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GDC 10: Mafia II Hands On


Crime pays.



March 9, 2010 -
Between Mafia II and
Civilization V, 2K has quite a showing at this year's GDC. We covered
Civ V in a comprehensive advance preview on Monday, so when we hit the
2K appointment on Tuesday, we headed right to the Mafia II demo. Senior
producer Denby Grace walked us through a thrilling montage that set up
the basic story of the game before turning us loose on the city of
Empire Bay for some in-depth hands-on time with the Xbox 360 version of
the game.




Denby's montage, entitled Home Sweet Home, begins in February of 1945
and sets the stage for the game and reveals the heavy cinematic
influences behind the game. A train slowly pulls to a stop in a station
and the camera cuts to a soldier stepping off, suitcase in hand. Vito's
come home temporarily while he recovers from a bullet wound he received
in the War. The winter backdrop gives the whole scene a muted look, but
there's still lots of activity in the station as travelers scurry back
and forth bundled against the cold. Unexpectedly, Vito's buddy Joe is
waiting there to meet him and offers Vito a ride home. As they walk out
of the station, a pair of police officers looks on with suspicion.




Before dropping him off at home, Joe takes Vito out for a drink. While
catching up, Joe learns that Vito will have to return to duty once his
wound heals. Bothered that his friend would have to go back to fight the
Germans, Joe excuses himself to make a phone call. As he leaves, Vito
catches the eye of a woman at the bar. The jukebox plays "Hey, Big
Spender" as the two flirt with each other across the bar. Soon Joe
returns with news that he's fixed it so Vito doesn't ever have to go
back into the service.






Vito quickly gets in
over his head.

Vito soon heads out
into the winter and makes his way home on foot. As B17s fly by overhead
and the sounds of "Let It Snow" play softly in the background, Vito
dodges the bustling winter traffic and starts to wonder just what kind
of business Joe is in.




Once at home, Vito is reunited with his mother and his sister Francesca.
After a satisfying home-cooked meal, Frankie pulls Vito aside and tells
him that, shortly after he signed up for the service, their father
borrowed some money from a loan shark. The debt hasn't been paid yet and
it's still growing, so she implores Vito to pay it back. With no other
options, Vito places a call to his friend Joe to see if he's got any
work.




It's clear that the game's designers are not only trying to capture the
cinematic feel of popular crime movies, but also create a hero that
begins with a respectable motivation who finds himself drawn into
situations that get out of hand. Vito is definitely a criminal in the
game, but he's not dishonest or dangerous merely to justify the
gameplay.






These men hate signs!

After
getting a sense of who Vito is and how he was drawn to the life of
crime, we settled in for some extended hands on time that touched on
almost every aspect of the game design. The demo itself cheated a bit to
give us access to more cars, more weapons and less perceptive police,
but the overall pace and feel of the demo represents what players will
experience when the game is released later this year.




It starts with Vito waking up in Joe's apartment in 1951. Joe's left a
note on the kitchen table asking Joe to meet him to help out with a job.
We spent a few moments wandering around the house, turning the faucets
on and off before finally heading to the wardrobe to pick out which
outfit to wear. A quick check of ourselves in the mirror and we're ready
to head out the door and down the stairs to explore Empire Bay.




Players can opt to steal cars right on the street, but just for the sake
of getting our demo started, the designers stocked Vito's garage with
three brand new cars -- two of them are big monsters that steer like
boats, so I naturally chose the sporty black convertible. A red line on
the mini-map outlines the path to take to reach the current objective,
so you don't have to keep referring to the large city map in order to
tell where to go. While you're driving, you can use the D-pad to switch
around to different radio stations, hopping from Little Richard to
Screaming Jay Hawkins to paisano-style Italian crooners.