when constructing another game themed in the absolutely lovely city of Empire Bay.

Empire Bay Needs to Be More Interactive!

A common complaint amongst fans was the fact that while Empire Bay was a great looking city – there was absolutely nothing to do in it.  It’s like when you go to an amusement park but find out they closed the main attraction rides.  You are teased with a great looking city, but there are only so many times we can drive around picking out new suits at the different clothes shops and stopping for gas was fun maybe the two times I ran out of fuel.  This is a open world game with no playground.  There were rarely any kind of side missions, and unfortunately the items to collect were locked to the missions of which they could be found in.

In Mafia III, Empire Bay needs to have entertainment.  Any city planner would tell you that in reality – if there is nothing to attract residents and businesses to the city, then it will be dead.  Empire Bay was plenty packed with civilians, cops, and fellow mobsters – was grabbing a burger and buying suits the only sort of entertainment back in the ’40s?  If so, we are truly spoiled today with video games, movies, sports, and our occasional DUI.

What kind of entertainment?  See every other open world game – items you can collect outside of missions, delivering exotic and rare cars to a dealership, completing side missions that involve shooting up a rival mob, performing hitman missions, money laundering, gambling rings.  This is the mob, possibilities are endless on the mischief we can cause!

Choice-Changing Storyline

This would be a little hard to pull off.  Like others I was a bit displeased on how short of a game Mafia II really is given that is single player only.  While the length wasn’t terribly short, we do expect more for a game that has no given replay value with multiplayer.  Granted, I do not want nor need multiplayer in a Mafia game, but we do want to feel as if we got a story worth our $60 bones we dished out.  Mafia II‘s story was solid, but was all too linear.  Similar games these days are beginning to offer game changing choice decisions the player selects to alter the flow of the story.  Games like Mass Effect and Heavy Rain are two notable examples.  Mafia III is one of those games that can benefit from the feature.

The choices could be minor, like in Grand Theft Auto IV when you had to either kill Dude A or Dude B, but the replay value of the campaign would skyrocket if you were given a choice in a game changing decision.  Do you whack Boss A or Boss B?  Do you work for Family A or Family B?  Kill the rat or flee him to the airport?  Choices would cause different actions.  We’d have to play the story again to see the end result of different choice options.

Mafia II originally had multiple endings (source), but the developers later went back and cut it down to just one ending.  They claimed that the way the game ends will make everyone happy.  For me, the ending was a bit bittersweet but I will admit I was surprised by it (in a positive way).  Wouldn’t it be nice though to have different endings have chosen to do different things in the campaign?  With the game offering only a campaign mode, it would be a welcomed feature.

Shoot to Thrill!

Blame it on other open world games, but I find it hard to believe that made men in the 1950s were unable to be able to shoot and drive and the same time.  I don’t mind the fact that it be hard to accurately control a tommy gun while driving, but there are a handful of handguns to choose from in the current game.  Perhaps the developers wanted to make driving sequences more challenging, and for that I applaud them.  Though, after the amount of times I ended up being blown away by a tommy gun from an opposing car’s passenger, I can’t help but to yell “Damn’t, I had the perfect angle to blow his mother f****** head off.”

Many fans complained about the driving controls, but I had no issues.  Simulation was hard to get used to, especially coming off months of playing Just Cause 2 and GTA IV, but they were unique.  It was a learning curve; by time you get used to them, they started to become natural.  You have to remember these were American made cars back in those days – so of course they handled like poo.

In addition to being able to shoot while driving, it would make a nice sequence to be able to perform a hit on an enemy who may be at the local diner getting his hamburger on in the comfort of your front seat.  The feature is not necessarily needed to make the game better, but a bit more accessible.  Let’s face it, mobsters are able to shoot while driving their car.

Free Roaming

This goes along the lines of Empire Bay needing to be more interactive – but it felt like playing while through Mafia II that the game just wanted you to go to mission to mission until you’re done.  In the end result, this saved us some time – because exploring Empire Bay was all in all useless.  There were no easter eggs to find that the story didn’t lead you to, there were no impulsive missions to carry out.  The only objectives you would need to do between missions is to re-stock on ammo, grab a bite to heal yourself, and maybe change a suit to lose the cops.

Open world games need to have some motivation to have the player roam around the map.  Just Cause 2 had dozens and dozens of camps to take over (I’ve put well over 100 hours in that game and still have not accomplished 100%) on top of a variety of other objects.  inFamous had blast shards to collect, and sub-missions to help improve your good/evil balance; Crackdown has the orbs to jump around the city to find; so on and so forth.  The original Mafia included both a free roaming mode and race mode. Mafia II just has the campaign, with the additional DLC packs you can download for new missions.

One can argue the DLC adds length to the game, of which you are correct, however, that’s an additional $20 (of the two DLC packs currently available) we would need to spend to expand our experience.

Those would be our needed features for the next Mafia game.  While we’re at it, here are some more minor changes we would like to see.  Call it nitpicking, but I call it making the perfect game:

Prevention of Corrupted Save Files

Thankfully I never experienced my save files going corrupted in the campaign mode, however in the PS3-exclusive “Betrayal of Jimmy” mode, I have experienced far too many save files going corrupted.  The only way I found to prevent this is to beat the entire mode in one sitting (which is very possible).  2K’s response to this issue is simply – “start a new game.”  I have, and whenever I save (and there is no certain percentage marker of where this occurs), in most cases it comes back corrupted.  Saving game progress is so 1995, come on.  Outside of this issue, “The Betrayal of Jimmy” was a nice surprise and offered some diversity in that you had the choice of which missions to do next.  By saying that, I am glad it came free (to those who bought new copies), but I certainly would not have spent $10 on it.

Better Collector’s Edition Collectibles

The Steelbook was mighty tempting, but for $20 more you really didn’t get much to be excited about in the Mafia II Collector’s Edition.  It came with your typical concept art book, which is something most of us will probably look through only once, and other than the Steelbook casing for the game there was no big incentive of dishing out the extra dough.  In no time stores began to clearance out the CE edition because buying just the standard version sufficed.  The soundtrack would have been a nice incentive if 2K hadn’t offered it for free a few weeks after release for download on our computers.

What could have made it better?  Vouchers for the DLC (that were announced pre-release), exclusive content we can get excited about (exclusive suits, seriously?).  The exclusive cars were ok, but for who bought the standard game, they also received store-exclusive vouchers for new cars.  The new trend seems to be including some sort of figurine, I wouldn’t mind a mini statue of Vito in a shootout pose, or even one of the classic cars we can drive in the game.

There is not a doubt in our minds that 2K Czech are working on early ideas for a third Mafia game.  The second one may not have topped the sales charts, but the one thing publisher 2K Games did right was release it after the Red Dead Redemption frenzy and before the major Fall blockbusters like Halo Reach and Call of Duty: Black Ops.  A late August release may not have been the best window, but it’s a guarantee more players played it then than they would have if released with the chart toppers.

Whether or not we will see the return of Mafia on this current gen of platforms or the next is undetermined.  Chances are, it will be held off for a few years before an announcement is even made.  Analysts and fans predict Rockstar and Take Two are readying the announcement of the new Grand Theft Auto that will likely be revealed at this year’s E3, so the chances are we won’t see or hear anything Mafia III until next year at the earliest.

Mafia II at its core was a solid mob-themed title.  It had its shortcomings, its faults, its ridiculous flaws, but for those seeking a quality single player experience can’t do no wrong with picking it up.  Gamers can find new copies of Mafia II going for $29.99 these days; at that price it’s a no-brainer to pick up.  Collectors can nab up the Collector’s Edition for under $60.  It’s a decent pickup but in all reality only Steelbook collectors need apply.

About the Author

Bryan Lazarony was groomed to be the next philosophical leader of our time. Unfortunately for those responsible, Bryan turned out to be geek. Now he spends his time watching movies and playing games. He truly is a loser. Catch him online - PSN and XBL are both blazsox.