I am a bit of a gamer and I have been looking forward to this latest release in the Mafia series of video games. Mafia: The Old Country (TOC) follows on from the 2016 release of Mafia III, and the remastered versions of Mafia & Mafia II.

Unlike Mafia III which saw the series try an open-world approach to the game, TOC sees a return to the linear nature of the game, with it being story driven and a much more tighter experience. We are spoiled by open-world games and to many this is a letdown but I find it is a great approach to this series with a more story based and cinematic experience. There is still plenty do in game during missions, and collectables to collect.

The graphics and ambience of the game are simply stunning, it is beautiful game visually and it feels alive during the missions and it is a game I would return to. Outside of missions there is a sort of free exploration in the Carcyclopedia mode. There you can wander and there is some things to do but not much. This is something perhaps that will be fleshed out in the future or maybe some DLC to expand the game.

As enjoyable as the game is, it is about 15 hours long, you simply want more! More things to do outside of the missions. There are lots of things they could add like races, both horses and vehicles, gambling, knife fights (great fun), debt collection or protection.

The story was very well done and I don’t feel any of it was wasted, the problem was it could have given more. It really was a cinematic experience and lots of call backs to the typical Mafia tropes and it felt like The Godfather when Michael was in Sicily. The game features call backs to the other Mafia games like San Celeste from Vito’s army missions in Mafia II, Samuele Trapani being the Sam from Mafia, and a key thread binding all four games together Leone “Leo” Galante, as well as several other characters who feature in the previous games. The game was full of great characters especially Luca, and Tino, Enzo was very well rounded too albeit naive.

This game is clearly a sequel and plays like one, it is interesting to see where the series goes from here. It is very exciting too and I hope there isn’t a long wait for maybe Mafia IV, something set in Las Vegas charting the rise of the mob and Casinos would be a lot of fun.

All in all a wonderful game and one of my favourite’s through the series and welcome return to the linear story driven game, over the open-world of Mafia III. If there was more to do it would be a perfect 10. The game is 9/10 for me