Alright. I have to say something. Will someone please wake up Germaine Greer? She'll want to write some liberal flag waving anti-videogame essay on The Godfather 2. Seriously though, I've never committed so much random violence against so many women in a game before. I never thought I'd even write that sentence. But I have now.
Every side-quest in this game seems to revolve around punishing a women for sleeping around or casually backstabbing a fellow 'sister' for not treating her man right.
Does it make it right that you can slap a girl about the chops and throw her through a glass display case to James Brown's It's A Man's Man's Man's World?
Swim with the fishes One thing is certain; EA is trying hard to bring the world of gangsters, crime rings and criminality, in all its violent forms, to The Godfather 2. Battering a woman (and the occasional man) will result in favours that can then be called in - usually to find the weak spot of a rival Family's Made Man. Killing him using this knowledge, for example burning a Made Man to death rather than shooting him, will permanently send him to the fishes; get it wrong and he'll simply be out of action for a number of game days.
Why the need to extort favours? Why kill, rather than injure a Made Man? What's the deal with 'game days'? This was supposed to be a GTA rip-off, right? Well, though The Godfather 2 has the veneer of a GTA clone, and it does feature the same free-roaming cities, third-person gunplay and exploration of a GTA title, there's a simple, yet effective, strategy game buried beneath the GTA pretensions that constantly forces your hand.
The aim is to feel like a Don. The Godfather 2 is not about being a thug for hire who wants to sort out his reckless cousin or brother. This isn't GTA. You're here to build a criminal empire, to start on the streets and take over a city building-by-building; business by business... often by slapping a girl around the face.
The story is inspired by The Godfather 2 film, but not based on it, so there are many key events missing, such as Vito Corleone's flashbacks to life in Sicily (though these will likely be available as online maps, along with Las Vegas).
In this sense, and like the first Godfather game, you don't play a character from the films but a new guy, Dominic, a Capo for Aldo, the hero of the first game, who dies in the prologue and leaves his Family in your hands to rebuild.
Though you can play the game in the usual on-the-streets GTA view, there's a 3D map interface EA is handily calling the Don's Eye View. From here you can get an overview of each city's whole map, see what businesses you own, what you don't, how many men you have guarding a building, or conversely, the weaknesses of your rivals.
You can also access deeper options that enable you to spend money earned from your businesses on developing other characters in your Family. Spending money on specialist skills, Black Hand attacks or basic health increases will ensure that a character is more important and is able to turn a fight your way, if needed. Either taking these guys on a job in your three-man crew or placing them on vital businesses to defend from a takeover could quickly turn the game to your advantage. You never know when they'll come in handy.
It's these deeper options that help The Godfather 2 play differently to the likes of GTA and Saints Row 2. Success here isn't just about playing out the scripted story missions, but tinkering with your Family, building crime syndicates and forging or dismantling alliances with other Families.
Recruiting your crew The Family structure offers a number of ways to play the game. You can hire a maximum of seven characters. These characters are found around each city and need to be recruited. Some will be hanging around your businesses while more interesting characters will be hidden away somewhere in the city.
They all have backstories, but more importantly, specialist skills. You'll have a Safecracker, Bruiser, Medic, Engineer and Arsonist to take out on jobs - and all will affect how effectively you attempt a takeover.
For example, an engineer can cut off the phone lines to a building, so when you attempt a takeover, your opponent can't call out for support. A Safecracker can unlock safes, but also doors, ensuring that you can often sneak into a warehouse or shop unawares. The likes of Bruisers and Medics are more self explanatory, though Bruisers do have the added perk of being able to break down some locked doors.
On the ground these different categories of gangster ensure that each mission can be played out in different ways, adding a unique tactical edge to what could have been simple third-person shootouts. Take the wrong crew on a job and you'll make life hard for yourself. You can order them to break doors, hack safes or set fire to things, but the command list is restricted to 'Go there, do that'. The AI is solid, and to an extent can win a takeover for you.
Once you develop key mobsters you can command them from the Don's Eye View to attempt takeovers without you, although this kind of multitasking is only really needed when playing against human opponents online, who will likely act more aggressively than the AI.
Take a tour of the city Though there's a lot to experiment with, the game's structure does wear thin. You will essentially tour a city map, highlighting rival gangs' businesses; roll up with your crew and take them over with not too much trouble. The Florida and New York maps can be dominated in a day or so, while the Cuban map is more gun-heavy, playing more like Mercenaries than the tactical map conquering of the rest of the game.
Once you've taken over a Family's businesses, you can have a crack at their base of operations - the mansion where the Family head resides. Things get trickier here, as there'll be more powerful guards - Under Bosses or Made Men - hiding out. Handily, you can make hits on these characters individually at their hideouts, found by performing the lady slapping antics mentioned earlier.
The basic formula is sound, and as you progress, more Families join the map to ensure you'll need to think who you attack and when. But you'll repeat the same acts over and over; invade a business and take it over, slap a lady for a Made Man's address and weakness, assassinate him, before heading to the Family mansion for the final payoff.
Few real surprises The Godfather 2's big problem is that outside of this template, there are few surprises. There's no need to explore the cities unless you want to earn extra cash or Made Man locations. The maps are quite small and there's no playfulness within The Godfather 2's cities.
While other free-roamers, such as Saints Row 2 and to an extent GTAIV, layer on bonus missions, extra story strands and hidden mini-games, The Godfather 2 is a straight-down-the-line formulaic empire builder. You can fiddle with stats and tactics within its rules, but you never step outside of them to have fun on a broader scale - which is a shame.
The film's plot is barely recognisable. Key scenes play out at certain moments, but it doesn't fit together with the new story of my Made Man's rise to Don quite as well as it did in the original The Godfather game.
The new story written for the game does at least develop the themes of the film, praying on familiar period paranoia to offer missions that saw my Don in waiting smashing up a union - "We don't want none of that Commie shit over here!" - to setting up camp in Cuba and attempting to assassinate Castro for the CIA. It's a good play on the period, especially as the music includes James Brown and what appears to be the moody beige backing track to every Colombo episode ever made.
Visually, The Godfather 2 can't compete with GTAIV and lacks the imagination of Saints Row 2. While the core gameplay works, The Godfather 2 is a very straight game.
The third-person shootouts are fine, but they lack thrills and the empire building works without ever offering any deeper freedom to manage your crime rings, while the free-roaming cities lack any of the fun and playfulness I had expected - unless you enjoy gawping at rendered tits.
The bottom line is that its disparate parts don't combine to make a better whole. Germaine Greer can rest easy.
I totally agree with this review. In Finland the game was released yesterday and I played it for some hours. Lots of violence and fun but gets boring quite fast, so basically I think that it is best to play just like a hour or two at the time.. Nice game but nothing special in it.
Quite a shame it doesn't have the staying power of other open-world games. I really enjoyed the first game on the Wii and I was hoping that this one would really shake up the genre with the new strategy elements, but it doesn't look like it's bringing all that much new, refreshing content.
Hopefully Mafia 2 will give me the old-style Mafia fix I'm looking for, then.
Godfather is amazin and you can create your charater whereas in GTA you play an imagrant i mean whats that about, nd you cant even change Nikos clothes and in Godfather you can change his clothes as well as face and body. and GTA was not as good as the hype it was good for bout 3 days nd dats it.
Fair enough you couldn't give him haircuts etc like you could in previous versions, but you can change his clothes, you have to very close to the beginning of the game. And 'you play an imagrant i mean whats that about'(sic)?. What's THAT about?
I love GTAIV - apart from L4D and Mario Kart, it's taken up huge amounts of my online time, in addition to single player. I've had trouble getting into L&D though, I just don't give two shits about Johnny.
The thing that kept GTA4 going is the feeling that the city is actually alive. The console versions maybe don't have enough traffic, but there's always something happening on the streets, from random traffic accidents to police chases and the like. It's just good to drive around in, obeying the speed limit and traffic lights.
I know you can't have everything, but maybe I just expected too much. I wanted a GTA4-feel city with a decent level of strategy supported by good AI minions and a kick-ass tale of street urchin come good. I think I did expect too much :)
I was considering getting this as it sounded interesting but I had my doubts. Now I know it doesnt have any minigames or stuff for the P.C to do I dont think I'll bother.
I think developers are trying to dumb down the GTA type games and removing things in order for realism. Bring back the fun.
I returned Red Alert & exchanged it for the just arrived GF2. & boi am I glad I did. Red Alert is the electronic console version of playing chess with a checkers set. I didn't even essaye R.A.'s online feature. GF2 shipped in this morning here in eNZed, & I've been playing it for 15odd hours since. & got carried away so much, that I only JUST got 'round to online play. It's much better than the former GF game but the new online feature has a zany quality all it's own. This is the ONLY good product by EA since Return of the King! My players russet afro & the jiving jazz soundtrack gave the deathmatch I played a swinging a unique atmosphere that hearkens back to JFK, possible moon non-landings, and cars with fins. Like the ps2 Scarface game, managing your menus is like running a business. I'm keeping this title!!!
Only in AD&D fantasy do we get RPG's where you can be the good guy, but in 'realworld gaming' like this game and the GTA series, you are always a criminal, a murderer, etc.
How about an RPG where you're a 19th century U.S. State Marshall?
Or one where you play a French Resistance leader in WWII?
Or a dog trying to get from New York to L.A.?
Or a Space Ranger going from one planet to the next dealing with murders, mystery's and alien bad guys?
I want games with the characterization and story of a GTA IV or Mass Effect with the open world of an Oblivion or GTA San Andreas and as deep as a Planescape Torment, or at least Baldur's Gate II - but I want to play the good guy and I want lot's of stats to play around with - and I want it 'realworld' not AD&D fantasy!
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