Mafia II reviews

Firstly, let me say that this game in its current form suffers similar problems to many other new releases. The trend is to quickly release something that looks shiny and pretty, and yet incomplete, then sell the real fattening as DLC. And shiny and pretty it is. With a decent graphics card in your computer you are looking at a Renaissance masterpiece. Indeed, I stopped doing things with my character on the second run thru just to look at, or walk thru, the stunning scenery.

As well, the story does kind of make the player feel pretty unsympathetic to the main character. His side kick Jo seems to have more life, though brutal, than the lead character. I found myself thinking as the final scene played out that I felt no real interest in him at all. I completed the game in no particular hurry in around 12 hours – of those 12 hours, probably 25 percent was in-game movie clips – so the game has roughly 8 hours of interactive user play. Is this enough? In my opinion no. Not for the price. We have all come to expect much more (GTA set the standard) in things to do. After all this game is a single user experience only, with no multi player add to justify the short play time – such as games like Battlefield and MOD have. (They also have short single user games, but more than payback on the Multiplayer side of things. The users are being misled here by the pre launch marketing hype. It is obvious the developers put in place many things that did not make the final cut, such as commuter trains and side missions, both in the original mafia game but absent here. Forums are suggesting that development time for this game was not as long as hinted, more like 2 years with a small team of 4 or 5 developers working on it. I believe that 2K has come up against big daddy here – the expectations and profits perhaps where beginning to look threatened with perhaps and maybe an upcoming new release – who knows? Anyway, a bad decision to release this in its current form. Not because it is buggy – it isn't. Yes, there is minor clipping and a few things wrong with the boxing and sidestepping that irritate or don't work – and some other minor stuff – but on the whole the game is not laden with bugs and very playable. It is because the game promises so much more and plays so much less. Once again, the magician paints a glamorous picture, offers thunder and lightening, promising great things and in the end offers up peanuts

Mafia 2 takes you deep into the world of a mafia member – starting from his youth, you build up and loose fortunes. This game has amazing visuals, realistic combat and driving and does a brilliant job of telling the story and setting the atmosphere. Definitely worth your time.

The music, cars and weapons are all perfect for creating the setting. I haven't felt this involved in a game world since Fallout 3.

Downsides are: Very short, only ~8 hours. Steam. Minimal exploration.

Many reviewers have stated the minimal open world nature, and have heavily criticised the game for it. Personally, I think this game does brilliantly as a story driven 3rd person shooter, and just overlook the open world. The nature of the open world gives you choices for getting from A – B. There are collectables, but I figured it would take forever to get the 20 something play boy magazines and the 100 odd wanted posters.

I've played a LOT of games over the last 25 years. I'm a big fan of the GTA series. I've also played the “Godfather” and the original “Mafia”. And games have come a long way since then. At least, OTHER games have come a long way. This is just a slightly prettier version of the original, somewhat frustrating “Mafia”, complete with the lousy driving experiences and clunky combat. This might make it on the consoles, but on the PC it's rubbish. (FYI, my PC is a state of the art Intel i7 running Win7–64, with 12GB RAM, and a GForce 9800 in it). And don't get me started on the seriously awful radio stations when you're driving your steel coffin around. It's like a geriatric version of GTA 3. Do yourself a big favour and wait for a real game that's actually fun to play, because this isn't it.

Best game ever. Good story, Great gameplay, Great fun.

Who played the first one? Who loved the original game? Everyone? I thought so. The original was epic. Definitely one of my favourite PC games of all times. Mafia II had a lot to live up to and seriously high expectations.

Obviously though, they thought we had forgotten all about the original 8 years ago. Because Mafia II is an inferior child.

Now, lets clear something up. Like the original, this is NOT a sandbox game. So comparing it to GTA is silly. Just because its set in an open city where we can drive cars means we should compare it? No! It is a linear story driven game. However, because of this the story MUST be strong, but its not. It is just O.K.

The characters are rather bland and its hard to form any emotional attachment to any of them, especially your character, Vito. The story feels like it has been squeezed in and thus shortcuts made. Twists are too quick and have no real shock value. Years go by in very short amounts of time. And people come and go far too quickly.

So what about the actual gameplay? Hmm… I will admit that for most of the game it felt like I was watching cut scenes. For at least the first 10 chapters you do very little. Drive somewhere, kill someone, and drive home. Hell, in some missions you don't even do that. Sell some cigarettes, clean some toilets, load some boxes. Where are all the epic shootouts? Well they are in the last 2 or 3 chapters. It's a shame that it's only the last few hours of the game where you actually feel like you're playing the game!

So it sounds like I really hate this game right? Well no, it was fairly enjoyable. If you haven't played the original then you might even really like it. But it's nothing compared to the original.

I'm not recommending that you don't buy it, but just be aware that if you were expecting an epic sequel you WILL be disappointed.

So I have been playing this game quite a lot the past few days and TBH it looks a lot greater than it is.

Althou it is built in a sandbox mode, the main story line is all pretty narrow with not much room to do things how you want to. The driving is very bad, the Police cant drive for C**P, The passengers comment on running red lights but police wont arrest you.

All up it is pretty much a remake of a GTA game with less features. Yeah, it has its perks but at the end of the day this game is a major let down.

If you are looking for some hardcore mafia action this is not the place to be, the mafia killing is very dull with not much gore, or any for that matter.

Received this game today, I must say it looks like an amazing game.

This edition also comes with a map of the area. (Always Handy)

Not mentioned above this game requires Steam to run.

Never played Mafia 1 but thought I wood get Mafia II as it wos only like $20 when I got it and for that much I thought y not and it is a really good game really like it and can not wait for mafia 3 to come out as im sure to get it.

Can only be activated by registration with Steam which is impossible as their servers are always busy. Don't purchase.

Awesome game with an epic story mode

I love the Mafia games plenty to keep you occupied and extra downloadable content available. Unfortunately the story ends a bit too fast.

Excellent shooting game.

This is a good game with likable characters, good writing and a cool story, but it does have some simple mechanics and not allot of content but I still liked it

When I first played it, it gave me the feeling of the setting (1930s). The graphics is amazing. The storyline is great but (10–15 hours of gameplay)

The gameplay is quite good. It is a 3rd person shooter and the combat is great.

There are a lot of weapons, cars, clothes, posters and magazines to collect.

The music weapons and carsmatches the tine of the year.

Overall the game is awesome. If you are a fan of GTA series you'll love this too. It's definitely worth your time and money

Became a gangster-no not the wanna be type with there ass hanging out of the jeans-the real deal 1930s onwards mafia men of america.great role playing game.i love it .

It is a good game, confuse plot though.
I finish the whole game in 2 days.

Very well written story, great graphics. This is not GTA – do not think it is a GTA clone or expect a GTA clone, it is not the same and is not meant to be played that way. Once you get that through your head, you will sit back and enjoy a really well polished single player FPS/Adventure game.

This game was just so much fun, from the brilliant hand to hand combat and the surprisingly solid shooting. The ending of the game is amazing and just left me hanging on the edge of my seat. Though the storyline was a little too short for my liking I just wanted more and more :P). To anyone thinking of buying this, GET IT. ONE OF THE BEST GAMES I HAVE EVER PLAYED

I am only part way through this but it is almost like you are playing a movie. My misses has even said (rare for her) that it sounds incredibly interesting. I am enjoying this game but it appears short and no replayablity (if thats a word!)