Summary
WhileGrand Theft Auto 6 has been delayed into 2026, gamers will still be able to get their crime simulator fix withMafia: The Old Country. The game,which was originally unveiled last August, willseemingly release this upcoming August, according to a leak on Steam.
The next entry in the long-running Mafia franchise is slated to get a full gameplay trailer next week on May 8 at PAX East, with an informational panel to follow that same day. Ahead of that reveal, a trailer posted on social media has shared that the game will launch with in-game purchases, or microtransactions.
In the Mafia Twitter account’s latest post teasing the upcoming panel, the opening of the trailer reveals the game’s ESRB rating (M for Mature), plus the “In-Game Purchases” disclaimer.
Unfortunately,the game’s ESRB rating page doesn’t shed any light on what those purchases could be. It does, however, give a glimpse at the kind of gameplay loop that will be present, with knives, pistols and shotguns being named as weapons, and extortion, theft and murder as activities.
That said,per the ESRB’s rating descriptor page, “In-Game Purchases” are defined as the following:
Contains in-game offers to purchase digital goods or premiums with real world currency, including, but not limited to, bonus levels, skins, music, virtual coins and other forms of in-game currency, subscriptions, season passes and upgrades (e.g., to disable ads).
In other words, there could be post-launch content whichother Mafia games have had in the form of story DLC, ordigital goods, like vehicles or weapons, which Mafia 2 famously had as DLC.
At the very least, there won’t be any dreaded Loot Boxes. Per the ESRB, games with Loot Boxes will have the “In-Game Purchases” descriptor, plus an additional “Includes Random Items” tag. Still, for a game that will be a single-player experience through and through, and will likely start at $69.99, the idea of there being in-game purchases before the game has even had a full reveal isn’t the best start.
