So here’s how it went: I sat down to play Mafia The Old Country after hearing it described as “a tight 15-mission campaign” set in early 1900s Sicily. Honestly, I was expecting another mobster cliché parade-lots of goons skulking in alleys, maybe some laughable fake Italian accents. But within the first hour (mission 2, sneaking behind a smoky trattoria while a storm rumbled overhead), I stopped caring about the tropes. I was too busy soaking in the rich mood, the weight of Enzo’s choices, and the subtle, stunning details of Hangar 13’s world. The main question rattling in my head wasn’t “How long is this?”-it was, “Why does 13 hours here feel like truly being somewhere else?”
I clocked my run across three surprisingly late nights (thanks for nothing, insomnia), coming in at about 13 and a half hours on the standard difficulty. That spread out almost perfectly—about an hour per mission, give or take some deaths and repeat stealth runs. The word “hours” doesn’t tell you everything, though. See, Mafia The Old Country’s magic isn’t in padding out the runtime—it’s how it pulls you into Enzo’s world so completely, you forget about outside time. I lost whole evenings just wandering winding alleys, eavesdropping on grumbling vendors, and watching the sky change color over the olive groves. Did any of that count toward my official play clock? Who cares—I was having a blast.
If you’re careful (or obsessive, like me), you can stretch it out hunting for every last letter and family relic. A critical path run pushes 12-13 hours. Factor in distractions, failures, and the filling out of the world’s edges, and 15 hours isn’t unrealistic. Most playthroughs, though, will hover just under that—unless you take up permanent residence in Don Torrisi’s crumbling courtyard, cigarette in hand, just soaking it all up.
I tend to be skeptical of “young, reluctant protagonist falls into crime” plots—they’re everywhere, from Goodfellas to GTA. But Enzo’s arc hit different. Instead of thrusting you into pyrotechnic shootouts from minute one, Mafia The Old Country makes you feel every muddy step of his journey: sweating under a boiling Sicilian sun while laboring in mines, mumbling over nervous dinners about debts and dignity, then slowly (sometimes heartbreakingly) trading innocence for survival. The game leverages that deliberate pace. Characters don’t just spout exposition—they reveal themselves through subtext and inflection. I genuinely cared about Enzo’s mother before the second act’s gut punch. How often do you say that?
For all that, let’s be real: the gameplay won’t blow up YouTube with highlight reels like a Rockstar game. Mafia The Old Country cuts right to the point. Basic third-person shooting, stealth sequences (sometimes tense, sometimes slightly clunky), and straightforward driving split up the missions. The “meatball and red sauce” to the game’s fancy ingredients, if you will.
You get side objectives, but they’re more about flavor and worldbuilding—running a late-night errand for Nina, or intercepting police chatter than fast-traveling between endless busywork. In fact, the sparse approach to side content is both a blessing and a curse. Personally, I found it refreshing—the lack of map clutter means you focus on the people, the place, the moment. But if deep systems or endless challenges are your thing, you might crave more mechanical meat.
What floored me again and again was the sheer atmosphere: low sunlight reflecting off limestone walls, pattering rain after midnight, the thrum of banter in bustling market squares. The audio design deserves a toast—gunshots echo different in the back alleys than they do in sunken tombs. Dialogue (in both English and Italian) sells every scene. At one point, clattering into an abandoned monastery and hearing the wind whistle through cracked mosaics, I forgot I was meant to be tailing a rival gang. I just stood there, haunted.
But, confession time: the AI sometimes acts like they’re a little too full of grappa. A couple times, I exploited the same corner for cheap takedowns because the guards basically lined up like it was lunchtime at an orphanage. The checkpoint system can also be punishingly old school—fail a late-phase shootout and you’re repeating lengthy setups. Annoying in the moment, but weirdly in keeping with the “no second chances” theme the game embraces.
I played on PC, middle-of-the-road rig: RTX 3060, i5-11600KF, 16GB RAM, 1440p. Performance was mostly buttery, never dipping below 60 FPS except for one wait-for-patch moment in the city square during heavy rain (quick restart sorted it out). Load times were nothing, even with everything maxed. What did hit me, though, was the game’s camera occasionally catching geometry and flipping perspectives in tight interiors—a minor jank, but broke immersion at the wrong times.
I also fiddled with the language settings—a nice touch, letting me hear some missions in full Sicilian Italian with subtitles. It’s a world away from the old hammy voiceovers of Mafia 1. No game-breaking bugs in my 13-hour run, though I did spot a corpse t-pose behind a market stand. Made me laugh, not rage quit.
If you’re addicted to open world checklists and endless “stuff to do,” you might wonder where the map markers are. But if you hunger for lived-in worlds and the ache of meaningful, imperfect choices—think Mafia 1, L.A. Noire at its best, or even Red Dead’s quieter moments—you’ll feel at home here.
Honestly, it’s the rare game I’d recommend to someone who’s pressed for time. You can binge this across a few evenings or savor it one mission at a time. Either way, you’re getting a bracing shot of Sicilian mood and a story that lingers once the credits roll.
I walked away from Mafia The Old Country surprised at how much I missed its world once I’d left. It’s far from perfect—the occasional AI goof and camera hiccup betray a mid-budget ambition. But it’s also the best kind of proof that a focused, atmospheric story trumps a bloated open world and checklist design any day of the week. It’s a story worth living, not just watching—and for me, that’s the mark of something special.
If you want bombast or endless grind, look elsewhere. If you want to lose yourself in a smoky, sun-drenched reverie that’s over before it outstays its welcome, Mafia The Old Country is worth every minute. I’m giving it a hard-earned 8.5 out of 10—slight technical wobbles, but a heart and atmosphere that stick with you way longer than its runtime.
Mafia The Old Country is a focused, atmospheric, and deeply character-driven journey through early 20th century Sicily. It’s not a marathon, but you’ll savor every step. 8.5/10.
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