In the years following World War I, Prohibition turned alcohol into a forbidden elixir that fueled countless criminal enterprises. Omerta embraces this seedy life, making you a young Mafioso fresh off the boat from Sicily, eager to carve off a piece of that action.
Of course, no one looking to build an empire would content themselves with a basement brewery or bathtub gin, and every ambitious boss needs minions. Recruit like-minded ruffians and grease local palms for info on rental properties and rivals, and you’re on your way. As you glide above the disappointingly sterile streets of Atlantic City, you’ll pump booze through everything from speakeasies and nightclubs to boxing clubs and casinos.
You’ll start from scratch whenever you dominate a district and move on to fresh turf, but with 28 businesses to erect, there’s room to develop your preferred money-making strategy. Even so, you’ll spend most of your time sending goons on simple assignments such as bribing cops and laundering money through corrupt politicians, or dropping dirty money on efficiency upgrades for your various ventures — and sadly, it’s not nearly as exciting as you’d think.
It’s hard to deny the satisfaction of putting bullets into KKK swine.
Want to grab lots of loot in a hurry? Plunder the riches hidden in the vault of the local bank. You’ll have to murder any armed guards who stand between your crew and your getaway car, but a successful score nets thousands of dollars.Across an almost 30-hour campaign, the most visual feedback you can expect is an ant-sized celebrity performer awkwardly kicking her heels on the sidewalk, or a tiny sedan sputtering gunfire during bloodless, blink-and-you’ll-miss-’em drive-bys. Indeed, there’s frequently little to do but twiddle your thumbs while you wait for money to stream into your coffers or henchmen to return from assignments.
The occasional turn-based tactical shootout could’ve injected some much-needed verve, but the arbitrarily frugal placement of cover points too often forces your thugs to stand out in the open, and questionable line-of-sight will make you curse the inability to save in the middle of an engagement. Those frustrations are also present in simple online multiplayer shenanigans — where two pals work together to rob banks and free incarcerated allies, or murder one another in gang wars and warehouse cash grabs — and they remain just as aggravating. But at least you’ll get to feast your eyes on something more enticing than barely populated streets and fluctuating bank balances. In Omerta, they’re an unfortunate fact of life.
Multiplayer prison breaks require more than a little luck: the joint is packed with cops.PUBLISHER: Kalypso Media • DEVELOPER: Haemimont Games • ESRB: Teen • MULTIPLAYER: 2 on Xbox Live • ACHIEVEMENTS: Slow • COST: $50 • RELEASE DATE: February 12, 2013
+ 28 different businesses to build and supply; decent multiplayer.
– Most gameplay involves endlessly sending out goons to run errands as you watch from afar.
– Dull presentation; inexplicably sparse cover points; poor line-of-sight; no saving mid-combat.
? Who brings brass knuckles to a gunfight?
lemieux
February 13, 2013 at 11:21am
I will admit I wanted this game to be awesome. My dreams of it being like the late 90's PC game called Gangsters quickly were crushed after playing the PC demo.
Oh it was a nightmare. Bad controls. Bad camera. Bad everything.
All Calypso had to do was update Gangsters to todays standards and they would have had an amazing hit. Personly, would have purchased every DLC they put out and loved it.
Fact they failed on this game is pretty sad. It had money generator all over it. Pure cash cow.
Now its just dead in the mud.
