• Mafia II uses PhysX to really bring the destruction

    Devin Coldewey

    Devin Coldewey is a Seattle-based writer and photographer. He has written for the TechCrunch network since 2007. Some posts he’d like you to read: The Dangers of Externalizing Knowledge | Generation i | Surveillant Society | Choose Two | Frame Wars | The User’s Manifesto | Our Great Sin His personal website is coldewey.cc. → Learn More

    Friday, May 28th, 2010


    You might have missed the original Mafia. I thought it was a great game, but people complained about how you had to do mundane missions, stop at stoplights, and of course it was all a little overwrought. But that was all kind of the point. Hopefully they haven’t changed too much with Mafia II — except for making the graphics and physics all kinds of awesome.

    After all, it’s 2010: we shouldn’t be satisfied with bullet decals appearing where we fire a bullet. Our guns should be splintering wood, knocking chairs over, and shattering windows realistically, am I right? We see a bit of this every once in a while (Red Faction: Guerrilla, Crysis) but the implementation in this trailer is simply amazing. They need to make their fire look more real, though. The little tiny fires all over something is very Duke Nukem.

    And just look at that trench coat move!

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