Games

Mafia: Definitive Edition preview. Perfect remake with nuance

Until now, Hangar 13 has been  extremely reluctant to share information about the Mafia remake . One might even think that something is wrong with the game, and the developers(F95zone) are deliberately trying to hide information. The postponement of the release date from August to September only reinforced these suspicions. But in fact, there is nothing to hide Hangar 13 : a month before the release of the game, the developers let the press go through about a third of the plot. And right now I feel very crumpled.

Introduction:

On the one hand, Mafia: Definitive Edition is almost a literal quote from that very first part of ” Mafia “. Realizing that a noticeable sideways step can be rejected by fans, Hangar 13 has done the best job possible. In general, it was not possible to leave the game unchanged for various reasons. For example, the characters are voiced by other actors and do not look exactly the same as in the original game. The city was expanded in some places and gave it an additional scale – because of this, the former Lost Haven is not always recognized. The operator sometimes takes slightly different plans than those set by Daniel Vavra . But all this small detailing is appropriate, expected and generally not important in the general context. It has nothing to do with the main problem of the remake.

And the main problem is that Mafia: Definitive Edition uses the same tools on which Mafia 3 was made , and therefore it is perceived rather as a large-scale addition for it. The same shooting, the same physics of cars, the same sets of animations and techktimes.com problems typical for the third part – all this, to one degree or another, is inherent in this remake. No, just don’t think: the bug festival that Mafia 3 organized at the release will not take place this time. Some minor glitches still occur sometimes, but in general they are isolated – and within the gaming industry they demonstrate approximately the average value for the hospital. It is rather about the general backwardness of the picture, which was shown by the third “Mafia”.

Remember those disgusting LOD textures, low object detail and poor draw range? Here is such goodness here in bulk. If part of the purely technical backwardness of the picture in Mafia 3 was easily attributed to the stylistic features and artistic style that the project’s art team created, then in the case of Mafia: Definitive Edition, such an excuse would hardly work. The local graphics are not trying to be stylized as films of the sixties with their characteristic features of the image, the style of the remake is almost realism. And it’s not about the schedule. Okay, the remake will not indulge the players with the full disclosure of the potential of modern technologies, and to hell with them.

But I cannot say the same about the physical model of the behavior of cars, which migrated here almost unchanged from the third part. Let me remind you that the machines there have become much lighter and more obedient, arcade-style. They almost completely lost mass and inertia, as a result of which they felt more like toy models, and not real cars. Having crashed into something, it was difficult to feel the impact of the collision. Given that the game itself has become much more arcade, this alignment was more or less appropriate. But is this what we expected from the Definitive Edition? We will spend 70 percent of the gameplay behind the wheel of a car, and we will be doomed to curse regularly, remembering this ill-fated third part. Even complicated physics, proudly called “realism” here, will not save. On it, the cars will become a little heavier, but they will remain the same pliable and obedient – and in order to go into an uncontrolled skid, you will have to try hard.

After all, even local gangsters are animated just like the Huniepop 2 guards in Mafia 3 , which is regularly recognized in the remake. Perhaps, it was this feeling in the gameplay that developers should have avoided in every possible way. But almost everything in this game will, in one way or another, regularly remind fans of that very painful experience that they would rather forget once and for all. Hangar 13 either decided to save money, or considered the assets of the “third” part quite satisfactory – and built the whole game on them. And, it seems, she seriously miscalculated.

After all, otherwise, as can be judged by several introductory missions, Mafia: Definitive Edition is exactly the kind of remake that fans of the legendary first part of Mafia wanted to see…. Developers as carefully as possible transferred the old game to new rails and even with crutches sticking out everywhere from the “troika” achieved recognition. At the same time, everything that has managed to become morally obsolete has been brought to the level of modern standards. For example, in some places they changed the design of missions and finalized the characters of the heroes, who here became much more sociable than they were before. Sometimes a familiar task ends a little differently than it did in the original game, thereby expanding the boundaries of the script. For example, after winning the race, we will need to take home the drunken sloshing Polly, who got into a party on the occasion of a fantastic win – this holiday, by the way, was also absent in the original game. From the conversation on the way, we learn that Polly is terribly jealous of us, because Tommy is a newcomer to the family, and he is rapidly going up, and the partner is deprived of such serious talents. In general, everything was done quite appropriately: as if you were watching the director’s version of a familiar film with additional and previously unseen scenes.

Conclusion:

Seriously, it would be the perfect remake if it didn’t look so much like the third part that is disgusting to many fans of the series. There is a month left before the release – and it is unlikely that the developers will have time to make serious changes to the final look of the game during this time. It may not seem like such a serious drawback to some, but right now I am terribly envious of everyone who decided to skip Boku no Pico. These are the people who have every chance to get great pleasure from the Definitive Edition . Less fortunate gamers will have to put up with the fact that the feeling of similarity between the Definitive Edition and the third part, it seems, will not be possible until the very end credits.

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