2K Celebrates The Mafia Franchise, Announces New Game Is In Development

Paul David Nuñez August twenty ninth, 2022 – 2:41 PM

Today marks 20 years of the Mafia franchise. To rejoice, 2k has an interview with among the builders which have labored on the collection for the reason that unique. The interview additionally revealed {that a} new Mafia challenge is in improvement. In addition, in honor of the 20 years celebration, 2K has introduced that the unique recreation will probably be accessible without spending a dime on Steam for a restricted time.

Work has began on an all-new Mafia challenge

Before we dive into the longer term, please be a part of us with a visit down reminiscence lane in Mafia’s 20-year historical past 🚕 #Mafia20

➡️ https://t.co/VxW48hExpV pic.twitter.com/dcgF2igEAb

— 2K (@2K) August 29, 2022

The interview was with three builders which have been with the franchise for the reason that starting. Roman Hladik, General Manager and Head of Production, Tomaš Hrebicek, Media Director labored on each recreation within the collection. Alex Cox, Game Director, has been with the franchise since Mafia II. The interview coated how their roles modified all through the years, the fanbase all through the years, which recreation holds a particular place of their hearts, what updates added in Mafia: Definitive Edition had been impactful to them, their favourite characters, and the most important classes discovered about recreation improvement over the previous 20 years.

Speaking on what they’ve discovered all through the years, Hladik mentioned “I would say we are learning all the time. With every project we do, we learn new stuff, because things keep developing, right? In the early days of Mafia, making games was… I wouldn’t say easier, but it was a small team with simpler technology and so on. Games and technology keep developing, so it’s all about constant learning. The biggest lesson came after we managed to release the original Mafia, and we thought we fully knew how to make games. We started to work on Mafia II and it was a huge challenge—the development was slow and we were constantly hitting new issues. It was a lesson for all of us who thought we had learned enough just by doing the first game. That was the biggest realization: this is never, ever going to be easy.”

“Another important lesson for me has been: get your assets running in the game as soon as possible and try to keep them there. A lot of the time, something seems like it’s almost done, but it really isn’t—the last 10% is so difficult because that’s when we’re checking it in the game along with everything else,” Hrebicek mentioned. “Early on, I had been so focused on the cinematic feel and animations in the story cutscenes—but I learned over the years that the game itself is more important. We need to think about the game first, then support it with a great story. To the new artists in the industry out there: you are not just a graphic artist, you are a game developer. Every discipline and department should constantly take stock of what the game is actually about.”

Cox mentioned “Any seasoned developer will, at some point, come to the conclusion that the one mantra to project success is: keep it simple, stupid. Don’t overcomplicate things; really understand what you’re good at and just do that. That’s something we learned with Mafia: Definitive Edition—rather than reinventing the game, rather than changing it substantially into something different, we identified what people liked about the game originally: the distinctive, cinematic crime fantasy. And we just really, really drilled down on that and focused on the execution. How do we modernize it without changing it? How do we make it more beautiful without altering the general atmosphere of Lost Heaven? I think that was a really good emphasis for us, and as a team we’re carrying that into our future titles, understanding what our core competencies are and building on them to create even better games going forward.”

In honor of #Mafia20 let’s return to the place it began 🏙

Get the unique Mafia (digital) for FREE on @Steam from Sept. 1 – 5 pic.twitter.com/ZdxSFZrLwh

— 2K (@2K) August 29, 2022

2K mentioned that the unique Mafia recreation will probably be accessible without spending a dime on Steam. This just isn’t Mafia: Definitive Edition, which is a remake of the primary recreation. It consists of an expanded story, gameplay, and unique rating. The unique recreation will probably be free on Steam from September 1 by September 5.

Talking about updating the unique recreation and which updates had been impactful to the devs, Cox talked in regards to the character of Sarah and elevating her for Definitive Edition. “Overall, I think we did a good job elevating the character of Sarah, who was the only female character in the original game. She got short shrift in the original plot—she felt like a very throwaway character,” Cox mentioned. “We worked quite hard to reintegrate her into the story for Definitive Edition, and there are some really touching scenes between her and Tommy, which come through not just from the revised design and the writing, but also from the execution on stage and the high-fidelity performances.” He additionally talked about integrating it extra with the opposite two video games tieing it into the identical universe.  And this can be a extra dorky factor, however as a result of Mafia: Definitive Edition was a part of the Mafia: Trilogy bundle, it allowed us to do some little bit of a retconning, bringing the unique Mafia recreation a bit extra into the identical universe as the opposite two titles. With the collectible cigarette playing cards, we introduced gangsters from all three video games as they’d’ve appeared within the Thirties. Being capable of flesh out the backstory, unite the lore, and produce the three titles nearer collectively was cool.”

For Hladik, the technical facet of issues made an influence. “On the original Mafia, there were a lot of technical limitations; for example, the draw distance was only a couple hundred meters, so you never got to see grandiose views of the city. With Mafia: Definitive Edition, we had this amazing opportunity to enhance the vision of the first game—suddenly we could create scenic vistas and better express the atmosphere of 1930s cities.”

Hrebicek was impacted by how they might carry the actors’ performances to life with extra element then within the unique recreation. “It was amazing going from only being able to capture one actor 20 years ago to now being able to capture the full stage performance, including all the details of the actors’ faces, which really helped the story shine,” Hrebicek mentioned. “For Definitive Edition, we could play with all the details, capture every bit of the performances. There’s that iconic scene when Tommy comes back to Sarah after a bloody shootout, and there’s very little dialogue—but we understand so much about the connection Tommy and Sarah have through the detailed expressions on their faces.”

Discussing the way forward for the collection, Hladik mentioned {that a} new Mafia title is in improvement. “I’m happy to confirm we’ve started work on an all-new Mafia project!” he mentioned. “While it’s a few years away and we can’t share anything more right now, we’re really excited to keep working on this beloved franchise and to entertain our players with new stories.”