Mafia: The Old Country

Mafia: The Old Country, released in 2025, is an action-adventure game from developer Hangar 13 and publisher 2K. As the fifth main installment in the Mafia series, it serves as a prequel, taking place decades before the original game. The story is set in early 1900s Sicily and follows Enzo Favara, a teenage carusu who gets pulled into the rise and fall of the fictional Torrisi crime family. Critics gave the game mixed reviews, applauding its narrative, characters, Sicilian setting, visuals, and shift back to a linear format, but they took issue with its static open world, outdated gameplay mechanics, repetitive combat, and clichéd plot.

The gameplay is third-person and linear, focusing on story-driven sequences in cinematic environments. This approach brings it closer to *Mafia* and *Mafia II* than the more open-ended *Mafia III*. While mostly linear, players can stray from the main path during certain chapters to explore the surroundings or complete optional objectives.

The game is set in Sicily during the 1900s, around the fictional town of San Celeste—previously seen in *Mafia II*—and explores the origins of the Sicilian Mafia. The narrative centers on Enzo Favara (voiced by Riccardo Frascari), who moves from a childhood of indentured labor as a carusu in Sicily’s sulfur mines to joining the crime family of Don Bernardo Torrisi (Johnny Santiago).

In 1904, 17-year-old Enzo and his friend Gaetano (Giancarlo Sabogal) work as carusi in the sulfur mines owned by Don Ruggero Spadaro (Lane Townsend). They are supervised by Spadaro’s abusive underboss Damiano "Il Merlo" Bastoni and his brother, caporegime Corrado "L'Ombra" Bastoni (both played by Raphael Corkhill). Enzo and Gaetano plan to leave Sicily for a better future, but their scheme fails when a gas leak causes a mine collapse, burying Gaetano alive along with their debt-payment money. Furious that Spadaro and the Bastonis ignored earlier warnings about tremors, Enzo scars Il Merlo in a brief knife fight. He flees the mines, pursued by Spadaro’s men, and hides in a stable. He is found but rescued by Don Bernardo Torrisi. After Torrisi threatens him for trespassing and potentially breaking a truce between the Spadaro and Torrisi families, Il Merlo and L'Ombra back off. Enzo starts working for Torrisi under underboss Luca Trapani (Alberto Frezza).