The Godfather II

"Removed too much to give too little back."

Firstly let me say I am biased. Like many other people you will find on the forums, I loved the first game. Played through it a quite a few times and this being Godfather *2* I held it to the same light.

The Good:

Multiplayer is a great touch. The benefits that carry over into single player are useless for the most part, but I can see myself playing it more in the future anyways.

Adding the Family Tree to the game gave it a great feel. Recruiting members costs no money. Fill the tree up with members who each have a specialty or two and send them out to do tasks with...

The main addition to this game is the Don View, which I feared. Interviews and everything before the game came out focused on it. It works. It's a nice touch. It brings a RTS feeling to the game and by the end of the game, pulls it off but only near the end of the game. Send family members to take over a business, blow one up, or defend it from an attacking enemy soldier or capo without even moving an inch in the game. Priceless and you can not ignore it since the game play seems based on your soldiers leaving your crew in New York to defend a business in Cuba instantly. It's a fun experience however it remains limited the entire game as it forces you to play one area completely with a limited family tree, to move onto the next one with a still limited family tree. This removes all strategy from the Crime Ring bonuses like cheaper guards, bullet proof vests, or rebuilding businesses faster. So while we only see a glimpse of how fun the Don View can be in a game, you'll only get full use of it during the last half hour or so of game play.


The Bad:

Money seems more useless in this game. Gun Merchants are gone, replaced with all safe houses being stocked to the rim with ammo and bombs.

Safe houses are gone. Don't expect to purchase a nice loft in a high-rise to launch your attacks from. You get one given to you in each map and that's it.

Hijacking trucks has been removed, perhaps to draw away from the lowered importance of cash.

Purchasing Upgraded weapons has been removed. Weapon upgrades are no longer sold but instead found as a pickup hidden somewhere in the three worlds. Most not available until you play through a lot of the game and leave for new locations and run into them at random.

Upgrade tracks have been removed, a painful blow for those players from the first game who loved to gear the character to match what they want. The worst being the negotiator, who loses all upgrades minus one upgrade to increase time the break point is shown. Matters little since you can point any weapon at the owner and wait for the meter to fill, and will have to resort to this method often since owners have taken a liking tot he roof where no property exists to destroy.

Bribing the cops is there...but gimped. Going to a police station I could not find a single cop. Did this three times before I noticed it was futile. You won't see too many bribable cops on the street resulting in shooting an innocent and any witnesses to get the cops in the area. Once they give up looking usually you can bribe one of them.

The story feeling is gone. I have heard a few others feel this way too. The first game is a solid story. Following along with classic missions with Luca Brasi as you grow had a great feel. Between a fake Michael Corleone and loosely attached missions, Godfather 2 lacks a true feeling in it.

The SMALL map. Sure they replace the one LARGE map with three smaller areas, but it still feels small. The Original game had something like 90+ places to take over if I recall, I haven't done the math but it felt a lot smaller than 90. Not sure if it broke half of that. A rough count got something around 41 in Godfather 2.

The rest of the finer things. Shooting out tires! Why!? Armored cars would mean even more if you could still shoot tires out. Prize Fights. A great side track thing to give those melee lovers a fun time. Random encounters. You may have run into a few of these in the first game if you played it. Just walking around you could come across an ambush, family fights, an execution, or even get a chance to break up a cash exchange. In Godfather 2 I came across nothing but one solider with two specialties to recruit.


The Ugly:

Clothes buying has been removed, replaced with mob face during character creation. I felt it was horrible. The clothes looked bad, the faces looked bad, the hair looked the worst. It ends up making the player not go for the look they want, but a look that won't make them made the entire game.

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In the end, the game is ok, but replayability is shot with the implementation of a more restrictive progression system. Get it if you love the Godfather, think about avoiding it otherwise.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 04/20/09

Game Release: The Godfather II (US, 04/07/09)