Mafia III - Fuggedaboutit? - Review
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*Contains early game spoilers*
The Mafia. Guns, drugs, booze, rackets, assassinations, politics - what's not to love? Thanks to the mob we have some of the best film and television shows ever that gets you rooting for the bad guys. We have some of the best books, both fiction and non-fiction, with some of the most memorable and most imitable characters eventually brought on screen from fantastic writing.
So why hasn't the same been done for Mafia based video games?
You play as Lincoln Clay, a soldier returning from the Vietnam War back to his 'Black Mob' roots with his step father and step brother. Turns out while you've been gone, you're family have ended up in a troubling amount of debt to the most powerful Italian gang in the city ran by Sal Marcano. To make matters worse, this fictional interpretation of New Orleans, called New Bordeaux, is rife with 60's racism - so from the get go you've landed in a pretty unfortunate spot. This 'prologue' section paints the general overview of the game by also introducing you to the games basic mechanics such as driving and shooting, as well as lock picking and stealth. This all leads up to a job which you have been assigned to do for Sal Marcano to help set the record straight with your family and wipe the slate clean - they want you, along with a couple of Sal's guys, to rob the Federal Reserve for millions of dollars during the Mardi Gras parade. You complete the job but things escalate quickly when you realise that it was all a setup and it was finally a way for Sal and his guys to cut the Black Mob out of the picture. Sal kills everyone who you hold dear to you and attempts to kill you in the process, but you manage to survive.
What plays out next is you teaming up with any of the last remaining gangs throughout New Bordeaux, including Haitians, some washed up mobster from Empire Bay (guess who) and the Irish - to build enough capital to take out Sal Marcano, his underbosses and his lieutenants. The narrative and storyline is chaotically enjoyable taking you down a path of revenge and corruption and I do like that there is this slightly Punisher-esque anti-hero twist as oppose to your generic run of the mill 'rags to riches' story which is the basis of a lot of Mafia pop culture material. Despite all of this though the game to me feels very.... last gen.
Graphically the game isn't bad. Some people have complained about grainy textures but I haven't really focused too much on that, especially since I am playing on console anyway. I wasn't blown away by the effects except for when it has been raining - the reflections of the cars and environment at night is gorgeous. Some of the animations can feel a bit clunky - this is probably because GTA V has set such a high standard on character and car animations that it is used as the measuring stick for about every single open-world game with guns and cars nowadays - but I was willing to look past it because it still holds up. The game's environments are vastly improved upon from previous titles making them much more realistic. This is the first Mafia game I have played where the city does feel somewhat alive. There are little touches in regards to the time period especially when it comes to the whole racial theme of the game. There are certain areas and buildings which 'Don't allow coloured people' - people will become wary of you in those zones and will eventually call the police because of your 'loitering'. As a side note - this game does issue a warning at the very beginning explaining it's usage of extremely race offensive material because of just how things were at the time. I think it's a very bold move to put this in a video game and was one of the things that impressed me the most - it's good to see this level of maturity still being displayed respectfully in this medium of entertainment.
The audio and soundtrack tied in with the narrative of the game I'd say is what actually makes it stand out. With the perfect blend of The Rolling Stones, Creedence Clearwater Revival & Otis Redding, amongst many others, as you cruise around the various districts in the game. Certain songs are included during particular cutscenes in a Scorsese fashion which is quite effective as oppose to using their own score. The voice acting and facial animations are also all very natural. In another article I read someone compare the facial animations to that of Rockstars L.A. Noire and I have to admit Mafia III actually does it a little better.
With the controversial setting and tone along with the brilliantly put together soundtrack and voice acting we have the solid foundations here for a good video game. There is just something though, despite all of this, that hasn't made me go 'Holy shit!' or do a weird overly-excited laugh. Sadly I base most games I play these days on that metric - a holy-shit-o-meter if you will, which usually will consist of moments that I genuinely didn't expect or include a feature that helps you get lost in the game. This usually comes from the gameplay which above all else is the most important thing. It is the bread and butter of video games - good gameplay can help you look past whatever myriad of shit might be displayed in front of you. Mafia III however has all the sizzle of something good only to find it's been served on something that you know has been used before and is starting to get a little soggy.
Every game eventually suffers from some form of repetition - it's a case of how long it takes for you to realise you are repeating the same things before you decide if ultimately you're enjoying yourself or not. Mafia III lays the gameplay down plain and simple in the early couple of hours of the game before you realise there isn't much else to it, at least not until a few more hours in but we'll get to that in a bit.
The base game consists of you going from district to district breaking down Marcano's operations. That includes prostitution, trafficking, collecting dirty money from dead-drops you name it - your fucking it up for Marcano. Each district has a number of buildings and operations which you need to take care of, slowly luring out the lieutenant of that district who you can then kill. Once all operations from that area are complete and the lieutenant is dead you need to assign a district to one of your three underbosses (unlocked through playing the story). Each underboss has an upgrade path which can unlock new guns and perks - for example you can unlock a 'consigliere' (which made me laugh because this is not what a consigliere does) quite early in the game who drives to you to pick up any loose cash you may have to put it in your stash. If you die carrying this loose cash you will lose a portion of it so it's best to stash any money when you can. This consigliere can eventually be upgraded to go around to your various districts and collect the 'kickbacks' that you have earned which is the cut given to you by your underboss depending on how much they are earning. Early in the game you have to go an collect these manually by driving from district to district so it's handy having someone do it for you and automatically stash it. This is the core gameplay of the game, destroy rackets, kill lieutenants/underbosses, take over business, assign own underboss - rinse - repeat until you eventually reach Marcano.
This is a solid gameplay foundation... but for how long? Once you realise there is not much in the way of variation as oppose to your approach to taking down rackets, which consists of either guns blazing or stealth, you start to feel the tedium. It also sets in that you need to do this to progress further through the story. It's done merely to draw out the campaign experience because without it you could be looking at something quite short. Due to the size of the districts it takes some time to complete your tasks, especially if you want to make the most amount of capital. You can make your underbosses earn more and get a bigger cut from the kickbacks by performing optional side missions. Most of them however consist of driving well out of your way, usually to the southern Bayou area to pick up a truck or a boat and then bring it back. One of the underbosses, however, has you skulking the city for certain cars and interrogating informants to help you find a target who you have to kill - these side missions are somewhat more entertaining. They help break up the norm of your standard objectives but I can't say I feel compelled to do a lot of them at once. Not only that but the currency is only really useful when it comes to buying guns and upgrades which you can get from the convenient 'gun dealer' perk which is a guy in a van who drives to your location filled with firepower - this is a nice touch I must say.
What I find doesn't help contribute to the slightly repetitive gameplay is the pretty dumb AI. I get that you are supposed to be a powerhouse, one man army but come on some of the enemy tactics are laughable. Let's start with the all guns blazing approach to the game and how the enemy responds. Like any traditional 3rd person shooter with a cover based system you expect to be able to flank your enemy from the sides attacking their exposed cover. You don't need to worry about this. Stay in one tight spot and your enemies will walk out in the open towards you, sometimes not even shooting. You'll get one or two guys that might hang back in cover but the majority will run amongst each other. You can also run up to people to perform 'brutal' takedowns, despite the number of goons that might be around you while you do this they won't shoot while you perform the execution and they will all, once finished, fall to the floor in shock and fear before getting back up to shoot you. If in close proximity this gives you more than enough time to press the melee button once to perform one hit executions. This felt somewhat surreal to me and although being entertaining to watch it broke away from the immersion of the gunfight. If enemies just stayed in cover and moved around in that cover attacking my flanks, like many current 3rd person shooters do, these fights would be much more intense.
Now moving on to the stealth gameplay: it is way too easy. Enemies can be called over by whistling which you can then, once within range, execute. Whenever you whistle, even if the enemy is in a group of people, only one of them will hear and start to come towards you. This means you can individually call each one of them over and take them out one by one and no-one seems to notice. Not only that the execution itself is fairly obvious. Lincoln isn't exactly a leprechaun: he's a giant brick-shit house ex-military mother fucker wielding a knife bigger than his head repeatedly stabbing someone in the face to death. Don't worry though... no one will notice. To add to the stealth ease you're given some strange ability which allows you to see the outline of your enemies if you have spotted them already to track their paths. Why on earth you need this functionality in this game I don't know. It even highlights objectives and weapon lockers which you can loot, this is quite immersion breaking. To make it even easier you can collect various electronic parts dotted around New Bordeaux which you can attach to junction boxes to 'wiretap' the city. This exposes areas of interest on the map - which is a cool idea especially since they have decided to keep the authentic Playboy magazines littered around as collectibles which you can peruse later on. Despite this though, this 'wiretapping' also exposes all enemies on the map when you approach the area - making your authentic 60's x-ray vision even more useful. I think there should at least be an option to turn this off as it just seems completely unnecessary. This takes the challenge away and therefore I go for the guns blazing approach because at least it is a touch more difficult. It does only take a few shots for you to die, so there is some reliance on cover. You can use 'adrenaline shots' though that restore your health.
So two primary approaches that you have on the gameplay are unfortunately flawed by the poor AI. This also carries off when you enter some of the NPC areas like bars and restaurants. In most of Rockstars games they give you this amazing sense of chaos which can actually make you feel somewhat guilty for the crimes you have committed. This is simply down to each NPC's individual reaction. If you are kicking someone in on the street, some people will run and scream, others will watch in shock and some will even film it on their phones. In Mafia 3, you punch a civilian in a bar, everyone just gets up and leaves as a herd. A witness may call the police, but with one tap of the melee button you knock them out and that's that. It feels all slightly robotic and too scripted, no-one even tries to start a fight with you which I was expecting to happen when I punched someone in a 'Whites Only' bar. This brings me on to the New Bordeaux police force. The game early on says that the police, if you are already in a gun fight with mobsters, will join at your enemies side because they are on Marcanos payroll. Fair enough I suppose but I like to think that it's just the AI system isn't intelligent enough to differentiate friend from foe so police are just added to the enemy pile. I also think it was supposed to then suggest you weren't to feel bad killing the cops so it doesn't break to far away from Lincolns character. When you do get into a scrap with the law it is relatively enjoyable and follows GTA IV's circular police zone method of escaping them. It's fairly basic stuff but enjoyable nonetheless even though they are quite easy to get away from if you are any good at the driving.
Driving also takes a little getting used to but is one of the better handled points of the game. Most of the cars handle somewhat differently though I'm never blown away when driving them. It fits well and it definitely reflects driving from the other Mafia games which is supposed to feel more like a simulation. There is a simulation option which you can turn on if you want more of a challenge.
Although with everything I have mentioned above, Mafia III isn't a bad game, it's just not an amazing one either. I feel as though most releases, including this one, are games we should have seen at the birth of the Xbox One (or next-gen consoles in general), not a few years further down the line. I also I feel the tone of the game can sometimes be a bit mixed. In some areas the story is dark, violent and gritty but then it's clunkyness and occasional satire can make it seem like it's not even taking itself that seriously, which really breaks away from the tension sometimes. It doesn't feel as though it is doing anything new or groundbreaking. Don't get me wrong, we can't expect that from every game that comes out because that would be ridiculous but there is something about it that just feels a little dated. It's story, soundtrack and general gameplay elements such as taking over and assigning districts is fun enough to keep it going but I think once the game finally comes to a close you won't be in any rush to return to New Bordeaux, especially after around 15 hours or so of repetition. If you are a fan of the series it is worth giving a go, despite being a bit of a change from its predecessors or even if you are new to the franchise or just love sandbox games you can find enjoyment here somewhere, just don't expect it to blow you away.
