A bit of a shame that there’s no accompanying game announcements. The demo was nice but it still feels like next-gen hasn’t really justified itself visually. I’m not sure it really can at this stage. At least they’re making the tools more available for creators generally but there was a weirdly dystopian, corporate social media section in the interview.
They have their following. The big thing with the first one was that it was a like a more simulation-y GTA which the second kind of leaned into and the third not so much. Mainly it’s the setting and the characters that everyone loves. If those don’t do it for you then it might not be your thing.
They all have period accurate vehicle physics/handling.
Also in 2 and 3 one of the collectible items are Playboy magazines, so, yeah that’s a thing too.
In Mafia 3 your main guy you take missions from is a CIA agent and one of the collectibles are communist propaganda posters you’ve ripped down in the open world.
There’s neat little things in the mafia games, like having to get a job moving crates in a warehouse before you become a mafia man, going to prison for a while, etc, but they’re not good. I’ll never forget though the Montage in the 2nd game that’s a bunch of We Made It Boys, Living the Life Now scenes set to mafia movie music then it cuts to you all walking in the park, sun shining, broad daylight and wait, what’s that going on in the distance? Oh your buddy you were going to meet up with getting hacked to death by a bunch of guys with machetes. The game also depicts white flight to the suburbs