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Perhaps due to the rocky launch the title faced, Hangar 13 has spent the past few months releasing free content for Mafia III. While that’s great for most owners of the game, those that purchased the $29.99 season may have been wondering when that content would arrive. Well, worry no more, as the studio has finally unveiled when the next chapter of Lincoln Clay’s life will be told.

Beginning in March, three new pieces of story-based content will be releasing for Mafia III. Eschewing the core gameplay of the crime epic, these stand-alone tales will be stream-lined, straight forward stories. If this holds true, these pieces of content will improve one of the more frustrating aspects of the title, which was the tedious mission structure the game used.

Full details on the three story expansions haven’t been released yet, but Hangar 13 did provide descriptions and release windows for each of them.

“Faster, Baby!”

End of March 2017

Fast cars, dramatic chases, and epic stunt driving take center stage as Lincoln s forces with Roxy Laveau, a sister-in-arms out to take down a corrupt Sheriff terrorizing Civil Rights activists on the outskirts of New Bordeaux.

“Stones Unturned”

May 2017

When a merciless rival resurfaces in New Bordeaux, Lincoln must forces with CIA agent John Donovan to settle a blood feud that began in the war-torn jungles of Vietnam.

“Sign of the Times”

July 2017

A string of ritualistic killings has New Bordeaux on the edge of terror. At Father James’ request, Lincoln agrees to hunt down the cult responsible, a quest that will take him from the dark heart of the old bayou to the drug-ridden counterculture of the inner city.

One of the other interesting bits of information released for the first story expansion, “Faster, Baby!”, is that it will apparently take place in a “whole new part of New Bordeaux.” The fictional city, while sizable, was slammed for feeling dull and lifeless. According to Bill Harms, Hangar 13’s Narrative Director, they’ve been listening to these criticisms when it comes to deg the DLC.

We were really humbled by the response to the characters and the story in Mafia III, so we wanted to double-down on that as much as possible, while also providing players with different gameplay experiences. Mafia III focuses on the systematic destruction of Sal Marcano’s empire, racket-by-racket, while all of the expansions tell direct, linear stories.

We’ll be bringing you more on the DLC for Mafia III when Hangar 13 is ready to talk, so stay tuned!

Action-adventure sequel Mafia III has been officially labelled the fastest-selling game in 2K’s history. The news was revealed as part of parent company Take-Two’s most recent investor relations report (via VideoGamer), with the publisher stating, “developed by Hangar 12, Mafia III is the fastest-selling game in 2K’s history, generating week one sell-in of more than 4.5. million units.”

The figure, while impressive, only s for copies of the game sold through to retailers rather than consumers, so it’s not entirely clear how many units actually sit in the hands of players rather in the back of a stockroom.

Either way, the strong sales performance comes as somewhat of a surprise, what with the backlash 2K received over a certain version of Mafia III. For those unaware, it emerged following launch that the frame rate of the PC version was locked to 30, leading many irate buyers to flood the game’s Steam page with less-than-stellar reviews. 2K issued a statement shortly thereafter, promising to unlock the frame rate in a future patch.

Mafia III is available now on Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC. A PS4 Pro version will be available alongside the console’s launch on November 10. If you’ve yet to pick up the third instalment in the series, see here for our review.

If you were to ask me to name some of the most underrated games from the last generation of consoles, Mafia II would be at, or near, the top of my list. As soon as I put the disc into my console and pressed start, I fell in love with it, and couldn’t get enough, even after all of its able content had been released. It truly was a fun, immersive, interesting and wholly unappreciated game – at least, in my eyes.

Although it wasn’t always set in stone, a sequel to that very game was just released, and it’s got a lot of people talking on the Internet’s many gaming-related forums. Unfortunately for Mafia III, and its developers at Hangar 13 and 2K Czech, most of this talk is full of negativity, due to the game’s many issues. That’s a shame, because given how good the last game was, there’s no way that its follow-up should have ended up being this bland.

Mafia III is the story of one Lincoln Clay, an African-American twenty-something who’s just returned after serving his country in Vietnam. Ready to try to get back into the swing of things, he res his adopted family, who took him in when nobody else would, and discovers that all is not well. In fact, a Haitian gang is looming over his father Sammy, who’s at risk of losing his bar – and perhaps his life – because of a large debt.

Being headstrong, family-oriented and without fear, Lincoln takes it upon himself to settle things with the player’s help, before getting himself involved in a large-scale heist that the local Italian mob is organizing. As luck would have it, though, the shit hits the fan both during and after, and the resulting backstabs take the lives of our protagonist’s family, and almost steal his as well. It’s only out of sheer luck that young Lincoln survives, and he only does so with the help of close friends who nurse him back to life in the back of an old church. All of that laying down marks the only rest he’ll get for quite some time, however, as once he rises, there’s only one thing on his mind: revenge.

Every moment of this blood-filled revenge story takes place in a fictional city called New Bordeaux, which borrows lots of inspiration from real-life New Orleans, including its love of music, glowing neon lights and alligator infested bayou. The year, though, is not 2016. Instead, everything is set back in 1968, during an era where racism and racially-motivated killings were at an unnecessary high.

As you walk or drive through the streets of New Bordeaux, you’ll often be reminded of the above, whether it’s through someone calling you the n-word, radio news stories about black men being killed for no reason at all, or racist shopkeepers who are quick to tell you that their stores are “white only.” This racism isn’t limited to the general public either, as main characters also express their vile, prejudiced ideas on a regular basis. As shocking as it can be, it’s fitting given the era that Mafia III depicts, and that’s something that the developers made sure to point out in their pre-game message.

Instead of going for the snake’s head from the get-go (because what fun would that be?), Lincoln decides to do exactly what was done to him, by taking out important Italian mobsters one-by-one. His kill list begins with racket bosses then progresses to underbosses, before it moves on to the heavy hitters, including boss Sal Marcano and his family . It all makes sense, and sets up an interesting tale, albeit one that is unfortunately marred by incredibly repetitive mission structure and yawn-worthy progression systems.

So, what exactly do you do in this game?

Well, the general idea is that you want to take over and install yourself as the leader of each of New Bordeaux’s unique regions and the rackets that they all house. This means going to said area and looking for similar objectives that will allow you to cause trouble and stir the pot. Causing enough chaos – which is portrayed through a monetary counter that goes down with each major kill, contraband explosion or financial theft you perform – then leads to that racket’s leader coming out of hiding and readying himself for an encounter with Lincoln, himself. Then, once you kill said leader, you own his crime ring and can assign it to any associate you deem worthy.

If you’ve been watching the many trailers that have been released for this game, then you likely know about Lincoln’s three underbosses. If not, allow me to introduce them.

First, there’s Cassandra, a young, afro-bearing Haitian woman who Lincoln first meets before his betrayal. Originally depicted as a captive of the Haitian boss’, she turns out to be much more, and becomes your first lieutenant. However, while she’s vocal, she’s no match for the filthy loudmouth that is Thomas Burke – a drunken Irishman who lost his son in the same unfortunate event that took the lives of Lincoln’s most beloved.

Last, but certainly not least, is Vito Scaletta, who just so happened to be the main character in Mafia II. He’s older now, of course, and has run afoul of the Italian mob he once served, so he’s more than willing to aid your cause so long as there’s also something in it for him at the end of the day. Vito is also the most levelheaded of the group, which should make him the favourite of many.

Every time you take over a racket, be it car theft, prostitution, illegal weapons trading or garbage, you get to pick which one of these allied criminals gets to run it for you. Then, once an entire region has become yours, you have a sit down with the trio, wherein you assign one of them the whole territory. This, as you can imagine, becomes a strategic game in and of itself, because these strong personalities don’t take well to being slighted, and each one of them is filled to the brim with both greed and ego.

Mafia III is now available in stores, but as you may have noticed, reviews (including our own) have been slow to surface. There’s a reason for this, though.

Instead of giving press early access to the game, 2K decided to eschew tradition and hold review codes for Mafia III until just before launch. As such, getting a review up for release, or a particular embargo time, simply wasn’t possible. Add to that the fact that Mafia III isn’t a short game and you have another reason as to why we haven’t been able to publish our thoughts yet.

Despite putting nine hours into the game over this holiday weekend, we still have a lot to do and tons to explore. In fact, it feels as if we’ve just scratched the surface. That said, our plan is to play it a lot more over the next few days, in order to make sure that it’s critiqued and scored by the middle of this coming week. Thursday is what we’re aiming for with our review, so be sure to check back then.

Thank you for your understanding, and for your patience.

Hangar 13 and 2K Games’ Mafia III is out today on Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC, and while critic reviews are still forthcoming, a large portion of those that decided to stay up and the action-adventure at zero hour via Steam aren’t particularly impressed with their purchase, it seems.

A quick cursory glance over early reviews on the game’s Steam page reveals a rather large amount of negative reviews in regards to an apparent frame rate lock which restricts Mafia III from running above 30fps. What’s more, complaints about crashes and low visual quality seem to be a prevailing theme.

It appears the outcry has come to the attention of 2K, who has issued a statement on its website.

We know how important having options that best suit your PC’s performance capabilities are. The team has been hard at work ensuring that Mafia III’s performance is consistent across all platforms, and right now the game runs at a solid 30 frames-per-second. We are currently working on an update for PC that will give players the option to play Mafia III at higher framerates. We’ll share more details about the update, and when you can expect it to arrive, very soon. In the meantime, the team welcomes and would like to hear from you about what performance adjustment options are important to you. We’re actively considering a number of additional post-launch improvements on PC that would give players more control over how they can tailor the game’s experience to suit their rig’s performance. It’s been an incredible journey developing Mafia III and we couldn’t be more excited to get the game in your hands and hear what you think!

That 2K has addressed player criticisms so quickly after release is irable, but if it’s possible for Mafia III to run on PC at 60 fps, one has to wonder why the publisher didn’t give developer Hangar 13 more time to include the option prior to release. Of course, if the title does run at a “solid 30 frames-per-second,” is it necessary to do so? After all, console versions are locked at 30fps and neither the Xbox One or PS4 versions are receiving the same negative attention.

As for aesthetics, Mafia III won’t be winning any awards for its visual fidelity, but it certainly doesn’t look bad from what we’ve seen from pre-release trailers.

Assuming you’re not fazed by the above, you can pick up Mafia III right now.

Mafia III is due out in stores tomorrow, October 7th, and while we’re certainly excited to see what it brings to the table, it’s got us thinking: how does the original stack up after all these years? Well, we recently revisited the game to get a taste of the retro action, and found a package that stands the test of time surprisingly well.

It’s been 14 years since the original Mafia was released on the PC and one claim has dogged it ever since: that, in its delivery of a story tied to an open world, it’s somehow a GTA clone. Just take a look at Eurogamer’s 2002 review of the game. Awarding it a 4/10, the reviewer complained that unlike the fast cars of Grand Theft Auto, Mafia forces you to stick “lumbering clunkers that hobble along at a snail’s pace and accelerate from nought to sixty in a time that is measured in minutes rather than seconds.” The review concludes by neatly missing the point completely. “The storyline is brilliant, but we’re here to play the game, not ire its narrative structure,” it says.

You see, Mafia is a story first and foremost, an action game second and a driving simulator third. There just so happens to be a big open map, too. Whereas in Grand Theft Auto, that map is stuffed with oddities, side missions and shop stores, Mafia’s world is window dressing for the tightly-constructed narrative; a simple driver of verisimilitude.

Mafia plots the descent of Tommy Angelo from everyday cab driver to cold-blooded mobster during 1930s America in a world closely based on the real thing. Without the slow exposition and often tedious lulls in gameplay, the morality tale would be less convincing, but as it is, you’re pulled into a quite macabre story where the line between good and evil is often shrouded in uncertainty. 

As we begin to approach the always-busy holiday season for video game releases, publisher 2K and developer Hanger 13 have released a new, extended gameplay video for their , open world title, Mafia III. 

For the uninitiated, the game is set in the year 1968, in the town of New Bordeaux (a fictionalized version of New Orleans). The protagonist, a biracial orphan named Lincoln Clay, sets out to exact revenge on the rival Marcano crime family, who left Lincoln and his fellow ‘associates’ for dead after a bank heist turned sour.

While you’ll only have to wait a couple of weeks to get your hands on the game, you can check out the newly released gameplay demo above. It clocks in at nearly 20 minutes and shows off Lincoln as he attempts to take out one of the Marcano family’s underbosses, Tony Derazio.

Mafia III is set to release on October 7, for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Windows PCs. If you’re interested in reading up on the game, be sure to check out our preview from E3 2016.

Lincoln Clay is a wanted man. Upon returning from Vietnam, our war veteran descends into the criminal underbelly of New Bordeaux – a faux New Orleans, essentially – immersing himself into a world of double-crossing crooks and old-fashioned bank robbing.

Welcome to Mafia III, the high-octane action sequel in the works from 2K and developer Hangar 13. Set to hit current-gen systems and PC in October, the companies have today rolled out a Gamescom trailer for the threequel, shedding light on a fictional yet vibrant game world that’s brimming with depth and intrigue.

According to Creative Director Haden Blackman, the team at Hangar 13 have built Mafia III‘s open world in such a way that all of your actions will have some bearing on Lincoln Clay as a character, telling The Verge that “everything you’re doing in the open world is driving you forward. Lincoln doesn’t go off fishing or something — everything furthers his goal.”

After being left as the sole survivor of a vicious mob attack, Clay then sets about building his own gang to take on the city’s criminal underworld. Toss in a stellar soundtrack and some welcome nods to the series’ history – the inclusion of Mafia II protagonist Vito Scaletta, for instance – and it’s easy to see why Hangar 13’s threequel has garnered so much attention.

Mafia III is earmarked for release across PS4, Xbox One and PC on October 7. Gamescom 2016, meanwhile, will swing its doors open to the gaming masses tomorrow, August 17 and continue throughout the course of the weekend.

Hot off the heels of a trailer in which it re-introduced anti-hero Lincoln Clay, Mafia III‘s PR team is back with another promotional video. This time around, though, things take a dramatic shift from computer-generated footage to live action, with a short titled “Death Suits You.”

Playing out with fitting musical accompaniment, Death Suits You does a good job of setting the tone for the game’s violent campaign. It does so by showing what turned the Vietnam War vet into the revenge-seeking badass he has become, while preparations are made for a lavish funeral.

If you’re new to the fold, Mafia III is a game about vengeance, which follows a former soldier whose crew was murdered by New Bordeaux’s Italian mob. Using your social, combat and weaponry skills, you’ll need to work your way up from the bottom, establish a family and do whatever it takes to get back at those who’ve wronged you.

Mafia III will be released on October 7th, and the wait continues to be tough because of how damned good it looks.

“Family isn’t who you’re born with. It’s who you die for.”

The above tagline accompanies a new trailer from Mafia III developer Hangar 13, which comes to us as the first of six planned features that will lead up to the game’s fall release date. Fitting and poignant, given the subject matter at hand, it’s used to emphasize the journey that players will take as anti-hero Lincoln Clay.

An orphan who grew up to become a Vietnam vet, Clay is a man with a plan for vengeance. It’s this goal (well, need) that propels him through his quest, as he attempts to get revenge against the Italian mobsters who wiped out his gang. Along the way, Lincoln will meet and form bonds with unique characters, who will then become part of his new crew. And, over time, they will become like family, supplanting those who were lost.

Mafia III will be released this October. Stay tuned for more information as the game develops towards release.

Mafia III was one of the most popular games at E3, and for good reason, as its many awards prove. In total, the open world crime drama received sixty different accolades, including twelve specific awards and lots of positive buzz to go along with it.

In celebration of the above, Hangar 13 and 2K Games have released a brand new trailer, which features a few prominent quotes from individual outlets. It’s tasteful and elegant, because it doesn’t shove the awards down your throat and is mostly focused on beautiful-looking cutscenes and perfectly fitting music. They’re there to add credence, though, to what looks to be one of the most promising games of 2016.

If you haven’t done so yet, make sure to check out our coverage of Mafia III, which includes a detailed preview from the E3 floor, as well as talk about why the game’s booth was one of the best we’ve ever seen.

I’ve always had a thing for games set in rich, open world environments, where there’s lots to see and do. Grand Theft Auto is an obvious leader in this category, as are games like Fallout 3 and Skyrim, but those aren’t the only such titles that have hooked me. Other notable releases — like Just Cause 2, Bully, Saints Row: The Third, Saints Row IV and Mafia II — have as well, with the latter being a game that I’ve tried to champion since launch. Why? It’s always felt under-appreciated, and that’s bugged me.

This summer will mark six years since Mafia II hit store shelves, and it’s only fitting that we’ll soon receive a sequel. It’s a follow-up that I cannot wait to get my hands on, and one that is easily at the top of my most anticipated list. Hell, just the idea of Mafia III existing had me excited. Seeing it in action at E3 was the icing on the cake, and helped prove the reasons as to why I’m more excited about this game than almost anything else.

We’ve already talked about how Mafia III had one of the best booths at E3 2016, what with its New Orleans saloon-inspired design, real-life fortune tellers and hired blues band, but now it’s time to focus on the game itself. At least, the theatrical demo that 2K brought to this year’s Expo.

Mafia III is the story of Lincoln Clay, a former orphan and Vietnam War vet who has returned to the city of New Bordeaux and resumed his affiliation with the black mob. Not all is well, though, because Lincoln’s crew ends up being slaughtered by its Italian nemeses and he barely escapes with his life. Thus begins a tale of wanton revenge throughout a world that is designed to look and feel like 1968 New Orleans.

New Bordeaux is a thriving place, where everything you do has an effect on the story. From dealing with rival gang , to honing in on gun, moonshine and sex trafficking rings, there’s a lot to dive into outside of your main quest line. And, once you become the leader of your own crew, you’ll even be able to form ties with three unique allies, including Cassandra (who leads the local Haitian gang) and Vito, who was marginalized by the Italian mob and seeks payback. These morally troubled souls will act as your underbosses, and can be assigned parts of the city that take over, gifting you with unique bonuses along the way. Be careful, though, because giving too much to one ally may piss the others off and cause them to betray you.

We actually got to see a betrayal during our demo, and it led to a badass engagement. The only sad thing about it is that not everyone will get to experience it, or something similar, as how things play out in Mafia III will depend on each player’s own choices and actions.

Everything we witnessed behind closed doors gave us a good look at, and insight into, the game’s beautiful-looking city and the scum that lays beneath its pretty surface. We saw dramatically different boroughs, including the iconic Bayou, where riverboat gambling is a popular attraction overtop water that makes for a great place to hide bodies. In fact, the main story mission they demoed took place aboard one such vessel, and was jaw-droppingly badass.

This particular quest had Lincoln trying to put a dent into our enemy’s crime operations, by going after a pivotal member of its family who just so happened to be holding a political fundraiser onboard a bayou riverboat. Clay — who’s not afraid to show his face and get his hands dirty — saw that as an opportunity, and made his way onto the boat without being noticed, thanks to some pretty vicious stealth kills. Then, when the timing was right, he unleashed Hell upon his target.

In the midst of a firefight befitting a classic revenge movie, the boat crashed into a nearby structure, sending ferocious explosions throughout its cabin. That didn’t phase our two enemies, though, and made for a wild and memorable confrontation that eventually spilled out into the bayou. All throughout, a cinematic feel persisted, as Lincoln mixed guns-a-blazing gameplay with good use of available cover. And, while I don’t want to say much more out of fear of spoiling a great mission, I must say that its ending was well worth all of the lead-up.

One thing that I also noticed about this game was how rich its soundtrack seemed to be. This one demo, alone, had two fantastic songs in it. The first was “Bad Moon Rising,” and the second was “Mississippi Queen,” which played at a perfectly fitting moment during the aforementioned mission.

Needless to say, Mafia III is a sequel worth getting excited for. It’s full of atmosphere and great details, and looks to be an epic romp through late 60s New Orleans. Now, if only it would come out earlier than October 7th…