Mafia Comments by Gestalt

Oo-er.

I Like the 'Goodfellas' paragraph titles.

If only this game had been as good as that film ...

Apparently Illusion's idea of losing a tail is to massacre everyone in the car and the bar across the road, and then drive off at 40 mph

lol.

ps. Great review by the way. One of the more entertaining pieces of work that I have read in a while (except my life history ....)

Vice City. I don't think I'm looking forward to a game so much, with the possible exception of GTA4 ;)

Oh and erm Mario Sunshine, of course.

The game I'm looking forward to most is Battlefield: 1942.

It has quite simpy changed the face of multiplayer gaming.

Mafia strikes me as being that strange sort of game that you love, but hate at the same time.

Super Stu - Vice City is GTA 4

No it isn't. GTA4 is in development for (hopeful) release next year. GTA:VC is just an enhancement of the GTA3 engine, whereas GTA4 is another 'start from scratch' project.

I should be receiving a copy at some point today...oh well.

One question, are these problems patchable, ergo will they end up sorting out these problems, or are they so serious that they can never be rectified.

On that note i have often wondered why review sites don't do a pre-patch/post-patch section where they say how much the game has been improved by patches/mods

Nice review that's restored my faith in EG somewhat since the recent big ads & post censorship that has been going on lately.

I am not going to ask how you have been playing it for so long when it only got released today ;)

We can only hope H&D 2 will be a return to form.

What form though? I enjoyed H&D but if anything Mafia is very close to that since H&D was a very finikity and annoying game, yes i enjoyed it but it was at times very poorly implemented.

odd it only got 4 out of 10. everywhere else i read gave it pretty high scores and some people i've spoken to say it's one of the best games they've ever played..

The final score is irrelevant. I did not even look at it. The review alone is enough to make me never go anywhere near this particular piece of software.

"everywhere else i read gave it pretty high scores and some people i've spoken to say it's one of the best games they've ever played"

I think it's one of those games that you either love or hate. There is a great game under there somewhere, but it's buried under so many stupid little design flaws that it's hard to find, and the whole thing just frustrated me after a few hours. Kinda like Hidden & Dangerous really - great idea, flawed implementation.

As I said earlier in the thread -

Mafia strikes me as being that strange sort of game that you love, but hate at the same time

Namridus... if they told us it was fab and having gone and bought it I found it to be utter shite, the review would have been pretty pointless, wouldn't it?

No, we couldn't write better ourselves, but then I don't get paid to.

I assume you criticise your government at some point - presumably you could do a better job? Exactly.

Gestalt reviews game after playing it for 10 minutes shocker!

Nam. tch.

Really, honestly, it's only one score. If you wanna feel better, nose around on gamerankings and find a better score to justify the purchase.

Gestalt reviews game after playing it for 10 minutes shocker!

I doubt very much whether this is the case. More like, 'Gestalt reviews game after playing it for a week'.

seriosuly..
"a few lucky shots is enough to take you down, and a close-up encounter with a pump-action shotgun will kill you instantly"

Thats just crap. In any game that involves shooting that is the case. Shotguns up close are powerful, in Quake3, CS anything.

good one namridus..

http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/4807.asp

But gestalt is right and the rest of the gaming world is wrong you know!!!!!

One of Gestalts finest, once again proving that he's utterly unsuited for this job as a games reviewer.

Some news: Mafia isn't gta3 mission pack 1930's, it's a completely different game. It's not even a gta style game, it's not supposed to be. It's a shooter set in a large city, with driving elements. The emphasis is on the shooting and the action, not the 'living breathing' city stuff that comes with gta3.

I've just about completed it, and really enjoyed it. Once I'd got the 'this isn't gta3' thing out of my head, I've enjoyed it immesnely. It's a lot like hitman, mission based shooty action with a bit of brains.

Oh, there are many ways to complete the missions by the way, and if you found levels like the car park fustratingly hard, its because you didn't find the alternative ways to do things.

Give it up Gestalt. Please. Just flipping spare us and the poor games companies your jaded view on all things gaming. You're ruining what's now becoming one of the last great free websites alive.

"Mafia is stuck with lumbering clunkers that hobble along at a snail's pace and accelerate from nought to sixty in a time that is measured in minutes rather than seconds" - only the first few cars are this poor, you didn't get very far, right?

"Handling is awful, not because Illusion have done a bad job, but because the cars of that age really weren't that much fun to drive. And don't even think of driving up a steep hill - you could get out and walk faster. " - same, you get better cars as you go along, a nice incentive to progress for those of us who can be arsed to actually play and enjoy games.

""I think I'm missing something", "I've still got a job to do" until you get fed up and go back inside. As it turns out, the only way to complete this mission is to kill everyone in the garage and then drive out in a particular truck. " - Er, that'll be the truck full of boose that's the bloody mission objective.

"It doesn't help that combat is downright lethal; a few lucky shots is enough to take you down, and a close-up encounter with a pump-action shotgun will kill you instantly"

Which is how it should be. Stay distant from shotguns, and they will hardly touch you. It's all about the strategy of the fights.

"Even if you manage to keep Tommy in one piece, the chances are that one of the two AI sidekicks you have with you in the garage mission will get killed, resulting in a "game over" screen" - You don't need to keep tommy alive, just the other two.

"the only first aid station in the entire level is where? Right next to the exit, the one place where you couldn't possibly need it" - no, there's another first aid kit in the next level down from where you start, in the wire cage. Pay attention.

"To add insult to injury, the behaviour of a few of your enemies is prescripted, causing them to run to exactly the same spot every time you play the level." - well, no it isn't. In fact, the best way to complete this level is to move cars on to the ramps, before you meet tommy so the bad guys don't swarm you, works a treat. Lots of ways to do things you see, a point you've utterly missed because you're too god damn idle to play stuff.

I'm not going to go on. You're way wide of the mark with this through your own lazyness and jaded cynicism. Get a life.

oooooooo - that was harsh !

Eh, eh, Caaaaaalm down! :-)

Namridus:
And yes, I consider I can do it better myself

Bollocks. There's a lot more to running a country than deciding whether or not to bomb Iraq.

What realism, what brilliant AI! Just move the cars to block them from climbing the ramps, that's what a real gangster would do! Perfect solution to a perfect game.

And no, I don't think that blocking the AI with cars is a realistic, interesting solution.

Interesting review. Shame about the opinions (or should that be direct orders to change the score before they kill you threats) of some of the people leaving comments.

@Slim, one thing i will say in support of EG is, at least they are honest to their own opinions. They also quite often rate a game on the "fun" factor. I haven't played Mafia yet so I can't say whether Gestalt is right or wrong, what i will say is they are usually on the mark in my experience.

Mr Sleep

Let's face it, if all games don't get 10, people get pissy and acuse you of crap reviewing/fanboysim.

God forbid people should be able to have an opinion.

Slim - first of all, I haven't played that game so I can't really comment on what you or Gestalt are saying, but it strikes me that if someone like Gestalt who plays and writes about games for a living found this frustrating to play, then there's a fair chance many potential punters would too.

And it's not fair to say that things get better as you get through the game, because that's just admitting that the early parts of it are poorly put together. GTA3 adds loads of stuff as you play through it, but the entertainment is there right from the beginning.

Plus at the end of the day, it's just a review, an opinion. If you don't agree with it, just ignore it or offer your opinion in a reasoned way. There's no need to attack the reviewer! :-)

re: the cars on the ramp, it's not the only way to complete the level. It's one of my faves, so I've done it a few times, and you can just go down guns a blazing if you want. It's just a bit easier if you block their advance with cars. They will blow those cars up too, the AI isn't too bad.

MrSleep: I also like eurogamer a lot, and will take their opinions seriously in the main. Apart from gestalt. He seems to dislike all games, especially the hyped ones. I'm not sure if he does it for effect, or that he's really just a miserable idiot who's sick of games. Really annoys me when a gem like this comes along, and it gets a poor review from him once again. I can't imagine what the developers must feel.

I wouldn't mind if he'd given it a fair shot, but as my other post says, he's missed out on some really obvious stuff.

Edit: this contravenes our comments system policy. I've deleted the second instance of it too. Whether or not you agree with another person's opinion, we're not going to be the catalyst for childish bullying tactics. Wrong playground, sorry. -Tom

heh, well talk about hypocritical finishing your post off with an insult. I happen to love games, and think its important. Sorry if you don't, move along.

Killerbee: Sure its an opinion, but it happens over and over again with gestalt. They put a comments system in here, so I'm going to use it. I presume its permitted to post negative comments in with all this kiss assing eurogamer fanboysim that most people fire out?

@Stu, i agree with you that generally (as seen previously on EG) that there is always somone arguing against the score. I recall a discussion about outlawing it all together...which i think is a good idea. I read Mojo and they don't bother with review scores, which in my opinion is a great idea :)

@Slim, I usually agree with Gestalt's opinion, but not always, I don't think you are wrong to bring up alternate points to Gestalt, just merely it's a case of pointing these things out rather than insulting him along the way.

I don't think I insulted him personally, unlike pancake, I really do believe he's got a cynical and jaded view on games that comes through in his reviews, which is what I pointed out. I've said for years that gestalt simply doesn't like games that much, his writing often comes over as extremly unenthusiastic and he regularly marks good games down.

Oh, I agree about scores too, they're a daft idea.

Is Gestalt going to attempt to answer some of these unfounded attacks ?

Unfounded? I posted examples!

"I'm not going to go on. You're way wide of the mark with this through your own lazyness and jaded cynicism. Get a life." - Hmm.

Anyway its friday afternoon and Im just having some fun. Ive got the game waiting for me at home, hope its not as bad as Gestalt reckons.

Its worse.

@Errol, really? What is your problems with it?

Comments that were about his gaming reveiwing, not anything personal.

It's a good game, honest. Try it for yourself and let me know. It's a slow starter, thats true. The early cars are indeed very slow. Doesn't take long to pick up though, and becomes lots of fun. Don't expect GTA3 and you should enjoy it. It's very hard though, which I like, far too many easy games these days with daft save anywhere systems.

Because it was released first. You'll notice The Getaway is being compared to GTA3, and that's been in development since Julius Caeser was in power.

It's still a daft comparrision, mafia isn't really like gta3 at all, apart from in free-ride mode. And that's kind of a bonus game thing.

GTA 1&2 also featured the "living world" feel, so technically they all copy those innovations.

"only the first few cars are this poor"

They do get better over time (naturally), but even the later cars aren't that great, IMO anyway. It's not Illusion's fault, it's just that the time period they've chosen doesn't really fit the driving around being chased by the police style of gameplay, because your cars move fairly slowly, take forever to accelerate up to their top speed and spin at the slightest provocation.

The problem is that the way the game is designed has you driving from A to B and back for no obvious good reason in almost every mission, which just highlights any shortcomings in the cars, AI and graphics.


"You don't need to keep tommy alive, just the other two"

Er .. Tommy is your character. You did play the game, right? ;)


"the best way to complete this level is to move cars on to the ramps, before you meet tommy so the bad guys don't swarm you"

Isn't that kinda cheating?

"They do get better over time (naturally), but even the later cars aren't that great, IMO anyway. It's not Illusion's fault, it's just that the time period they've chosen doesn't really fit the driving around being chased by the police style of gameplay, because your cars move fairly slowly, take forever to accelerate up to their top speed and spin at the slightest provocation. "

So what, you want a 30's mafia game to have people zooming round in modern day sportscars? It's supposed to take the feel of the period. The slower speed has its benefits too, the driving is more tactical, with blocking taking a part, and you can shoot out of the car. Did you finish the game by the way? And did you do the subquests to get the better cars?

"The problem is that the way the game is designed has you driving from A to B and back for no obvious good reason in almost every mission, which just highlights any shortcomings in the cars, AI and graphics. "

For no obvious reason? The driving is part of the game, you drove to where the mission takes place through this huge city. While you're driving, you have the oppurtunity to do some things that you clearly missed out on.

"Er .. Tommy is your character. You did play the game, right? ;) "

Oops, thought you meant the booze guy.

"Isn't that kinda cheating?"

No, it's an alternative method. Something you panned the game for not having. They drive their cars accross the ramps to stop you getting out, isnt it good that the game lets you do the same to them?

Details that don't get away from the fact that this is a good and significant game. You do damage by slagging games like this without justification on a popular web site, it's just like max payne all over again. You read the hype, and the reality doesn't match it, so you slag it. You should review the game on its merits alone.

Im sure Gestalt has read these comments and rather than join in with the ranting he opted to leave the COMMENTS page as it is.

slim ur entitled to ur view and its good to get another perspective to a game. but u could have aired your views without personal attacks on what u consider to be sloppy journalism. once again we need to point out that REVIEWS are opinions. Gestalt gave his, u gave yours. But due to Gestalt being an actual REVIEWER and writing a decent page or 2 about a game, rather than a rant ((this games SUCKS - this game RAWKS!!)) I think more ppl will probably listen to him, or at least take on board his comments and try before they buy.

sheesh...

Keep up the good work EG.

xboxrox: well put, its a great game on its own merits, 8/10 is about right for me because of the fustrations with your companions ai mostly.

"You don't need to keep tommy alive, just the other two"

Er .. Tommy is your character. You did play the game, right? ;)

lol.

Edited 2 times, most recently on 06/09/02 @ 15:28