My Disappointment In Mafia 2 *Possible Spoilers*

[SpireOfFire]

right off the bat, i gotta say i've been looking forward to this game since i finished playing the 1st mafia almost 10 years ago (or however long ago it was). i love gangster games. mafia 1, the godfather games (i know they suck), a few others awful games i found enjoyment in.

but when i played this game on xbox 360, i finished it in 12 hours (normal difficulty) and was more than a little disappointed at the whole experience. while the graphics are acceptable, the story is great, the gameplay is fun, the controls are responsive, the sounds are good, and the acting is very well done.

but what left me unhappy was the lack of content, free roaming, side jobs, and the storyline constantly fucking with my money, my clothes, and my guns. there were AT LEAST two occasions where i was suddenly without guns, purchased clothes, and lost all my money. 1st when i was arrested (in the storyline) i lost everything except the cars in my garage (whoop dee doo). 2nd, was when those irish bastards torched my house. i lost everything after those two instances. needless to say, this really pissed me off. whats the point of giving us money if we dont have shit to spend on it and you just take away the money anyway?

now, to get my clothes and guns back, i needed money. heres where my 2nd complaint is: the best way to get money is doing storyline missions. the only side jobs are getting cars for guy A, guy B, or robbing shops. no racing, escort, fortress, contract killing, bank heist missions available. story missions, robbery, and carjacking. and even when you do get money, the only things you can spend it on are guns, ammo, and clothing (which all gets taken away eventually). again, whats the point of buying shit if we can't even keep it?

i spend hours upon hours on mafia 1. i spend 12 hours playing and beating mafia 2. i havent played it since, primarily because theres little to no replay value. if you want to nitpick and pick up all the playboys and wanted posters, sure. but that doesnt intrest me that much. theres no unlockable cars, no free roaming, no free riding, no free ride extreme, all of which were available in mafia 1.

overall, i am astounded this game was such a disappointment.

 

[Julianking93]

Well goddamn it. I was rather looking forward to this.

I never played the first but everyone says it's disappointing.

Oh well. Shit happens :/

 

[Regular Guy]

It's not really that much of a sandbox game, IMO.

I think it would have been amazing to see such a tight story pulled off in a GTA fashion, various missions for various people in a massive open world.

 

[Quid Plura]

I think when you approach it as not being a sandbox game, you could enjoy yourself, but it has been hyped as some sort of 40's GTA, so that can prove to be difficult.

 

[Phishfood]

Yeah, that really annoyed me too.

"here is a garage where you can store all your favourite cars, not that you will ever use them because every mission starts with 'take my car'"

"Heres where you can buy clothes that will last one mission"

"Heres where you can buy petrol for your favourite cars if you drive them too much. (see above)"

"Heres where you buy guns, not that you can buy anything that isn't dropped on missions anyway"

It was full of features that were utterly pointless.

 

[SpireOfFire]

I think when you approach it as not being a sandbox game, you could enjoy yourself, but it has been hyped as some sort of 40's GTA, so that can prove to be difficult.

well, whats the point of having money in a city this big if its not a sandbox game? kind of a waste of space and potential, dont you think?

 

[Quid Plura]

I think when you approach it as not being a sandbox game, you could enjoy yourself, but it has been hyped as some sort of 40's GTA, so that can prove to be difficult.

well, whats the point of having money in a city this big if its not a sandbox game? kind of a waste of space and potential, dont you think?

It is, yes. I don't really know why it's there either, we could do without it.

 

[Retardinator]

but what left me unhappy was the lack of content, free roaming, side jobs, and the storyline constantly fucking with my money, my clothes, and my guns. there were AT LEAST two occasions where i was suddenly without guns, purchased clothes, and lost all my money. 1st when i was arrested (in the storyline) i lost everything except the cars in my garage (whoop dee doo). 2nd, was when those irish bastards torched my house. i lost everything after those two instances. needless to say, this really pissed me off. whats the point of giving us money if we dont have shit to spend on it and you just take away the money anyway?

now, to get my clothes and guns back, i needed money. heres where my 2nd complaint is: the best way to get money is doing storyline missions. the only side jobs are getting cars for guy A, guy B, or robbing shops. no racing, escort, fortress, contract killing, bank heist missions available. story missions, robbery, and carjacking. and even when you do get money, the only things you can spend it on are guns, ammo, and clothing (which all gets taken away eventually). again, whats the point of buying shit if we can't even keep it?

i spend hours upon hours on mafia 1. i spend 12 hours playing and beating mafia 2. i havent played it since, primarily because theres little to no replay value. if you want to nitpick and pick up all the playboys and wanted posters, sure. but that doesnt intrest me that much. theres no unlockable cars, no free roaming, no free riding, no free ride extreme, all of which were available in mafia 1.

overall, i am astounded this game was such a disappointment.

The game fucks with your possessions for a dramatic impact. There's something [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/writersroom/8050-Writer-s-Room-Mafia-II-is-Not-a-Game] Russ Pitts wrote about that here (Third page). Here's a few things:
The cars take a lot of cash, so they're never taken away. I think I customized all of mine right before the mission where you lose all your cash, the lucky bastard that I am.
The clothes can be stolen with no fuss about it, as well as the guns.

The part where the micks burn your house down and you lose everything, I smacked one on the head, took his gun and took out the rest (Hard difficulty). I robbed a clothes store in my undies and then killed a gun store owner, took all the weapons and the cash and bought some more hardware at Harry's. If you come to Joe's like that, he won't give you a pistol and you don't have to take his shirt, although you still can. Then I riddled the cafe with as much lead as a Tommy gun can spit out. So guns and threads aren't much problem getting your hands on.

The thing with length is the biggest fuckup of all. You get some bang for your buck, but Mafia 1 was a nuke compared to this. I am on my second and probably last playthrough and judging by my xfire profile..
Mafia - 47 hours with 2 playthroughs and some faffing about in Free Ride Extreme. I started the story again and will probably have to start over with Extreme. So that's what? A fuckton of time.
Mafia 2 - about 26 hours for now. I'm just finishing the story on hard, second playthrough. I'm at the part with Henry and the Chinese. You know which one... so that's what, not even a third of Mafia's gameplay time when it comes together.

 

[Woodsey]

I think when you approach it as not being a sandbox game, you could enjoy yourself, but it has been hyped as some sort of 40's GTA, so that can prove to be difficult.

well, whats the point of having money in a city this big if its not a sandbox game? kind of a waste of space and potential, dont you think?

The city provides the mission space and serves as a backdrop to the story, the money is to upgrade cars for the missions (if you want), buy your favourite weapons for missions and to let you change clothes.

The point is that you should see Vito gaining more possessions the further he gets. Then the game makes the point of taking it away to show things aren't easy.

It's narratively driven; if you want to play GTA then play GTA.

 

[Zannah]

The story and narrative of mafia 2 that everyone seems to like for a reason, shrivel pathetically compared to the story of the original, the narrative clearly doesn't know what to do with the sandbox, and the sandbox elements break the narrative, turning the whole game into a rusty bucket of shiny damage physics and wasted potential :|

 

[T_ConX]

I checked out the demo, which was good, and was edging on pre-ordering it for some of the goodies, but then decided to wait for the reviews to roll out.

Seemed like a smart move on my part.

I think a lot of people came out of the demo, pleased at the tight gunplay and visual style, expecting that the full game was going to have most of what have become genre-standard features. WRONG.

The simplest way to describe Mafia II is that it lives on the opposite end of the spectrum as Saints Row 2. Mafia II is DEADLY serious and wants you to stay focused on story at all times, while Saints Row 2 doesn't care and lets you partake in crazy mini-games on the side at your leisure. Sadly, since the entire Sandbox genre is built on such freedom, Mafia II always feels like half of the game is missing...

In fact, the more I think about it, it seems Mafia II has more in common with the first No More Heroes. NMH had a nice little overworld you freely run around in, but there was nothing much do to in it, effectively making it just a glorified hub area.

 

[GBlair88]

So the really well made game built around a linear story line sucks because it doesn't have free roam? Twelve hours would be pretty standard for a game that is neither an RPG or sandbox game. I got through ODST in about six hours during one sitting and that was with my poor sense of direction.

 

[goliath6711]

"here is a garage where you can store all your favourite cars, not that you will ever use them because every mission starts with 'take my car'"

Saint's Row 2, does the exact same thing. as does both Mercenaries games and Red Dead Redemption.


"Heres where you can buy clothes that will last one mission"

All of the clothes you buy are in your closet, so there is absolutely no reason for this complaint. The fact that you start each chapter by waking up in your underwear should also be a clue.


"Heres where you buy guns, not that you can buy anything that isn't dropped on missions anyway"

Tell me an open-world game where that doesn't happen. In fact if it didn't there would be a lot more people complaining about how unrealistic that would be.


"but what left me unhappy was the lack of content, free roaming, side jobs, and the storyline constantly fucking with my money, my clothes, and my guns. there were AT LEAST two occasions where i was suddenly without guns, purchased clothes, and lost all my money. 1st when i was arrested (in the storyline) i lost everything except the cars in my garage (whoop dee doo). 2nd, was when those irish bastards torched my house. i lost everything after those two instances. needless to say, this really pissed me off. whats the point of giving us money if we dont have shit to spend on it and you just take away the money anyway?"

Complaing about that is like complaing about-

*SPOILER ALERT**SPOILER ALERT**SPOILER ALERT**SPOILER ALERT**SPOILER ALERT**SPOILER ALERT**SPOILER ALERT*




John Marston dying at the end of Red Dead Redemption. If the story dictates that you lose your posessions at some point, deal with it.

The developers knew exactly what they were doing and what they wanted to present. You just didn't like it which means the disappointment is your fault, not theirs.

 

[GrinningManiac]

Wow, how could I miss this on my searches for Mafia 2 ending?

Bah, I'll repost what I had

Just literally turned off the PS3

What a dissapointment

All that awesome story, all that build-up and tension and stuff. I was expecting something spectacular. Leo turned up, which was something, and so does Random Chinese Tong #2, but then it gets crappy

A gunfight? I mean, I wasn't expecting a bossfight against Falcone with a healthbar and whatnot, but just ANOTHER GUNFIGHT?

And then that ending cutscene. Joe throws away his dreams yadda yadda...and then he gets randomly offed?

Was that supposed to be shocking? I wasn't expecting it, sure, but only because it was a dumb, cheap twist at the end that was only put it just to add an :O emoticon to the end of the script.

I plowed through a bajillion gangsters, had an awesome FATALITY with Falcone, and then I'm supposed to think "OH NO, WHAT HAVE I DONE?" with regards to Joe? No, it was just crude

I'm a bit down now, because they ended such a cool game in such a cheesy way

I don't mind the lack of free roam and the general uselessness of money and the fact that the times you NEED money are when they take it away at random. I get all that, I see this isn't one of those sandboxy-things.

I just hated the ending. Turned a good thing sour