Gaming Mafia 2 Hands-on Preview

http://www.bit-tech.net/gaming/pc/2010/06/05/mafia-2-hands-on-preview/1

 

I loved the first Mafia game and I'm praying that the second doesn't suck.

Seriously, please don't suck.

 

Looks very interesting - seems i have to check out the first mafia game as well

(also, link has one extra - at the end, fixed: http://images.bit-tech.net/content_images/2010/06/mafia-2-hands-on-preview/mafia-2-preview-9.jpg)

 

Didn't have time to play the first Mafia - perhaps when I have time I shall load it up, and see if I should get the sequel.

 

27th of August is such a long way away ;(

 

Cheers, fixed now

 

QFT

I'm so excited about this, and I'm happy to see that there's a PC release!

 

Will their be a demo ? I really need to try before I buy these days, sick of buying games that turn out to be rubbish !

 

This is exactly what I was expecting (and hoping) to hear actually. The first Mafia game was nothing new either. I bought it knowing nothing about it, and after 5 minutes I thought, "Wtf this is just a GTA rip off". But after an hour I realised that although it is basically a GTA clone, it does everything better than GTA.... The missions were better, the city was better, the driving was better, everything about it was just more fun. I loved it.

I think this game is going to be the same way. It's still the same kind of game, driving from A to B on missions, and doing various shooting sections, but what makes it special is that all these things are just better than in the GTA games.

Also, I remember in the older GTA games you used to be able to drive cars down to the docks to sell them for money. I think you can still do it in the newer versions too, but it's not necessary because you get plenty of money from just going through the missions. I think this kind of thing is sorely lacking from GTA, and it's what makes it become a mindless action game, rather than more of a gangster lifestyle simulator. I think Mafia does a better job of balancing that.

I can't wait for this game.

p.s. There are some very clever underlying technologies in this game which the preview didn't mention. I read about it in other previews. I'd like to hear more about that, as well as some hints about system requirements.

 

Also, I wouldn't get too hung up on the drinking and clothes shopping. I don't think they are trying to change the world with that kind of stuff. It was already in the GTA games so I think Mafia 2 HAS to do it or it would be a set of features missing that it's competitor has. So it's there as a token gesture, and to not give anything away to the competition. Not to mention the fact that some people find this kind of thing important.

 

It's actually a pretty common misconception that Mafia is a 'GTA clone'.

The original Mafia was released only 6 months after GTA3, which was the first 3D openworld GTA game. So calling it a 'clone' doesn't really do it justice. Yes, it was released afterwards, but it was in production before Rockstar announced GTA3.

As you pointed out, Mafia also did a lot of things that GTA didn't do until Vice City and San Andreas (both great games), such as shooting out car tires, NPC's shooting from passenger seats etc.

Absolutely ground breaking at the time with great atmosphere, storytelling and a perfect ending

 

1st Mafia was a very good game. Am looking forward to this one. It's down for a buy on my list!

 

Loved the first game and was nice to see a good story and ending in a game

 

The first Game was Awesome!! I loved the cars so much, the way they got better as you progreesed through the story and in line with moving up in the world as a ganster. Story is amazing, I loved the way it all came back on you in the end, living the high life, who can you trust? And all the settings and the era. No game has come close to telling a story like that to me, I felt connected, and I havn't found a game since that has given me the same emotions, it is the goodfellas of games!

 

That is the thing...
GTA is always like an action movie to me, Nicolas Cage version of Gone in Sixty Seconds maybe. It's not exactly a deep movie, the drama is fake and the guns are cheap. Cheap thrills. Mafia is like the Godfather movies (the first ones of course), you have this deep story going on with lots of actual drama. It's a complete story instead of a few days in the life of a street thug.

Don't get me wrong, Gone in Sixty Seconds wasn't bad, it was just cheap entertainment. If you saw it, you probably had a decent enough time, if not, you didn't miss much. The Godfather however was something people should see, it was a masterpiece of acting and storytelling. The original Mafia game was like that, it sucked you into the story and you got invested. I've played several of the GTA series and always got bored before I finished, it always just ends up as pointless missions to win the game, and that was the problem, it was just a game, you knew you could win and you knew how it ended. Mafia, I wanted to see the end of the story, I may have known how it would end, but you didn't know how it would come about. The game just facilitated the telling of the story.

GTA will be remembered as "the game" that created all of this, but Mafia was the true gem. My brother even once commented he never bothered with Mafia because it was a GTA clone. Yeah, and The Godfather was just another mob movie.

 

Do all the features of APEX work on ATI cards? I know loads of people say that physx doesn't really add anything but I miss things like the dynamic fog out of Batman in other games. It just adds a little something extra to the mix.

 

I hope this is a proper Pc game that is designed for the hardware and controls. sick of graphics being the same on PC as 5 year old consoles due to dev just doing a straight port and not really tailoring games to the Pc tech.

 

Don't know for sure, but I'll definitely try and find that out at the next chance. My notes only confirm that it works in the console versions of the game.

 

Muchas gracias.

 

Same here, first Mafia was excellent and since the rumours about the sequel appeared i've been really looking forward to it