Review: Godfather II - EA makes us an offer we cannot refuse

Mike Bantick
Saturday, 23 May 2009 06:29

Entertainment

Something that doesn’t sit quite right is the Favour system involving stopping and chatting to everyday citizens roaming the streets.  There are a small variety of favours that Dom can take on here; beat up a rival girlfriend, smash a competitor’s store stock and so on.  The rewards can be simply cash, or more importantly, information on a rival family Made-man. 

Enough information to allow Dominic to eliminate him permanently from the game.  Which is great, but it feels weird getting this info from a housewife on her way to the shops. 

A better use of the favour system is when you come across the odd DA, cop or other influential individual who, in return for the favour request, can provide tangible benefits usable at any time.  These include calling off the cops, getting a crew member sprung from jail and other similar aces in the hole.

There are core missions that keep the plot moving, and these are by far more compelling than the standard business take-over battles or favours.  But much of this ho-humness comes from the level of difficulty in the game.

Get yourself a good Medic, buy him a few upgrades to toughen him up.  Toughen Dominic himself up, and you pretty much feel invincible from the start. 

Whilst there is a tiered system to the gun usage, most players will feel not much of a challenge in wading into a rival construction site laden with enemy goons and start blasting away.  The auto-lock-on system works smoothly and resultant gun-play feels satisfactory violent – some of those thugs can take many a headshot however.

It is only when a rival’s crew member rocks up that the battles get a little tougher.  But conversely, if you have info about the man, this challenge instead becomes an opportunity to rid yourself of him.

There is plenty to do, but it does become a little routine – almost like a regular job – though there is a definitive feeling of power in the ease of your empire building.

Visually, the game looks great.  Each city environment, whilst not as expansive as a Liberty City, is nicely populated and varied, with a distinctive feel. 

Locations are not far apart, so travel time is not an issue.  In fact the biggest annoyance here is when a particularly labyrinth style layout of a business, means trudging on foot, battling goons to reach and pummel the main man, take over the business and then have to make your long way back to street level. 

Police are never much of an issue, escaping, even on foot is not a problem, and if it is then it is easy enough to call in a “favour”. The Cuban Military is a little different, but still manageable, to the point where you get to shoot Fidel Castro!  Nice fictional and slightly odd touch EA.

You can take your crew online to (unnecessarily) boost their abilities for the single player game.  Multiplayer consists of a number of imaginative modes, including FireStarter (take an Arsonist for that one), Safecracker, team and single Deathmatch and a couple of others.

If you like your sand-box games to have lots of progression and a feeling of accomplishment then there is plenty to please here.  Most players will not be too taxed by the challenges posed in Godfather II, but the resultant Don like feeling of command is probably all that is needed.

7 Diamond Smuggling Rackets out of 10