Mafia: Definitive Edition is an interesting time capsule that will not only help players experience Tommy Angelo’s rise to a replacement 1930s Chicago called Lost Heaven, but also likely generate more appreciation for how far the industry has come since 2002 is. Hangar 13 has been rebuilt to the nearly 20 year old game that brings the graphics up to date and adds some quality of life improvements while ultimately respecting the core design of the original. It’s an admirable approach, but then you actually have to play the damn thing.
The early Mafia games used their open worlds differently than their competitors, with cities not really interactive playgrounds but more like movie soundstages. You can break away from the next story beat and explore back streets and back streets, but don’t expect to find plenty of optional activities or interesting secrets. Instead, the narrative advances you relentlessly, and the end of one chapter propels you straight to the beginning of the next. Do you need to catch your breath? Pity! It’s an interesting approach that I would probably enjoy more if the story was more engaging. Unfortunately, Angelo’s story is incoherent and boring, with leaps in time undermining how you’re supposed to feel about the relationships he’s apparently built over the years.
Angelo’s story is told in flashbacks as he discusses his past with an investigator. He begins his rise as a taxi driver who happens to be drawn into the crowd and then becomes a victim (and participant) in all of the intrigue, backstabbing, and capers one would expect. There’s an interesting story in here somewhere, but the timeline moves so erratically that I never felt connected to Angelo’s plight as a man caught between allegiances. We meet his future wife and learn that they love each other, but their interactions are so lifeless and sparse that Angelo’s later talk about the importance of family feels hollow and undeserved. The newly recorded voice performances are solid but inconsistent. Some characters, like Angelo and Don Ennio Salieri, give subtle, naturalistic presentations. It’s amazing to hear them interact with characters like Paulie, who reads his lines more vividly (and at times hammy). Sometimes it felt like these characters had been torn out of different stories.
Almost every mission predictably ends in an exchange of fire. After all, it’s a gangster story. Not only did I throw molotovs and bullets in the air, but I also hurled a steady stream of profanity at my television. The gun game is just awful, with guns feeling sluggish and under-challenged. It’s not uncommon to dial in multiple headshots before an enemy detects the damage and falls to the ground in a dramatic ragdoll flop. Rival gangsters slide between deck points like Fred Astaire on ice skates or dive in and out of safety in suicide bombings. The hand-to-hand combat is even worse. Successful button mashing rewards you with potted finishing move animations that look like a hokey fight choreography from a West Side Story middle school production. And woe to those who trigger one of these non-skippable animations in the middle of a battle. Enemies may be able to shake off your bullets, but you are not so lucky.
Ultimately, it’s difficult to shake the very real feeling that you are playing a relic from a bygone era. There are some moments when it comes to knocking down a warehouse door with a railcar or escaping an abandoned prison, but the thrill they may have once offered is marred by the sub-par gameplay that will keep you stuck once that Smoke becomes clear. The worst examples are the times when you are forced into stealth sequences. Fortunately, there are only a few of these sections, but the “sounding an alarm is game over” bug bets will frustrate you more than creating tension.
The original Mafia was well received when it was released and I’m sure many people will fondly remember it. To me, it’s something that is probably best viewed as a basic statement in a series that got better with time and subsequent entries. As part of the Mafia trilogy, it’s an interesting footnote on what came before. As a standalone game that can hold its own against modern titles in the open world genre? Fugetaboutit.
