Cliff Notes – Mafia: The Old Country PS5 review – keep your enemies closer
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Cinematic Experience: The game boasts impressive graphics and voice acting, but the story is clichéd and predictable, lacking originality even within the franchise.
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Gameplay Limitations: While the enemy AI shows promise, the overall gameplay is dull and unengaging, with minimal interactivity and uninspired mechanics.
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Narrative Depth: The exploration of moral dilemmas and character motivations is commendable, yet the linear storytelling and familiar tropes hinder player engagement and emotional connection.
Mafia: The Old Country PS5 review – keep your enemies closer
Mafia: The Old Country – you’ve heard it all before (2K)
The fourth Mafia game is a prequel to the whole series, set in Sicily at the turn of the 20th century, and featuring some amazing graphics and performances.
In a world where Dragon Age is now treated as a dead franchise and it’s 14 years since The Elder Scrolls got a mainline sequel, the Mafia franchise seems to have led a charmed life. Despite never excelling either critically or commercially it’s been going since 2002, with a steady stream of sequels, remasters, and remakes. Who’s asking for any of this we don’t know, to the point where the game itself almost feels like a front for the mafia, but the series is nothing if not consistent.
The Mafia games are often mistaken for GTA clones, but they only share a superficial similarity with Rockstar’s epics. Although they do have the semblance of an open world there’s nothing to really do in them and the story progression is entirely linear. Which isn’t a criticism, but it is one easy way for newcomers to the franchise to become disappointed – although there are plenty of others too.
These issues are clearly not unknown to developer Hangar 13, which incorporates some of original series creator Illusion Softworks. The Old Country sensibly does away with any pretence of an open world, but while its story does have some narrative weight it feels even less interactive than usual.
Mafia 3 had the most expensive attempt at an open world, but that only made it even more irritating to play through, which is a shame as its storytelling is excellent and would’ve got far more attention if it had been part of a better game. The Old Country seems to acknowledge this by decreasing the level of interactivity to such a low level it’s almost like the third person shooter equivalent of a visual novel.
The best thing The Old Country has going for it is the excellent graphics and unusual setting of 1900s Sicily. However, while Mafia 3’s story dealt with heady issues of racism and intolerance (it focused on the Black Mafia, rather than Italian Americans), The Old Country isn’t quite so daring.
To its credit, its examination of why good people are driven to do bad things is not superficial, as it shows how poverty, peer pressure, and toxic masculinity sends protagonist Enzo Favara into a spiral of criminality from which he never escapes. Literally, because while this is supposed to be interactive Entertainment his fate is predestined the moment you start the game.
Expert, exclusive gaming analysis
It takes the game precious little time to start ripping off paying homage to characters from The Godfather. It’s done with relatively subtlety – this isn’t GTA 3 era Rockstar Games – but if you’ve any interest in The Old Country’s there’s little chance you haven’t see the films and so the various pastiches stand out like a memberberry moment from Star Wars.
In any case, Enzo joins the mob, gains a father figure, and falls in love with the Don’s daughter. Oaths are taken, feuds are started, and crimes are committed. What makes The Old Country so strange though is that while the plot is by-the-number the writing and acting is very good, and well up to par with Mafia 3. It all takes a while to get going, and Enzo is so laconic it’s difficult to empathise with him at first, but the characters are three-dimensional and believable.
The problem is not so much that the story is cliché because it’s knock-off of famous mafia movies, but because it feels overly reminiscent of previous Mafia games, which had already farmed those same films for inspiration. What you’re left with is a copy of a copy and no matter how well acted it is, that’s a serious issue.
According to The Old Country all mafia dons sound exactly the same (2K)
An even bigger problem is that as a video game, and particularly as a third person shooter, The Old Country is completely uninteresting. The gunplay is a mild improvement on Mafia: Definitive Edition but it’s still completely unremarkable. The driving is worse, while the stealth sections, and instant fail situations, are the sort of thing that makes the beginning of Star Wars Outlaws seem like Metal Gear Solid.
The only gameplay element that’s above average is the enemy AI, which does a good job of trying to outflank you and is always on the offence. But that’s nowhere near enough to excuse how dull and frustrating the game is for most of the time. The knife fights that end so many of the sections are also fun at first, although the excuses for why the various people don’t just shoot you when they have the chance become ever more unlikely.
In terms of presentation, The Old Country is absolutely top notch, from the graphics to the voice-acting, but as both a game and a story it struggles to keep your attention. And that’s despite the fact that it’s only around 12 hours long. Although, and we have to hand it to Take-Two on this one, its price does reflect that.
Hangar 13 clearly enjoy what they do, and there must presumably be plenty of fans that do too. The game’s lack of interactivity is not necessarily a problem, but the fact that it sacrifices so much of what being a video games is in order to tell a story that’s been told many times before, including by the series itself, is just not a price worth paying.
Mafia: The Old Country review summary
In Short: The most cinematic entry in the series so far but no matter how good the visuals or acting are, the story is clichéd and predictable, and the gameplay feels like barely an afterthought.
Pros: The graphics are excellent, and the script and voice-acting are just as impressive. Surprisingly good enemy AI during combat.
Cons: The plot is predictable and formulaic even compared to other Mafia games, while the characters remain largely uninteresting for far too long. Banal gameplay and an almost completely uninteractive game world.
Score: 5/10
Formats: PlayStation 5 (reviewed), Xbox Series X/S, and PC
Price: £44.99
Publisher: 2K
Developer: Hangar 13
Release Date: 8th August 2025
Age Rating: 18
It’s a very pretty game (2K)
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