Mafia III has a gripping tale about racism in 1968, but bugs and weak gameplay hold it back

Lincoln Clay’s revenge story

Here’s a video of Clay’s fateful meeting with Marcano, who leads the mob in New Bordeaux. It leads to a betrayal, and that puts Clay on a path of vengeance against Marcano and his son Giorgi. The storytellers show the gravity of Clay’s decision to seek revenge against Marcano, as Clay is basically a good person who is willing to perform great evils and violence when backed up against the wall. He is a black man in a poor area of the South in the 1960s, when African-Americans didn’t have many options, said Harms.

Clay could simply go after Marcano and kill him. But in his version of revenge, he wants to kill all of Marcano’s underbosses, capos, and lieutenants, and dismantle the rackets that oppress the people of New Bordeaux. Donovan aids Clay, and the CIA agent brings a veneer of legitimacy to the anti-mob crusade. But it is Clay’s personal vendetta to murder his betrayers that drives him to take on the system that is corrupting all of society. And so, you begin a 30-plus hour journey to take out every single racket and mobster in the city.

Viewed through the faux documentary that serves as a narrative device in the game, Clay’s one-man crusade against the mob is a historic violent event that rocks the whole city for generations. Even the locations add some more backdrop to Clay’s rage. For instance, one firefight takes place in an abandoned theme park that has a racist funhouse ride (see video below) that is truly haunting. I also liked the riverboat casino that sinks in the bayou. Those locations — reflecting institutional racism and the excesses of the rich — told me more about why Clay did what he did in exacting revenge against the whole mob, rather than just one man.

Father Ballard warns Clay that his need for revenge is a “one-way road” to perdition, where victory will come at great risk to his humanity. In fact, this part of the game reminds me of the Tom Hanks movie, Road to Perdition.

Taking over the rackets

Above: A sit-down meeting in Mafia III. Clay has to choose who gets promoted.

Image Credit: 2K Games

Clay gets support from disaffected mobsters and even those he defeats. Each of these underbosses is a unique character: Vito Scaletta, the main character of Mafia II, who comes down from New York (played by Rick Pasqualone); Cassandra (Erica Tazel), an embittered Haitian immigrant who fled the evils of Francois “Papa Doc” Duvalier in Haiti; and Thomas Burke (Barry O’Rourke), an Irish gangster who turns to drinking after he loses his son.

As Clay takes out the mob bosses and captures their territory, he uses his underbosses to hold the turf. He must make good decisions about who will run each territory. Over time, the underbosses offer rewards, such as better health, improved weapons, and perks that include holding back the police from investigations or the ability to bring deadly hit squads into battle with Clay. Donovan notes that the tactics Clay uses against the mob were exactly like the ones he employed in Vietnam with the Phoenix Program, where high-level enemies were methodically assassinated one at a time.

The perks heavily influenced my underboss choices. I kept everything balanced, but I could tell that if I favored one boss too much, the other underbosses would rebel, betray me, and try to take me out. The “sit-down” meetings that happened toward the end were increasingly tense as Clay tried to walk the line in satisfying all three underbosses.

It could be a great movie

The cinematic cutscenes do an outstanding job of portraying the characters of Clay (voiced by Alex Hernandez), mob boss Marcano (Jay Acovone), and Father Ballard (Gordon Greene). The facial animation in those scenes is first rate, and the lines are very well written. If you cut out the bad gameplay problems, the game could feel like a 30-hour-long movie. Here’s an example of a cinematic scene and a car chase.

Great time-saving shortcuts

Above: This quick-access wheel saves a lot of time in Mafia III.

Image Credit: 2K

The open world could be vast and boring. But it had some nice touches. Once I built up enough experience in the game, I could access shortcuts by holding down the left bumper. The action brought up a wheel of commands. I could call a consigliere who took my excess cash to the bank. This was important, as you lose a chunk of cash every time you die. I could also get someone to bring me a new car when I needed one. I could ask for an ammo resupply at a moment’s notice. I could request a hit squad or pull some strings with the police to get them to call off a chase. Of course, some of these are quite costly, so you have to use money every time that you invoke them.

These were huge time savers that every open world should have. The map was also quite useful, with many different colors to indicate different kinds of targets and optional storylines.

On the screen, little directional signs told me where to turn next or how many feet away my destination was. That was explained away as Clay’s mental map of the city of New Bordeaux. But it sure was a big help in navigation, as the minimap wasn’t enough when I was traveling at high speed.

Open combat leads to many different outcomes

Above: Action from Mafia III.

Image Credit: 2K Games

Many of the missions are similar, requiring Clay to take out a well-protected target. But the outcomes are very different. You can approach the target with stealth, whistling to attract a guard. You can take out an entire group of enemies simply by drawing them around a corner and stabbing them. Eventually, though, it turns into a firefight. And those fights can go your way or the enemy’s way, depending on how good your tactical position is when all hell breaks loose. It’s always a calculated risk, and you can plot a different route if you need to fight again.

You also run into circumstances that change your mission in an instant. I was so bored with driving all the time that I just sped everywhere. And since you have no peripheral vision when you make a turn, the odds were great that I would skid into a wall, hit another car in a head-on crash, or run over a pedestrian. This was a problem I created for myself by driving too fast, but shortening the time it took to get from one place to another made the game’s length more tolerable. Luckily, the pedestrians and other cars were smart enough to avoid me most of the time.

In any case, I kept hitting police cars or running over people as the police watched. That caused the cops to converge on my car and hunt me down. I had to speed away as fast as possible until I escaped the search radius. Sometimes, I passed criminals in cars who were hunting me down. These risks added variety to the missions. In general, I felt the car combat was really difficult to master, but I managed much better on the ground.

The combat (on normal level) has enough variety to make it challenging. It’s just too bad that when you fail and get killed in combat, the load times can be very long.