By Sam Coles:
There are not many games that follow a story about the
mafia, before you say GTA III you were not in in the mafia you were working for
them in first half of the game. In 2003 a little game came out on the PC, PS2
and Xbox and that game is Mafia. It became a classic with its story telling
with a twisting narrative and interesting characters despite its flaws it is
still a fantastic game.
Mafia takes place in the 1930’s where Thomas Angelo is being
interviewed by a federal agent where he is retelling the events of his line of
work. Thomas starts off as a humble taxi driver when one lonely night when he
is having a cigarette two men from a mafia family are being chased and they
crash their car and asks him to lose their tail. He eventually loses them and
they give him money as compensation for the damage of his taxi, they also offer
him a position within the Salieri organisation but he respectfully refuses. The
next day he is ambushed by the same goons who were chasing him the night before
as they remembered his number plate. Thomas ends up going to Salieri’s bar
where they attackers are then shot and killed and he ends up joining the
family. The story has lots of twists and turns with plots of revenge and
betrayal.
The gameplay is an open world but not in the traditional
sense like Grand Theft Auto as there is this open to drive around but there is
nothing to do in it, it is there to set up the narrative to make the game feel
more believable. The game is very much on a linear path guiding you through the
story, you’ll be doing your fair share of shooting and driving and it’s
competent but a bit clunky in parts. The shooting is not bad but the aiming can
feel a bit sensitive and sometimes you can’t tell if you’re hitting your target
due to the lack of visual feedback. Driving is good but if you turn too much
you will swerve out I guess to create a sense of realism, the wanted level
system is more sensitive than GTA as the police will chase you for speeding and
running red lights it adds an extra detail in the world.
The presentation is a dated these days and has not aged well
with a poor draw distance with a fog effect to mask it coupled with the poor
character models, but they do have more detail compared to the character models
of GTA. Animation is stilted and characters never seem to blink if they do it’s
not often and you’re left with these cold stares during cutscenes. Voice acting
is very good for the most part but there are few bad lines where you can tell
that some of the developers stepped in and did some of the work but the cast of
main characters are well voiced.
Mafia is a flawed but great game which kick started a
franchise with a release as recently as 2016 with mixed opinions. If you want
to play the game that started it all then pick this game up its super cheap I
picked up my copy for 99p in my local retro store so it won’t break the bank.
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