Review for Mafia III. Game for Mac, PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the video game was released on 07/10/2016
Life is never what you expect, just as video games can often be experiences that are as exciting as they are disappointing.
This effect is amplified when you get your hands on an expected game with a strong precedent like Mafia 3. Mind you, the production of hangar 13 offers a remarkable game system, a classic but convincingly narrated plot, but ending up with getting lost in the maze of the gameplay with a repetitive and difficult to digest mechanics, as I will explain in this review.
Blood calls blood ...
Mafia 3 puts us in the shoes of Lincoln Clay, an orphan boy who grew up in the French Ward of New Bordeaux. His life was difficult right from the start, not only because of the loss of his parents but also because of his being African American in a period, the 50s, when racial hatred was rampant in the United States. In the second half of the 60s he enlisted in the army fighting in Vietnam and returning with honor to his homeland, finding himself however to solve the troubles of his adoptive father, Sammy, in conflict with the Haitian mafia.
Storytelling has always been a preponderant feature of the series and Mafia 3 not only lives up to tradition by offering a well-written storyline, but improves it by offering a documentary cut not unreleased in the video game but very little exploited. By mixing interviews with some of the secondary characters with both virtual and real films of the time, the player is thus completely immersed in the flow of events, understanding in a deeper way the psychology of the various protagonists and descending more than adequately to the complex historical period that is probably the backdrop to the Lincoln story the most successful thing in the whole game.
New Bordeaux is inspired by the city of New Orleans in Louisiana, one of the cities with the greatest concentration of black people and with a leading role during the years of battles for black civil rights. Lincoln's actions therefore take place at a crucial moment in American history, achieved through an accurate and coherent reconstruction of the historical period, with a highly disparaging language towards blacks, passers-by frightened by our arrival, openly segregationist shops that will threaten to call the police if we don't leave.
Even the police will tend to have a certain type of behavior based on where we will be, showing themselves much more aggressive in predominantly white areas than they would in poorer areas and therefore blacks. The historical context actively influences the environment and all its related components, thus placing in our hands a sort of complex and fascinating simulation of those years, conceptually solid enough to make Mafia 3 a title one of a kind.
Everything that Mafia 3 does beautifully, however, ends up breaking with a title that is technically a blaze of the lack of optimization. Leaving aside the bugs typical of an open world that we tolerate anyway because there is no perfect game from this point of view, the graphics engine shows some major defects in any respect: we move from an imbalance in the quality of textures to an embarrassing pop-up that involves everything on the horizon and even road signs on the asphalt.
The framerate never manages to stabilize at 30 fps, especially in the driving phases where most of the problems seem to occur, even ending up freezing or crashing for no apparent reason: it all ends up debasing a job which, however, also has positive things on its side.
We have in fact models of the characters made very well, whether they are playing or not, a guidance system that can be basic or simulative depending on our choices, a very realistic gunplay and convincing shootings, especially because the AI in this situation works well, often changing covers and putting a little 'of proverbial pepper in the firefights. The positive judgment is reversed instead in the stealth phases, where enemies are mere pawns to be knocked down with excessive simplicity even at high difficulties, making this practice almost boring after a few hours, preferring a direct confrontation yes more noisy and dangerous, but also more fun.
A dog that eats its own tail
But what raised perplexity before and disappointment after, however, is the gameplay and the general structure of the game which, once the initial narrative turn has passed, starts a sequence of missions in all respects identical to each other, leading sooner or later to total boredom even to those like me who chew bread and sandbox without problems.
It all starts with the triggering event that will lead Lincoln to want to take over New Bordeaux: from here on the game map will be swarming with missions aimed at weakening the city's rackets such as prostitution, heroin, alcohol and other slightly illegal businesses. Each racket is managed by a boss, who, however, will remain hidden as long as things go well: our task is therefore create havoc, destroying the shops that sell liquor of the mafias, or breaking into a brothel and freeing the prostitutes inside them. Once you have done enough damage, the boss will reveal himself to fix the damage you did, thus offering you the perfect opportunity to kill him or save his life by putting him under your payroll.
These operations will then allow you to obtain funds to carry out your work, accessing in the meantime the so-called favors which translates into better armaments, cars, and even the ability to bribe the police while being wanted.
All very beautiful and interesting, if only this that's all we'll do in Mafia 3 from start to finish: despite the presence of some secondary missions and the management of the territories we will not do anything else, bringing the player inside a loop whose end is closely linked to the amount of boredom accumulated by playing. A real disappointment that leaves you dismayed, if you think about the variety of missions that have always characterized the series and how such a beautiful and complex game world has not been exploited properly.
The few elements that partially break the rhythm of the game are the electronic components, objects left almost everywhere in the city and which allow, used on telephone exchanges, to obtain a more detailed view of the map. very similar to what synchronization represents in Assassin's Creed; then there are the collectibles, also scattered and which further characterize the historical context of the game: from the covers of the discs of the non-original soundtrack, through the erotic illustrations by Alberto Vargas up to the motor magazines of the time and the numbers of Playboy which, in addition to offering damsels of undoubted beauty, also contain actually published interviews (personally I recommend the one to Stanley Kubrick, ed), raising even more the level of quality and refinement regarding the historicity of the game.
Finally, let's talk about the soundtrack, with which hangar 13 manages to unseat even Rockstar with an absolutely crazy choice of songs and that begins to mess with Jimi Hendrix's All Along The Watchtower already on the title screen, passing through the great hits of Rolling Stones, Janis Joplin, Otis Redding, offering a total overview of the music of those years with just three radio stations present. The radios will also provide news both relating to what will happen in the city but also real news of the time, for example speaking of the French May and the student revolt of '68, helping to make the game realistic to levels never seen before.
The non-original soundtrack instead, boasts the classic Mafia style, offering songs with perfect noir shades and without smudges that remain faithful to the great themes of the series.
In conclusion
However, Mafia 3 remains a big disappointment with regards to gameplay squeezed to the max and an embarrassing technical sector, elements that must be taken into great consideration when it comes to a video game. An opportunity as great as it is partially unsuccessful to bring the series to the evolution necessary to compete worthily in the current market.
Despite this, the only possibility to immerse yourself in such an accurate and interesting historical context still makes the game worth trying at least.
► Mafia III is an Adventure-Racing-Shooter game developed by Hangar 13 and published by 2K Games Aspyr Media for Mac, PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the video game was released on 07/10/2016
