Recent reviews by Wickedfaith

Facts:
Finished on hardest difficulty
Favorite mission: Election Campaign
Czech Dub
TLDR;
Forgettable experience. Style over substance.

As stated by many, the Mafia: Definitive edition looks pretty. It really does. And its a really good shooter. Even though I thought I knew the city very well from the original game, The artists made sure it does not look anything like it. Sure, the resemblance to certain places is there, like the bridges, the underpass, or the church in downtown. but the city has changed it's looks so much, that i was able to get lost in it. BUT, the game is pretty much style over substance.
The game experience is forgettable. Even while playing on hardest difficulty, I didn't really encounter a situation, where i would be forced to start over, which i quite liked. The race mission was probably one of the most restarted ones, because I didn't quite come to terms with handling of the car. On mission design - the missions are designed well, but the level layout felt too narrow - Going from A to B, there is no way you can get lost, even in final segments of missions like You Lucky Bastard, where, in original game, you had the whole port at your disposal, meaning, you could go anywhere in the port, and had great freedom on smaller playgrounds. In the remake, it felt more like going through locked out corridors. Why were the quests for Lucas cut? One of the aspects and rewards of Mafia was seeing your car collection grow as you progressed. Why was the inventory cut? The original made sense, but here, you are allowed to take one big weapon, and a sidearm, no reason for that other than probably dev laziness. Also, throughout the game I didn't feel like I progressed toward something, and that's because of the writing. Seriously.

[Potential spoiler]
The game dialog is very well dubbed, the actors really gave their best in this, and it shows. However, its the script that has issues. Big issues. From the beggining (the moment detective Norman walks through the door to the table in the restaurant) I thought that something just didn't click. The dialog had me in tears laughing, not by how funny or well done it is, it was because of cringe. If i was to take a look at that same scene from the original game, it's characters had very well explained motives, (Thomas Angelo, a mafia outlaw, who is determined to put the entire mafia behind bars for his safety, and the safety of his family, and the detective, who didn't care, and had his own stance to his situation, but at the end of the story, Tommy's testimony is solid, and thats why he helps him.) and it was all done through concise and short dialogs. You understood very easily what was going on.

In the remake however, the character acts cringey and out of context. (Seriously, why the ♥♥♥♥ did he say, that he doesn't even have a dollar for the coffee? I thought that this guy was a well paid mafia henchman, did he purchase a Geforce 3080 from eBay or something???) And Mr. Norman feels like he isn't even supposed to be a detective to me.
[/potential]
The original game had a message. A message that was conveyed very clearly. About lives not being dictated by Book of Laws, but people. People you love, people you hate. People that are your boss, or your subordinate. And in the end, it could be your best friend, or another gangster, who is a tool of your own demise. In the remake, the epilogue was a mess and nonsensical gibberish about family values. And its not just an epilogue that has this problem.
The biggest change from the original, and the bit i liked the most was in the character development. Be it Tom's relationship with Sarah, the chatter during driving segments in the missions among your fellow gangsters, or just gossip of the other pedestrians.
The original was lackluster in this, but it didnt seem like an issue. This was a nice icing on the cake.

The cops are dumb and feel like they are there for the neccessity of being there. Nuffsaid.

The music is pretty, but like the whole game, forgettable. There isn't a theme that would stand out. Original Mafia had a few music pieces that played throughout the cutscenes and gameplay, and districts had their own tunes, and i remember each and every one of them. All of those are replaced by the car radio, which also cover news from the city, and from the era. It can be turned off if you so desire.

When it comes to bugs i didn't come across anything that would break my game too much, though, in the occasion of loading a checkpoint due to me dying, i sometimes thought that the game loaded me further down the mission than i actually was. Happened to me twice, i think. And once i opened a door to a room, walked over the chair and died instantly due to an environment collision. Also i had this weird bug that would just freeze the game for a solid 30 seconds, but alt+tab out and back to the window resolved the issue, as i realized further into the game.

Conclusion:
I really want to like this game, i really do. I bought this product for nostalgia and out of pure curiosity. Where the original made an impact, this feels like an unfinished painting of Mona Lisa, or that same painting but just in black and white.
Whoever wrote the script clearly didn't understand the point that the original was trying to bring across. The final straw that broke the camels back is the fact that the devs didn't bother too much with side content.