Mafia: The Old Country

About

“Uncover the origins of organized crime in Mafia: The Old Country, a gritty mob story set in the brutal underworld of 1900s Sicily. Fight to survive as Enzo Favara and prove your worth to the Family in this immersive third-person action-adventure set during a dangerous, unforgiving era.

Enzo will do anything for a better life. After a brutal childhood of forced labor, he’s ready to risk everything to become a man of honor in the Torrisi crime family.

His oath to the Mafia, with all the power, temptation, and hardship it entails, is a burning reminder of this simple truth:

Family Takes Sacrifice.

This thrilling narrative is brought to life by stunning visuals, cinematic storytelling, and the authentic realism that the critically acclaimed Mafia series is known for. Enzo’s story unfolds in a time when skill with a stiletto blade was a deadly asset, a lupara sawed-off shotgun was a go-to firearm, murderous vendettas raged for decades, and mafiosi patrolled their protection rackets on foot, horseback, or behind the wheel of turn-of-the-century motorcars.” – Mafia: The Old Country 2K splash page.

Role

On Mafia: The Old Country, I joined as a designer focused on identifying bugs, cleaning up scenes, refining game mechanics and ensuring the game was released in a stable state, passing certification on its first pass.

To achieve this, I spent a few weeks learning how the game was setup and their custom systems to control the flow of the narrative and track player states, the in-game cutscene managers, zone blocking, and the diegetic GPS system seen in other Mafia titles.

Once the game entered content lock, I started prototyping in their systems for the free roam update that was released at the end of 2025, creating tools and systems for the various combat and race encounters they would like to see.

Responsibilities

• Identify the source of known bugs
• Replicate and solve any bugs I found in testing
• Collab with other departments to find the best solutions to problems
• Support fellow designers in solving bugs similar to those I had fixed before
• Refining level mechanics to tighten the story and game experience
• Communicate issues hidden deep within the setup with Hangar 13 designers for awareness
• Find solutions to complex problems and work with other departments to find the best solution

Contributions

As a bug fixer working with Hangar 13, my primary role was to work through the backlog of issues based on the priority set by production, working with them to identify what would be a simple fix for me or something that would need a fundamental change to the core system and thus be risky so close to their content complete lock.