A new trailer has been released for Mafia The Old Country, the highly anticipated fourth chapter of the Mafia series, set in Sicily for the first time. Given the precedents and the sensitivity demonstrated, it is a title that gives rise to hope. The risk, we know, is the romanticisation of the mafia phenomenon. Here are all the details that emerged from the trailer.
“All the men in this room are united by blood.” It is with this sentence that the trailer appeared at The Game Awards 2024 opens Mafia The Old Country. This is the fourth chapter of the popular series 2K Games centered on the lives of fictional mafia criminals. Until now the main setting was represented by the United States of the 20th century but with this new chapter, the series arrives in Sicily for the first time, specifically that of the early 1900s. A premise: theenormous sensitivity demonstrated by Hangar 13 with Mafia III and the confirmation of the support of local consultants gives us hope. The risk, otherwise, is the romanticization of the mafia phenomenonwhich we know is much more complex, as well as a diffusion of stereotypes linked to Sicily and Sicilians.
The setting of Mafia The Old Country
After Tommy Angelo, Vito Scaletta and Lincoln Clay, it’s time for Enzo Favaraa young Sicilian who grew up in the sulfur mines. In the trailer we see the oath rite that he must complete to enter the family of Don Troisi. There is all the typical mafia rituals: the sacred image, the knife, the reference to blood. Meanwhile, scenes follow one another that leave room for an archaic Sicily but open to twentieth-century modernityat times western, with lyrical background music broken by the sound of the shootings that will punctuate the game. A cinematic trailer, which aims to capture you immediately through a fascinating atmosphere and Sicilian, among citrus trees, freshly caught tuna, lupare and ruins of a distant past.
MAFIA THE OLD COUNTRY | The views seen so far show a truly evocative Sicily.
It has not yet been specified which area of Sicily will be the main setting, but some emerge from the video details that suggest Palermo. In fact, there is a fragment with skulls, which refers to Capuchin Catacombsjust as there is a scene of an assassination between the balconies of a theater, a probable reference to Teatro Massimo. As for the sulfur mine from which Enzo wants to escape, it could be the one in Lercara Friddi, in the province of Palermo, the municipality where Lucky Luciano comes from.
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What do we expect from this title
If the first two chapters of Mafia are of mafia stories videogames comparable to “The Godfather” by Francis Ford Coppola, with Mafia III, the development studio Hangar 13 has created a game with a more documentary style, which criticizes racism in the United States. In fact, the game is set in a fake New Orleans in 1968, to be experienced in the role of an African-American veteran of the Vietnam War: Lincoln Clay to be precise. The setting, or the setting to say it in videogame jargon, therefore becomes a pretext to tell a story of great changes within the United States, experienced firsthand by categories without rights, including homosexuals, African Americans, women. Everything is then declined in a criminal perspective to remain faithful to the cornerstones of the series.
MAFIA THE OLD COUNTRY | There will be chases with both vintage cars and horses, to underline the continuity between the archaism of the 19th century and the modernity of the 20th century.
Mafia The Old Country will have a more linear game world and collected compared to Mafia III. Despite this return to the structure of the first two chapters, we expect a living Sicily, carefully reproduced through historical rigor. As reported by the game director Alex Cox on IGN, the studio worked closely with historical consultants and Sicilian professionals. In particular, Cox talks about the meeting he had with a knife craftsman. “The guys (from Hangar 13) went to visit his workshop, where he talked to us about all the knife-making and culture around it in Sicily,” Cox said on IGN. “Obviously (the knife) is relevant to the mafia as a weapon.” This also portends a certain centrality of melee combat within the game. Mafia The Old Country will arrive insummer of 2025 on all major gaming platforms.
