I have a moderately hot take. People obsess about endings too much, for just about everything.
Don’t get me wrong, a powerful ending hits like little else. Many of my favorite moments in a year come when a game absolutely nails an ending. But if a game takes me on an awesome journey, and then doesn’t stick the landing, yeah, it’s not ideal, but it isn’t going to ruin an experience for me. I never liked the ending to Lost, but it didn’t take away from how awesome that ride had been. The last two seasons of Game of Thrones sucked, but it doesn’t make the early seasons less fun. The original ending to Mass Effect 3 was disappointing, but it certainly didn’t diminish the many amazing characters and moments that I experienced leading up to that.
For many people, it seems like a bad ending will make them feel like the entire journey was a waste. For me, if I go on a road trip to a destination, and the entire road trip is a blast, but the actual destination ends up being a bust, I still won’t regret the journey I went on.
I sort of understand this mentality with a short book or a movie. Spending a few hours with something and then having a shitty ending is kind of annoying. But after dozens and dozens of hours with something, the journey ends up being more important than the destination in my view.
I share this take to say that I really disliked the ending to Mafia: The Old Country. I thought the last chapter of the game goes in some misguided directions that detract from a lot of the storytelling that took place before that.
This was, of course, disappointing to me. There were a few decisions at the very end of the game in particular that I found almost laughable. And yet, I still spent around 14 hours with this game. And for much of those 14 hours, I was on the edge of my seat and having a fantastic time. There are many moments from this game that will stick with me for a long time to come, and several performances that I thought were truly unforgettable. There are set pieces and cinematic moments that had my heart pounding and quiet moments in the beautiful Italian countryside that had me in awe.
For all my issues with the ending of The Old Country, and for some other various issues in the middle, I still had a great time playing this game, and I still think it’s worth it, even if the ending probably won’t hit with everyone.
If You Hate This Voice Acting… That Might Literally Be Anti Italian Discrimination
You play Mafia: The Old Country as Enzo Favara. Enzo was sold into slavery by his father and now works in sulfur mines in Italy. The game starts off with Enzo escaping the mines in thrilling fashion, which ends up leading him into living with the Torrisi crime family once he escapes.
I’m admittedly not big on mafia films in general, but things kind of play out how you would expect from there. The game chronicles Enzo’s rise through the Torrisi family and how the Torrisi family navigates mafia politics with a rival family.
The big selling point of The Old Country is that it wasn’t an open world game with a bunch of distractions and that it was a more focused and linear story. I think the game mostly lives up to that promise, but it has some issues (beyond the ending) as well.
More than anything, I think The Old Country is fantastic at building up to and delivering on big moments. The big plot points in the game, like when the families in the game confront each other or when Enzo has big moments within the Torrisi family, are all absolutely fantastic. While I wouldn’t call the writing top tier, it does the job well enough, especially when combined with a series of phenomenal performances.
Perhaps more than anything else in the game, the performances never disappoint here. Everyone is fantastic, and pretty much every major and even somewhat prominent supporting character has a big moment or two where they showcase their abilities. Riccardo Frascari, as Enzo, is excellent, which is important since he is in almost every scene. But the biggest star of the show for me was Johnny Santiago as Don Torrisi. Somehow, every line he delivers has an underlying intensity that is downright spooky. There is a scene relatively early in the game where Enzo steps in to represent the Torrisi family in a horse race. Santiago delivers a line where he asks Enzo if he understands that he can not be embarrassed in the race. This is spoken in a soft and gentle way, but with just enough menace to send shivers down my spine. Pretty much every scene he is in is like this. He absolutely nails the role and deserves consideration when awards season comes along.
The Torissi Family Definitely Has Higher Standards Than My Wife Did For Fully Committing To Someone
I think the performances are so good that they helped me stay engaged with the game, even in its slower moments. Unfortunately, I do think there are a few more plodding scenes than anticipated for a game that is much more focused than a lot of its genre competitors. Enzo’s build-up into becoming a full-fledged family member takes far too long in my view. It was incredibly obvious where things were going, and it was a bit ridiculous to me that he seemingly had to literally be Superman multiple times before it happens. The game also has a few sections that were clearly set up to be cool moments but are shoehorned into the game because the developers just seemed to want a scene like that to happen in the game. In the middle of the story, there is a giant car race. The game does a terrible job of really working it into the greater plot, and it becomes pretty irrelevant the second it ends. Once again, I think there are a lot of games where I wouldn’t have this type of criticism, but it is a bit disappointing when The Old Country is a short and focused story for a video game. I expected things to be a bit more brisk.
Despite that, even in the slower paced moments, even with a few sections that feel like filler, and even with an ending that made some other moments sour for me, the story still had me engaged throughout. As lazy as the race’s implementation into the story feels, it’s still a freaking awesome race with multiple very cool moments throughout. That’s the thing with The Old Country. If I step back and analyze everything at the end, I have quite a few critiques, but while you are on actual rollercoaster, it’s a serious thrill ride.
Thank God For All The Conveniently Located People-Sized Empty Boxes Around Here
In between story cutscenes, you will naturally spend plenty of time killing people in The Old Country. The game is split up into gunplay sections, stealth areas, setpieces, and “open world” sections.
At times, the game forces you into stealth or into action, but there are also areas where you can pick between one or the other.
I tried to do stealth as much as possible because the game can actually be a bit tricky on hard when in full-blown gun fights. The Old Country’s action segments play out like a pretty standard cover shooter. If you’ve played Uncharted, you probably know what to expect here. You get behind cover and pop out to shoot enemies. Sometimes, there’s a shooting gallery feel to the encounters, but enemies will occasionally press on your position as well.
I actually kind of enjoyed these action segments for the most part. Enemies can really light you up on hard difficulty. When you pop out of cover, it actually takes a second or two for the sights to line up properly so that you can really aim your shot. This makes it so you can’t be cheap and just quickly pop out of cover and start picking foes apart. In order to hit someone, you really have to commit to being exposed for a few seconds, which gets difficult when multiple enemies are shooting at you. This meant that I really had to try hard to find ways to flank enemies whenever possible. It was important to be aggressive and strategic, which I liked a lot. It gives each encounter a nice bit of intensity since I rarely was able to easily just cover up in one spot and take everyone out.
Occasionally, enemies ruin that intensity with some braindead AI. There are certain enemies that will leave their cover and slowly walk towards you, opening them up to much easier shots than the smarter foes that stay behind cover. I also wish the game was a bit more generous with things like grenades to mix things up occasionally and to break some stalemates. But overall, I still liked a lot of the firefights here.
I have slightly more complicated feelings about the stealth. On one hand, a lot of the areas where you can go stealth are really cinematic and cool. The game throws some really neat scenarios at you. You are usually infiltrating some very large areas with lots of enemies. That alone adds big-time tension to the air whenever you are sneaking around. However, the actual gameplay in these sections is pretty poor. Just like in action segments, enemies do a lot of dumb things. It was stunning how easy it was to just take out each enemy one by one without much effort, thanks to easy enemy placement and movement patterns. Worst of all, there are almost always convenient boxes to hide enemy bodies right by wherever that enemy tends to be stationed. It felt like they didn’t put their all into designing these sections, which is disappointing. But the stakes and the scope still made it exciting at times.
The set pieces meanwhile are consistently exciting. There are several fights that take place on horseback or in cars that are fast-paced, thrilling, and full of big moments. The game doesn’t bust these out all that often, so they feel special every time they happen, and I enjoyed them, even if they aren’t on the level of the Uncharted series or some other big 3rd person shooters.
Finally, there are also quiet times in between missions. Despite being a linear game, The Old Country has an open world that you can explore at certain sections of the game. However, there is absolutely nothing to do in this open world, so mostly, it’s just a big map that allows you to drive to your next mission, though you can also skip these drives at several points.
It’s a bit odd, but I kind of enjoyed this structure over the game just throwing me from one mission to the next. At the very least, it makes the world feel much more alive when you have to drive a couple of miles to each big mission. It makes everything feel real in a way that it wouldn’t otherwise. The drives with nothing to do also give you a chance to take in the gorgeous scenery in the game. While I certainly wouldn’t have been opposed to some side missions or side activities, the lack of anything to do also keeps the plot going, which is probably good considering I already had a few pacing problems with it. I ended up considering the barren open world a win, even if it feels a bit odd at times.
Sometimes A Video Game Tells Its Story Like A Movie. And Sometimes A Video Game Tells Its Story Like A Video Game. I Swear That Makes Sense
The scenery isn’t the only part of The Old Country’s visuals that is excellent. The character models, the lighting, and the general art direction are all fantastic. The music also snuck up on me with some really cinematic and heart-pounding bangers during some of the big moments in the game. There is no way that I would believe this game was $50 if I was watching someone play it and didn’t know the price. Between this and Expedition 33, I now realize that we are really living in a new world with Unreal Engine 5. Smaller teams and budgets can make some insanely good-looking games with it.
Those visuals are a big part of what makes this game so cinematic and are a small part of why I had a great time playing it. Much like Star Wars Outlaws last year, Mafia: The Old Country is a game that I can pick apart in a lot of different ways. But also, every time I booted it up, it felt like I took a little trip to my local movie theater to watch the latest big budget mafia movie. The performances, the visuals, the music, and the mostly strong story all blend together to create a game that feels like a movie, and there aren’t a lot of games that capture that feeling, even many of those with great stories. As much as I disliked the ending and a few things here and there, The Old Country is pure cinema, and I liked a good chunk of the ride that it took me on.
Score: 8.0/10
Big Nerd Gaming 
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