Mafia II

Gameplay:

The game is set in the 1940-50s era of Empire Bay, a fictional city based on New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston and Detroit.There are 30-40 vehicles in the game (45 with DLC) as well as licensed music from the era.

Many firearms from the previous return, such as the Thompson submachine gun and Colt 1911, as well as a pump-action shotgun (though it was changed from a Winchester Model 12 to a Remington 870). New WWII-era weapons like the MP 40, the M3 submachine gun, the MG 42 and the Beretta Model 38 also appear in the game.

Interacting with objects in the environment involves two action buttons- a standard action and a "violent" action (for example, when stealing a car, the player may choose to either pick its lock or break the window glass), used in context-sensitive situations. A map is included as in the original Mafia game. The checkpoint system has been completely overhauled. New controls include a cover system that allows the player to hide behind objects (such as generators, walls and large crates) to shoot enemies, rather than just using a crouch while behind an object.

It has been stated by 2K Czech that the game's cutscenes are created by the game engine, in real-time, rather than pre-rendered cutscenes. For example if the player is riding in a car and a cut scene starts, the player will be driving the same car and if the car is damaged, that will appear in the cut scene.

The game has three different in game radio stations, Empire Central Radio, Empire Classic Radio and Delta Radio, with licensed music, news, and commercials. The radio stations includes music from different genres including rock and roll, big band, rhythm and blues, doo-wop, among others with licensed songs by Chuck Berry, The Everly Brothers, Dean Martin, Little Richard, Muddy Waters, Buddy Holly & The Crickets, Bing Crosby, Bill Haley & His Comets,The Chordettes, Bo Diddley, Rick Nelson, Eddie Cochran, The Champs, The Drifters, Screamin' Jay Hawkins, The Andrews Sisters, among others.

The game begins with Vito Scaletta looking over a photo album, as he begins to tell his story in voice over. He is born in Sicily in 1925 to an extremely poor family. A few years later, his family immigrates to the fictional city of Empire Bay in America. They are no better off there than they were in Sicily. As he gets older, Vito gets involved with a local criminal named Joe Barbaro, who Vito becomes best friends with. Vito is arrested during a botched robbery and given a choice: Go to jail or join the army. He chooses the latter and ends up in the Invasion of Sicily in World War II, which he helps liberate before getting shot and sent home on leave.

      

Once home, he is discharged courtesy of Joe's mafia connections, and learns that his dead father left his family in massive debt. Hoping to make money, Vito turns to Joe, who introduces him to Henry Tomasino, an employee of crime boss Alberto Clemente. After working for a few jobs, Clemente himself meets with Vito and Joe with an invitation to become made men, after a "small" fee of $5000. Working under Henry, Vito does several illegal jobs. Though he makes the money to pay the debt, he is soon arrested and sentenced to 10 years in federal prison.

Once inside, Vito falls in with the crowd of Leo Galante, consigliere for Frank Vinci, another crime boss. After doing some jobs for him, Galante manages to shorten Vito's sentence. Vito discovers from Galante that in the Liberty Bay Mob (known as the Commission) there is no fee for becoming a made man, loyalty to the family and hard work is enough to become a member of the family. Galante also describes that the Commission is made up of three large families: the old, conservative Vinci family, Clemente's family, and the Falcone family, a more recent line that is determined the prove themselves. Galante's connections enable him to give Vito a lighter sentence. Once out, he meets up with Joe, who now works for Carlo Falcone, the last city's crime bosses. He starts doing odd jobs for Falcone, eventually becoming a made man of the Falcone family, and buying a waterfront home. His biggest job comes when he is sent to kill Clemente, who has participated in the drug trade, against the commission's wishes. Though the job is botched (resulting in the death of Joe's 17 year old neighbor Marty), he and Joe eventually succeed. Later that night however Vito is forced to pick up Joe from a local bar where Joe had been getting very drunk over his guilt about Marty's death which Joe states "shouldn't have happened".

Soon after, Vito is approached by Henry, who wants to defect to Falcone's crew. In order to do this, he is ordered to kill Galante, though Vito saves his old friend by convincing Henry to let Galante simply disappear. Soon after, a gang of Irish criminals, formerly led by a man whom Vito killed in prison on Galante's orders, burn his house to the ground. Broke, he turns to Joe who helps him get revenge. To help him get out of debt, Henry gets Vito and Joe involved in the drug trade, revealing that Falcone is also involved. Although Vito is successful, the Chinese, who supplied the drugs, discover that Henry is a possible federal informant and acting on this new found information, they brutally kill him in the middle of the park with meat cleavers in broad daylight. Angered, Vito and Joe seek revenge and shoot up a Chinatown restaurant killing the Boss who won't give them any further information, they are now indebted to the loan shark they got money for the drugs from. Now very poor and in large debt, Vito is tasked to earn most of the money through his own means, which involves petty theft through out Empire Bay.

At first Vito turns to Derek Pappalardo (an employee of Frank Vinci) for work, but during a job breaking up a strike by dock workers, Vito learns that Derek ordered the killing of his father and his assistant Steve Coyne followed the order by drowning Vito's father to death. To avenge his father's death, Vito kills Derek and Steve. Eventually Joe and Vito manage to get the money back; in the process, they kill Thomas "Tommy" Angelo, the protagonist of the first Mafia game. Sadly, the incident with the Chinese has caused too much tension between Falcone and Vinci, as both believe the other did it, Vito is told by Falcone to meet him at an observatory. On the way there Vito is picked up by Galante. He is told that he will walk into an ambush, and the only reason he isn't already dead is because of Galante. Galante gives Vito one chance redemption for what he has done: assassinate his boss Carlo Falcone. With Joe's help, Vito succeeds and they go with Galante to celebrate. The car Joe is in turns away at intersection. Galante apologizes to Vito and claimed that Joe wasn't part of their deal. The game shows an enraged Vito then ends with a panoramic view of Empire Bay.