Mafia 2: First details! : update :

Big Classy

Does it play well with the 360 pad on the PC?

subedii

Sir Carcass wrote: »

brynstar wrote: »

I agree with the demo impressions so far. The shooting feels solid, and I love all the camera shake effects. The health system seems like the one in Red Dead, a mix of recharging health and healing items. The thing that most surprised me is that the speed limiter and touchy cops are still in the game. I figured that whole system would have been cut due to the way that games have changed since the first Mafia, and I'm impressed that it's still here.

I didn't expect it to be gone. It showed up when the GTA 3D games were in full swing, and it was kinda their own thing, but I am glad it's back.

Yeah they said in an interview that they wanted to keep the police like that since they were going for something a little more realistic (or at least, down to earth) than GTA. So speeding whilst cops are around gets you pulled over. Try to run it and it's a chase.

Played the demo. Pretty short, but I was expecting as much with "just" 1GB (grief, I remember when entire games were a megabyte). Plus I can appreciate the fact that they actually made something separate specifically for the demo

Driving with a keyboard takes a little getting used to, but feels similar to the original game so I was already doing better at it on my second playthrough.

Demo runs really smooth maxed out. Pretty surprising. Turning on the PhysX stuff naturally drops it down to averaging 20 FPS or less for me, but you can't have everything.

Shooting's solid, and yeah, it's a lot more rewarding when each shot has impact, and even a pistol works. I seem to remember gunfights being a bit more lethal in the first game, but that could just be the whole recharging health thing, and the fact that aiming's easier now (going full auto-with the Tommy before would pretty much spray everywhere). I imagine turning up the difficulty would change that anyway, but at the same time, it saves on the frustrations of SUDDEN DEATH that you would often run into during gunfights before.

brynstar

Gunfights were much more lethal in the first game Subedii, you're right. You had to be immediately accurate or even the lowliest of enemies would take you down. I completely agree with you, it's much less frustrating now and I still think it's challenging enough to be fun.

Fats

I was a little concerned about this game but the demo is great. Looking forward to the 24th.

brynstar

I went to the gas station and filled up my tank. That was pretty exciting actually. >.>

Also, I think the long raincoat is my favorite outfit in the game thus far.

Yall

Anyone else have a wicked dark screen upon exiting the demo?

unpurposed

Yall wrote: »

Anyone else have a wicked dark screen upon exiting the demo?

Yeah, it freaked me out the first time, but it's the demo screwing something up. CTRL-ALT-DELETE and then cancel fixed it for me.

Fig-D

Downloading the demo on Steam, but my PC aint no spring chicken so I'll probably be downloading the 360 and PS3 demos as well. Someone else will probably do the same and find all the differences long before I'm even done downloading though.

Yall

unpurposed wrote: »

Yall wrote: »

Anyone else have a wicked dark screen upon exiting the demo?

Yeah, it freaked me out the first time, but it's the demo screwing something up. CTRL-ALT-DELETE and then cancel fixed it for me.

OK.

I just launched another game assuming it would tinker with the settings again and set them back to normal (which it did).

At any rate, I'm buying this game. Now to decide - 360 or PC...

Big Classy

Werll PC is a no go for me, seems to run horridly at my native resolution. weird.

Fig-D

Hm. Game performs "okay" on my PC. I'm going to fool with it some more. 360 demo is downloading in the other room and I'll grab the PS3 demo once the PSN Store updates.

PC specs:
Windows Vista 32
Intel Core 2 at 2.4GHz
4GB RAM (most applications, including the Mafia II demo, only see 3GB)
nVidia 8800GT (1GB Video Memory)

Sir Carcass

Can't download the demo from Steam. Keep getting server errors.

Edit: Changing my server fixed it.

subedii

Yall wrote: »

unpurposed wrote: »

Yall wrote: »

Anyone else have a wicked dark screen upon exiting the demo?

Yeah, it freaked me out the first time, but it's the demo screwing something up. CTRL-ALT-DELETE and then cancel fixed it for me.

OK.

I just launched another game assuming it would tinker with the settings again and set them back to normal (which it did).

At any rate, I'm buying this game. Now to decide - 360 or PC...

Well the good thing about the PC version is that if you pre-order it (on Steam) you get Mafia 1 now. Which actually holds up pretty well today.

I only played Mafia 1 about a year ago, found it pretty compelling. The city was fairly well realised, and they had some diverse settings for the missions too (hotel, airport, dockyard, things like that). The storyline actually played out pretty well too, which surprised me.

The flipside naturally is how well your PC can run it in the first place.

InkSplat

So, for those who have played Uncharted 1/2, how does the cover/gunfighting compare to that? I'm pretty reliant on cover to be anything less than rubbish, so it's kind of important. :P

Fig-D

The cover system works well enough. You can't move away from an object to move from cover though, so that takes so getting used to. You have to hit the cover button again to disengage from cover (at least on the PC version, haven't tried the console demos yet). Word to the wise though, don't use cars for cover. One lucky shot to the gas tank is all it takes for you to be looking at the "you dead" screen. Guns are pretty powerful, both for you and the NPCs. Two guys with Tommy guns will mow you down in seconds if you aren't in cover. Headshots are your friend, and guns are much more accurate than they are in Uncharted.

Dashui

I'm also trying to decide between the PC and 360 versions. I'm hoping someone who has tried both can give an opinion on the visual differences. Obviously the PC version will look better, but how much so? Is there noticeable aliasing on the 360 version? Muddy textures? I don't have Gold right now so I can't download that demo.

InkSplat

Fig-D wrote: »

The cover system works well enough. You can't move away from an object to move from cover though, so that takes so getting used to. You have to hit the cover button again to disengage from cover (at least on the PC version, haven't tried the console demos yet). Word to the wise though, don't use cars for cover. One lucky shot to the gas tank is all it takes for you to be looking at the "you dead" screen. Guns are pretty powerful, both for you and the NPCs. Two guys with Tommy guns will mow you down in seconds if you aren't in cover. Headshots are your friend, and guns are much more accurate than they are in Uncharted.

Hm. I'll have to download this tonight or tomorrow and give it a shot. I really love the time period and the idea, but most open world games just don't have cover, so I usually end up not bothering cause I know I suck, heh.

Infamous being a good example.

Fig-D

I should be able to tell you in a few Dashui.

Funny though, while the PC version supports AA, you don't get the usual x2, x4, x8, x16 options. Its just on or off.

I'm guessing that the 360 version will probably look better than the PC version on my PC just because I had to keep the geometry to "Medium" in order to keep a steady framerate.

Fig-D

InkSplat wrote: »

Fig-D wrote: »

The cover system works well enough. You can't move away from an object to move from cover though, so that takes so getting used to. You have to hit the cover button again to disengage from cover (at least on the PC version, haven't tried the console demos yet). Word to the wise though, don't use cars for cover. One lucky shot to the gas tank is all it takes for you to be looking at the "you dead" screen. Guns are pretty powerful, both for you and the NPCs. Two guys with Tommy guns will mow you down in seconds if you aren't in cover. Headshots are your friend, and guns are much more accurate than they are in Uncharted.

Hm. I'll have to download this tonight or tomorrow and give it a shot. I really love the time period and the idea, but most open world games just don't have cover, so I usually end up not bothering cause I know I suck, heh.

Infamous being a good example.

Yeah, the game encourages you to use cover. You really didn't need cover in Infamous once you got the shield ability, but that's a discussion for another thread. If you've played GTAIV, I'd say that cover is more available in this game than that, and appears to be better used by NPCs as well. I can remember enemies in GTAIV just sorta standing next to cover (but not in it) in several missions.

Sir Carcass

Wow. I ran benchmarks with everything on full (except no AA) at 1920x1080. With PhysX on high, I got an average of 9fps. With it off, I averaged 47fps. I guess PhysX hates ATI.

subedii

Sir Carcass wrote: »

Wow. I ran benchmarks with everything on full (except no AA) at 1920x1080. With PhysX on high, I got an average of 9fps. With it off, I averaged 47fps. I guess PhysX hates ATI.

No PhysX just hates everything. Unless you've got a separate dedicated card for it, running PhsyX off of even a higher end card tends to cause a huge performance drop.

I'm running an Nvidia. With PhysX off I get a pretty solid 50 FPS maxed out (no AA). With it set to medium, that drops to about 17-20 FPS.

With Batman: Arkham Asylum I was able to run alright with medium PhysX, I guess there's just a lot more stuff to process here, with the car physics and the rest of the game world.

Dashui

I found some comparison screenshots between the PC, PS3, and 360 versions. They actually look pretty much identical in terms of texture quality. The PC version is slightly sharper, but not noticeably so. The PS3 version, however, has some aliasing and the colors look washed out.

I might just get it on the 360 now, despite having bought a new computer, so I can play it on a big screen TV with a more kick ass sound system. I hope the demo goes silver soon, though, so I can still give it a try first.

Edit: I guess I can't directly link the images. Here's the URL to the page itself instead:

http://www.pcgames.de/Mafia-2-PC-53060/News/Mafia-2-Grafikvergleich-PC-mit-Xbox-360-und-Playstation-3-auf-Augenhoehe-764628/galerie/1401854/

Edcrab

Ah, PhysX might be slowing things down? I wondered why it was chugging so much despite "optimal" default settings.

Demo is pretty cool! There's something so endearing about just driving around the city, reminds me of the first game. Combat was solid but the checkpoints get a bit silly, especially when you consider that some cutscenes are skippable but elevator conversations aren't (why wasn't the checkpoint after that sort of thing, I wonder?) but overall I was impressed.

Sir Carcass

Yeah, that checkpoint should have been after the elevator stops.

So I just played through it. Incredibly short, but incredibly awesome. The time limit kinda sucks, but I guess I'll live with it, being a demo. Like the cover system and the guns feel beefy. I also died a couple of times when I got stupid, but health generates pretty fast otherwise.

And wow, I was surprised when I picked up that first Playboy.

Fig-D

Dashui wrote: »

I'm also trying to decide between the PC and 360 versions. I'm hoping someone who has tried both can give an opinion on the visual differences. Obviously the PC version will look better, but how much so? Is there noticeable aliasing on the 360 version? Muddy textures? I don't have Gold right now so I can't download that demo.

Textures look pretty similar on the PC and 360 (and are, unfortunately, kinda muddy). I'm still downloading the PS3 demo (PSN is slow today) but I did notice a few differences between the PC and 360. It might be my TV, but the colors on the 360 are brighter and deeper. The brights are brighter and the dark are darker. I'm not sure if there's AA present in the 360 version, as I noticed a bit of "jaggy" artifacting when looking at grass and object from a distance. Shadows flicker in and out quite a bit more on the 360 (something that's not unique to this game). The difficulty seems about the same, meaning that if you're used to mouse aim (like me) then the 360 version will feel more difficult.

Bottom line: if you have a nice PC and you like mouse aim, grab it on the PC. Its a good port, so issues that the PC version of GTAIV had need not factor into your decision. If you don't have a good PC, Mafia II still feels solid on the system and doesn't have any problems that aren't shared with many other open world third person shooters on the system.

cooljammer00

Just finished the demo. Driving is a bit squirrelly, but I guess that's "authentic".

Dashui

cooljammer00 wrote: »

Just finished the demo. Driving is a bit squirrelly, but I guess that's "authentic".

PC or console? When I plugged a 360 controller into my PC, driving became much better. It really did feel a bit unresponsive when using the keyboard and mouse.

cooljammer00

I'm playing it on the PS3. I also thought there was chugging or slowdown when I was in cover but then I realized that it's deliberate and that the last game I played with a cover system was Alpha Protocol, aka duck walking at a brisk pace.

Fats

For anyone else wondering why PhysX was slower than usual:

There's some noticeable slowdown with PhysX turned on.

Apparently, this is because the game installs physx with cpu mode enabled. Uninstalling and then reinstalling actually makes it use the gpu.

To fix:

1: Uninstall Nvidia physX.
2: Go to steamapps\common\mafia ii - public demo\3rd
3: Install physx from there.
4: Play the game.

I tried it and can now play with PhysX on high, though I'm not entirely sure what it's simulating.

Fig-D

Okay, after playing the PS3 version I can say that its between the PC and PS3 for me. I like the muted colors of the PS3 version better, a complaint I had with crazy styling of Bayonetta, but a positive here in 1940s gangster Americana. There was also less slowdown for me in areas involving smoke and fire.

Now I have to decide if I'm going to be dropping any serious cash on PC upgrades or a new PC anytime soon (my PC is overdue for some upgrades, but my financial situation isn't great right now) or if I'll be satisfying my mafia urges on the PS3.

cooljammer00

Mechanically I'm sure the game is sound, but these sorts of stories just don't interest me.

Also, could use less of the "PUSH THE ELEVATOR BUTTON, VITO" stuff too.

Popesnax

This demo is so fun

Its like I'm really playing Grand Theft Auto IV, only it is the 1940s, cops don't care if you attack black people and I have a spiffy hat

tofu

Definitely not a PC game, the controls are pretty bad and there is some graphical jank (why can't I enable AA?).

Gonna try it on the 360 later.

LaCabra

subedii wrote: »

Sir Carcass wrote: »

Wow. I ran benchmarks with everything on full (except no AA) at 1920x1080. With PhysX on high, I got an average of 9fps. With it off, I averaged 47fps. I guess PhysX hates ATI.

No PhysX just hates everything. Unless you've got a separate dedicated card for it, running PhsyX off of even a higher end card tends to cause a huge performance drop.

I'm running an Nvidia. With PhysX off I get a pretty solid 50 FPS maxed out (no AA). With it set to medium, that drops to about 17-20 FPS.

With Batman: Arkham Asylum I was able to run alright with medium PhysX, I guess there's just a lot more stuff to process here, with the car physics and the rest of the game world.

I never dropped more than two or three frames on PhysX when I was rockin' a 9800GT. I'm on a 5770 now and it's way more noticable.

Fig-D

tofu wrote: »

Definitely not a PC game, the controls are pretty bad and there is some graphical jank (why can't I enable AA?).

Gonna try it on the 360 later.

There is an AA option in the video menu on the PC. It's only Off and On, however, not the usual x2, x4, etc. Also, you could force it through your video card's display software if you wanted.

I found the controls to be fine, actually. Using Ctrl for cover is a little odd, but I imagine that customizable controls will be in the full game (I hope).

Big Classy

This runs really bad on my PC, slow, janky , driving is horrid.

tofu

Fig-D wrote: »

tofu wrote: »

Definitely not a PC game, the controls are pretty bad and there is some graphical jank (why can't I enable AA?).

Gonna try it on the 360 later.

There is an AA option in the video menu on the PC. It's only Off and On, however, not the usual x2, x4, etc. Also, you could force it through your video card's display software if you wanted.

I found the controls to be fine, actually. Using Ctrl for cover is a little odd, but I imagine that customizable controls will be in the full game (I hope).

Whenever I leave the menu AA always defaults to off.

The on foot controls are alright but the driving controls are bad, even worse than GTA with a keyboard. I couldn't find an option to turn off the awful mouse acceleration either.

Heir

This ran very well on my PC. I've got an ATI 4870 1gb...I had AA on no sweat.

Vehicle controls take a little getting used to on a KBM, but overall I think it looked and played great. Can't wait!

Popesnax

So I never played the first game, but the demo for this one has me interested. Would it be worth purchasing the deluxe version on steam to get it?

Fig-D

You don't have to purchase the Deluxe version to get the original on Steam.