MAFIA TRILOGY
The original Mafia is being remade from the ground up, and we love it
All three games to be re-released, with a ground-up remake for the first.
01 2K is turning back the clock on its 18-millionselling American gangster series with Mafia: Trilogy. Created by 2K’s narrative specialists at Hangar 13, this collection of remasters and remakes will bring Mafia and Mafia II to PlayStation 4 for the first time, as well as delivering a revamped edition of Mafia III.
While you can grab Mafia II and Mafia III Definitive Editions digitally from the PS Store right now, you’ll have to wait until 28 August for the physical release of Mafia: Trilogy and the ground-up remake of the original Mafia – the real reason to get excited about Hangar 13’s handiwork.
MADE (AGAIN) MAN
It’s been 16 years since Mafia sped and shot its way onto PlayStation 2. The same year we glided through Grand Theft Auto: Vice City listening to Flock Of Seagulls we also took to the richly detailed streets of Lost Heaven and Duke Ellington was our jam of choice.
The incredible-looking remake of the first game is the trilogy’s clear draw, hence you need to wait for it. Mafia’s storyline follows cab driver Tommy Angelo as he rises up within the Salieri crime family. It hits all the American-Dream-gone-bad notes you’d expect from a game inspired by The Godfather.
This PlayStation 4 overhaul is comparable in scope with the likes of Resident Evil 2’s extensive remake. Hangar 13 has built a new game engine to power the remade gangster epic, and it shows in the reflective rain-soaked streets, the period-perfect car models, and the incredibly accurate character detail. The Mafia remake also features an updated script, brand-new in-engine cutscenes, and additional gameplay sequences that never made it into the original game.
Though we’ve enjoyed many criminal capers over the years, few games have managed to capture the atmosphere of a particular moment
in time in the same way as Mafia (and its sequel). Rising through the ranks of the mafia in Prohibition America, Tommy gun in hand and Louis Armstrong on the wireless, always felt unique. This remake, with its beautiful rendering of an all-American city, a jigsaw of inspirations from New York to Chicago, looks set to double-down on the sense of existing in a time capsule the original evoked.
Crucial to this remake is the devs’ desire to replicate how we remember Mafia playing on old hardware, refined to play how we expect a game released on PS4 to. New, modern control, pacing, and AI refinements have been incorporated into the faithfully recreated gameplay. The original soundtrack and voice acting have been re-recorded, too. This is the original Mafia looking, playing, and sounding like a new game built for PS4.
DENT TO DETAILS
Mafia was renowned for its realism and attention to detail, with a physics model that was unique for the time that meant cars would dent, crumple, and break up in authentic ways. Heavier cars would tear apart lighter ones in a chase, for example.
With a new engine powering this remake we expect Hangar 13 to bring that level of detail up to date with a bang. The thought of peppering cars with a machine gun, their windows smashing and tyres bursting under fire, is tantilsing. We expect the ability to target fuel tanks to send a rival mob’s car up in smoke will feel unrivalled on PS4.
20-30 VISION
Mafia puts the details of its 1920s/1930s gangster world under the microscope and allows you to revel in the drama of being a mobster with a conscience. When you’re not putting hits on rival mobsters or taking part in bank heists and double-crosses, the allure of the game comes from the opportunity to simply walk the streets in this interwar era, to go on a date under moonlight or cruise the billboarded streets listening to classic jazz waft over the skyscrapers. Mafia is a mood.
We’ve already teased how new gameplay enhancements and extra content will be built into Hangar 13’s remake, and we fully expect motorbikes to feature in the game alongside those crunchable cars. We can’t wait to take to the game’s
CRUISE THE STREETS LISTENING TO CLASSIC JAZZ WAFTING OVER
THE SKYSCRAPERS.
streets and race track on two wheels as well as four.
THREE-UP
“Everything I’ve done, I’ve done for my family,” drawls Mafia’s protagonist Tommy in the teaser trailer, before the sequel’s Vito Scaletta suavely joins in with a similar sentiment: “For the last ten years all I’ve done is kill. I’ve killed for my family. I killed anybody that got in my way”. Mafia III’s Lincoln Clay joins his brothers in time and crime: “Family ain’t who you’re born into, it’s who you’d die for.”
The thematic links are clear, and ensure there’s a dramatic purpose to playing all three parts. While you’ll need to wait until August for Mafia: Definitive Edition, Mafia II and Mafia III are available now to download. Neither has undergone the extensive reworking Mafia has witnessed, but with Mafia II getting a 4K HD remaster and DLC, and Mafia III including all DLC, there are reasons to replay. Owning all three games gains you crossover bonuses – for example, owning Mafia III means you can unlock Lincoln Clay’s Army Jacket and Car in Mafia and Mafia II Definitive Editions. As an incentive, if you own Mafia III you can download the Definitive Edition now.
Order Mafia: Trilogy now, or check out mafiagame.com for more details.