Grand Theft Auto is the best sandbox franchise ever. It’s fast-paced, set in a proper open world and written by prodigal geniuses/actual criminals. There are no limits and no restrictions and that’s why Mafia 2 should under no circumstances be compared or referred to as ‘GTA back in the day’.
Both are based on climbing the organised crime ladder, taking over a city and occasionally driving over grannies in a hot car but - and this is a big but - while GTA is based on modern society, STD jokes and no sense of morals, Mafia is set in a world where a dirty jacket has moral implications.
It takes just seconds in 2K Czech’s masterpiece to get into a 40’s state of mind with the music, the cars and the serious undertones of an archetypal US metropolis at a time when WWII dominated existence. More than anything, it’s the game engine that delivers Mafia’s experience and makes the historically alien world so plausible. The engine was apparently developed independently for the various platforms but all that matters is that it looks, plays and is in every way better on the PC. While textures, models and lighting are world class, it is perhaps the physics that are most impressive. Whether it’s done on your NVidia card or on your CPU (overhead is negligible) the physics are a major factor in the gameplay. Collisions, weapon effects and everything down to your coattails look - and act - as they should.
The ambitious deployment of physics combined with a city-sized bag of variables has however placed ridiculous constraints on AI behaviour, something quite visible in many interactions. For the most part the replicated NPCs walk, talk and dodge your car as if it they were real but under special circumstances such as missions they occasionally stumble, turn bizarrely on staircases and get stuck in doorways. It is something you could live with but hopefully won’t have to as we strongly suspect these hiccups are ghosts in the supplied ‘full review code’ that’s bizarrely stamped ‘incomplete’ upon loading up (don’t ask).
Minor irritations aside, Mafia 2 has you in third person control of Vito Scaletta, a mischievous youth sent to the frontlines for petty crimes and a potentially misspent youth. You will actually play the WWII segment and witness Vito’s first encounter with a ‘man of honour’ who does to Mussolini’s troops what his platoon can’t. Without spoiling, there’s also a stint in the slammer which is played out rather than a disconnected fade in, fade out. Nice.
Storytelling and involvement are the bread and butter of Mafia 2 in the long run. Rather than opting for ambiguity or moral decisions, your aspirations are crystal clear – do whatever it takes to become made. There is very little room for fantasy and if you aren’t satisfied with the play on morality, this is not the game for you. The sound of sirens as a safe cracks open, your acquiescence to your first hit and the thrill of fighting off sodomites in a jail shower are the thrills of Mafia 2. Also, the cars.
Again, without spoiling, the subtleties and historical accuracy of the era only become more impressive when your return from incarceration and Modernism has converted your snow covered, ashen megacity-noire into a swinging hotspot. The lighting, weather and mise-en-scene are all dynamic and driving an old trunter on an iced-up mountain pass is no joke. On that note neither are the police. Speeding, manslaughter or any other criminal activity will get you wanted and not changing your plates or clothes will keep you wanted. Thankfully there is an element of realism and if you murder the cops and any witnesses within view, you can usually make a clean getaway in a new car. Keep poking the man, however, and they will pull up next to you with a Tommy Gun-wielding sergeant hanging out the window and proceed to waste you. There are different wanted levels but throughout the game the cops are relentless and extremely aggressive.
The three subsystems within gameplay are also finely tuned and whether driving, fighting or shooting it’s hard not to be impressed. Cars handle like the behemoths they once were, fist fighting is just plain fun while gunfights reign supreme thanks to a streamlined cover system and raucous environmental physics.
Technically, Mafia 2 walks a fine line between brilliance and over-ambition. As a game it’s a piece of art, a classic narrative and a title that will have fans of the original gushing. It’s as classy as its characters, as smooth as single malt and about as real as guns, cars and crime can get. The attention to detail lifts the bar way up on sandboxes, but only if you have the discipline to ignore the missions. Which you won’t.
Nicholas Boerma
SCORE 92%
Full product specifications and other data can be viewed in the October (163) issue of PCFormat Magazine
