Mafia II: Jimmy's Vendetta DLC Review

It’s not been two weeks since Mafia II entered our hearts and emptied our wallets and already there is a cross-platform DLC release. What I, and I’m sure countless others are thinking is, can this new addition bring anything new to the game?

The short answer is yes.

Jimmy's Vendetta follows Jimmy, the mafia’s 'go-to guy'. After he is betrayed and thrown into jail, he promptly escapes and seeks revenge on those who have wronged him. That's where you come in. Your job, as Jimmy, is to play out his revenge whilst racking up points for a multitude of actions, but more on the points system later.

This DLC consists of 30 new missions, a few added items of clothing, one or two new cars, 20 extra garage spaces and best of all, free roam. Now, don’t get your hopes up too fast, these missions are not like the original game. These consist of you going to a floating marker, being given a brief two-line description on why you are doing what you are, then accepting. The missions will consist of killing members of a certain family, disrupting certain family’s trade routes or stealing a car. If you’re lucky, you get a mix of the three. At the end of each mission you are given your score and a rank which then loads into the leaderboard where you can compare your scores with others. Your score is based on the kills, headshots, speed, drifts, getting air time in vehicles, condition of the car you delivered (dependant on the mission) and last but not least, how fast you finished the mission. You can also go back at anytime to floating markers (they’re shown on your map as stars) and retry the mission to try and improve your score. You also get an overall score which is based on all the actions you perform from the list above outside of missions.

The missions that you are given, like I said earlier, are pretty simple; this doesn’t mean that they’re all easy though. I found myself getting increasingly frustrated as I continuously died in a mission (or even worse, on my way to a mission) which then means I am sent back to my last save point. With that said, these were few and far between, for the most part it’s pretty simple and enjoyable, if not a tad repetitive.

The main focus of this game, in my view, is speed. There is a new upgrade for your cars which is called ‘Super-Charged’, allowing you to reach higher speeds (and plants a super-charger on your bonnet), the missions are much shorter and much more action packed and the police seem a lot more on edge than usual. Along with this, the points system awards you for doing things fast or being generally reckless. It does make a nice change to the gameplay of the original though, which isn’t always a bad thing.

This DLC does have it’s flaws (as much as I would love for it not to). There are some quite substantial bugs such as certain indestructible vehicles, hands with the power of pistols and disappearing police. There is also a lack of collectibles. With the original Mafia II, you could collect Playboy magazines and wanted posters scattered throughout the missions and city. In Jimmy’s Vendetta you are unable to collect either of these and there are no new collectibles in their place. I found this unusual as these were quite a large part of the re-playability within the original.

Jimmy’s Vendetta has gone in a completely different direction to Mafia II which I found odd. The game mechanics have completely changed and it raises the question: could they have made this DLC in a fortnight or has it been in development longer? I ask this because it seems to have all the aspects that Mafia II left out, the biggest of all being free roam (followed by the points system). Could this be a ploy to make us, the consumer, spend more money on the franchise or did 2K Czech take comments into consideration over the past two weeks and act accordingly?

Overall, Jimmy’s Vendetta is a must for all the Mafia II fans and if you didn’t really enjoy Mafia II, I suggest giving this one a try anyway. Given, it’s a tad pricey for a ‘try’ but believe me, it’s worth it. Yes, there is a lack of story and yes it does seem a bit suspicious that it’s got everything Mafia II didn’t. On the other hand you have fast cars, easy missions, free roam and high-speed chases along with a leaderboard system adding an air of competitiveness into the mix.