After Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak, I took a couple days to decide what I want to play next and I decided to check out MAFIA: THE DEFINITIVE EDITION.
I'm about 2 hours in and so far I'm enjoying it. It feels like an affectionate homage to Gangster films like Goodfellas and The Godfather but set in the 1930's during "Age of Gangsters" but in a semi-open world. And I mean that while there is a big map to drive around in and do missions, it doesn't seem to be any side activities, but rather the city is there for the missions to be set in and to give the game a sense of verisimilitude.
So far the plot is fairly grounded and in line with what I'd expect: Tommy Angelo lives in 1930's "Lost Heaven"(which is either New York or Chicago or maybe a combo of both) making a hand to mouth living as a cab driver during the beginning of the great depression. One night he's waiting for a fare and two mobsters show up in the middle of a gunfight and force him to be their getaway driver, which eventually ends up with him joining up with the gang. It's organized as a series of missions separated by weeks, months or even years, which show Tommy rising in the gang's hierarchy while introducing the player to the mechanics(Tommy doesn't get a gun until mission 3 or 4, when they go to collect protection money from some of the local businesses).
At the same time, while the gang tommy joins up with seems to be the "nicer" of the gangs shown and the leader being seemingly more reasonable(There's a cut scene where the other mob boss gets into a traffic accident and beats the other driver to death in broad daylight, in front of two cops who just watch, with a tire iron. The other guy apologized for the accident, despite being rear-ended by the mob boss), the game doesn't gloss over the fact you are a mobster and your co-workers aren't exactly saints. During the protection money mission, there's a conversation on the drive where one of the other guys is going on about bashing a guys head against his shop counter and the bloodstain still hasn't washed out, only to have the same guy go the same shop alone, followed by a couple minutes of sounds of things breaking and the guy talks about how he basically just beat the shit out the same guy again to let off steam. Its a stark reminder that these are not good people and Tommy is not a good person for willingly choosing to associate with him. Tommy doesn't seem to be at all bothered by this either, but then again, he was more then happy to get revenge for his cab getting smashed up earlier by the other gang.
The plot and characters seem well written and the story is well paced, so it does feel like Tommy is getting drawn in realistically and becoming part of the family, as well as him developing a relationship with the other members of the gang(notably Sam and Paulie) who by this point are beginning to resent him for rising so quickly in the gang compared to them. It's fairly subtle but the fact Paulie occasionally bitches about the fact they've been in the gang far long then tommy but they're still doing shit work like collecting protection money while Tommy gets some of the cooler stuff and is better liked by the gang leader feels like foreshadowing to something like Paulie eventually turning on Tommy out of envy.
Probably the biggest annoyance with the whole game so far is the mission "Fair Play", which is a 3 part mission. Long story short, there's a big race coming up and a lot of bets were placed. To help fix the race, tommy is going to steal the car of a hot shot driver the night before the race, drive it across the city so a mechanic can sabotage it and then drive it back to to the racetrack before anyone notices it's missing(thus the time limit). You have about a 3.5 minute time limit to drive it there, 3.5 to drive it back(and don't drive too fast because the engine is now prone to overheat due to the sabotage) and once those are done, you get the icing on the cake, once the race is ready to start, you're told that the driver your guys all bet on got beaten up by the other gang while you were out sabotaging their car and they need an experienced driver ASAP(If they had anyone else they wouldn't be asking you), so you have to win the race now too. And suddenly now the game is a racing game and you have to take first to finish the mission in a 1930's hot rod that doesn't exactly turn on a dime and you've only gotten to drive on this mission so far. The saving grace is there are checkpoints after each leg of the mission so you don't have to re-do the entire mission if you lose the race, which I had to replay the race about half a dozen times because it's pretty easy to wreck and fall so far behind you can't catch up. So yeah, that mission sucks and it's the biggest flaw in the game so far. Allegedly the AI also cheats with rubber band AI and I believe it as often as it feels like I'll be in the lead and suddenly the #2 car will suddenly pass me for no particular reason.