Mafia

Dmitriy AnsolisCIS4879/27/09

Introduction

Title: Mafia Publisher: Gathering of Developers (aka God Games) Developer: Illusion Softworks Release Year: 2002 Type of Game: Third-person shooter Price (PC): $30-40 (originally ~ $50) System Requirements:

PIII 500 96MB RAM 32MB video memory 1.8GB hard drive space

Overview

Mafia is a third-person shooter that takes place in the 1930s in a fictional city called Lost Heaven

The main character becomes part of the mafia, and starts doing various jobs for them

Story

The main character is a taxi driver named Tommy Angelo

He gets involved with the mob (because of money), working for the Salieri family

The story is told as a flashback Tommy realizes he doesn’t like the “gangster” life He meets with a detective to tell him his story and

help take down the Salieri family

Player’s Role

The main character works for the Salieri family and completes various jobs for them, including car chases, robbing banks, shootouts...

Installation & User Interface

InstallationThe game takes about 20 minutes to install,

and comes on 3 CDs User Interface

The user interface is very straightforward, and shows all basic information such as amount of health remaining, the health of your teammates, map, speedometer…

Gameplay

Gameplay mainly involves driving and shooting sequences

Somewhat similar to GTA – open world Weapons and cars are provided by

characters working for Salieri A lot of variety in missions, different ways

to complete the missions

Scoring

There is no “scoring” The game rewards you by giving you

access to more weapons and better cars as you complete the missions

Artwork

Cars look very realistic, recreating the style of the 1930s

City textures aren’t always very detailed, but generally good

Character animations and cutscenes are excellent for a 2002 game

Sound/Music

The music choice is excellentMusic matches the time periodPlayed on the radio as you drive

Sound effects (cars, weapons) are very realistic

Other Information

Special Features Freeride mode

Drive around the city completing various fun challenges Unlock new cars Not part of the story

Manual Descriptions of characters, weapons Map of the city Technical information

Bugs Some texture problems

Game Review

What is good about the gameGreat storyGameplay is challenging, involves strategyMission varietyDetails that make the game more realistic

Game Review

What is bad about the gameThe game forces you to drive to your next

mission This often takes a long time and can be frustrating

– if you exceed the speed limit, cops will pull you over

Little to do in the citySometimes too realisticSome people complain about the save system

Game Review

Often compared to GTAIII Comparisons due to open world and driving aspect The two games are actually very different

Mafia focuses more on the story and the main missions, and is more linear GTA gives you tons of different things to do in the city, distracting you from

the main story Mafia is also much more realistic

The games shouldn’t be compared because although they look similar at first glance, they are actually completely different in terms of game play

Mafia is better than many third-person shooting games because of the variety of missions, interesting plot, and realism

Game Review

Appropriate audience: rated M due to violence and languageAnyone who enjoys shooting games would

probably like this game Design mistakes

Summary

Strengths Great story Challenging gameplay Mission variety

Weaknesses Player must drive to the next mission Save system

The game is worth purchasing How could the game be improved?

Allow the player to “jump” to the mission location, or incorporate the drive into the game/story

More to do in the city

Mafia 2 – Coming Soon!