Recent reviews by Difficulty Tweak

Compared to Mafia 1 (DE, anyways) and Mafia 2, Mafia 3 is derivative as ♥♥♥♥. It's got a million different Ubisoft open world collectathon ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ things with it, a ton of mechanics from previous games were stripped out (police escalation -- a traffic violation warrants a death sentence in New Bordeaux, apparently, and don't hand me that ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ about the cops being bought out by Sal, because they were bought out in Mafia 1 too and they didn't gun you down on sight), vehicle customization, and the general way of progressing through the story. Not to mention the absolutely braindead AI (seriously, I played on hard and the AI basically never reacted when I shot someone with the Silentium, meaning stealth was boring and obnoxiously easy.) Other ideas like varied police response times depending on the neighborhood you're in (rich/white or poor/black) are neat in theory, ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ awful in execution, same with civilians running to the phone. One could be close enough to spot any crime you commit, but far enough away that you won't catch them before they run to the phone, and the next thing you know there are five cops on your ass in ten seconds. The police system is generally miserable and the AI are retarded -- I saw at least 40 civilians dive directly into the path of my car to then get run over and killed, leading to a call to the cops.

It so desperately wants to be a Far Cry game and that comes with all of the resulting baggage of open world fatigue.

That being said, this is still a positive review because I found the story to be quite enjoyable in spite of the massive ♥♥♥♥♥♥ that is the game itself. John Donovan easily embedded himself with Joe from Mafia 2 and the Definitive Edition Paulie as one of my favorite characters in the entire series. The character writing is very strong and the story is decent, and while I used to turn my nose up at the story for what I perceived to be "woke ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥" when it came out (mostly because I was young and stupid), I've long since come around to it and Lincoln is an interesting enough protagonist.

joe barbaro gets kicked out of a diner for being racist

swarthoid simulator

this is the most 7/10 game i've ever played

pcGODS... we WON...

Gundam Breaker 4 is a thing now. There is no reason to buy this ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ anymore.

do the wagie waggle as you watch your friend charge into a sentry turret with a sign and then get shot to death like a dog in the street

i have a primal urge to kill

i didnt know that games could not only still come out looking like early ps3 games, but also have netcode worse than ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ 2009 MW2. why the ♥♥♥♥ is this ♥♥♥♥ peer to peer?

imagine being blizzard team 4
you stop updating ow1 and leave it to die to focus on ow2
you want ow2 to be *the* definitive game with the expected singleplayer content
you announce and design all this stuff for this single player mode
you release ow2 early to get it into peoples hands while you work on singleplayer
when ow2 inevitably begins to stumble because you don't know how to balance ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ (kiriko), you continue to double down on bad decisions
you realize you cannot deliver on your promises because your team is incompetently managed and too small
you quietly try and pull the plug on the singleplayer content to replace it with the same PVE events you've done before in the past
you charge people $15 for it
you are surprised when there is backlash
you are now ♥♥♥♥♥♥
could absolutely ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ NOT be blizzard team 2 lol