We all know about the checkered past of movie licensed videogames, but as the two forms of entertainment merge closer and closer with one another, games based on movies (and other licenses) have finally started to come around as viable sources of quality gaming. Further exemplifying that fact is EA Redwood Shores' impressive videogame interpretation of the classic film (and book), The Godfather. While The Godfather borrows liberally from the Grand Theft Auto mold of open-world, sandbox gameplay, it does so in a way that doesn't feel like a cheap knockoff, by impressively putting the renowned license into action and tying it all together with solid gameplay mechanics and a wealth of content that stands out on its own as a thoroughly entertaining gaming experience.

As you'd expect, the game follows the plot of the film fairly closely, including all of the timeless scenes that fans will instantly recognize thanks to EA's painstakingly authentic cut scene work, including scenes such as the horse head in the bed and Sonny being ambushed and pumped full of lead at the tollbooth. Instead of playing through these classic scenes as one of the lead characters, though, you witness these events from the film in the role of an up-and-coming enforcer for the Corleone family, who has goals to ascend through the family ranks all the way up to Don status.

The movie plot is actually more of a backdrop to the game, which is both good and bad - good in that it expands on the license instead of simply repeating it, but bad because the storyline of the game doesn't always feel like it is as well emphasized as it should've been. It takes around eight to ten hours to get through all of the story missions, and after that there isn't anything plot-related to back up the rest of the game's twenty or so additional hours of completing all side missions and finding all bonus collectibles. This won't bother casual fans of the film, or gamers looking at this title simply as something fun to sink hours of their free time into, but the most diehard Godfather aficionados expecting to see the epic narrative of the film recreated in its exact form down to the very last detail may feel a bit disappointed with some of the liberties taken in the adaptation process.

Before beginning your stint in the Corleone family, you first must create a character to take up the ranks, and with EA's MobFace tool you can create your own personalized mobster in extensive detail. Similar in execution as EA's GameFace technology, The Godfather's MobFace is packed with a miraculously in-depth set of character creation tools and settings. Everything can be tweaked and adjusted to your liking. Basic settings like skin and eye color, hairstyle, facial hair and body size are present; however, the system goes so much more in depth than that with sliders for adjusting the shape, size and angle for every facial feature there is, such as the forehead, eyes, brow, cheeks, ears, nose, mouth, lips, chin and jaw. You can even add blemishes like moles and scars if you want. Better yet, many of the facial feature settings start with a basic selection of sliders for minor tweaking, yet also feature advanced options at the touch of a button that allow for further adjustment of every little detail. After a character has been created in terms of body and facial features, you can then purchase and outfit your mobster with period apparel, like shirts, coats, vests, pants, hats, shoes and glasses. I wouldn't go as far as saying MobFace is as robust as GameFace, but it's pretty damn close. If you're prone to the addiction of character creation options, you'll be in heaven here; you can easily spend an hour or two in the creation process alone.

Once you've created your personalized Corleone mobster, you're tossed into a living, breathing recreation of 1940s New York. You'll soon be running and driving around the massive city, much like the GTA games, pulling off jobs, hijacking cars, outracing the cops, killing innocent people (if you want) and engaging in a variety of other activities. The story missions have you playing out major events from the movie, and these are quite linear, but the bulk of the gameplay revolves around you freelancing around the city in the name of the Corleone family, extorting businesses, taking over illegal rackets and warehouses, robbing banks, engaging in mob wars and performing hits on contracted targets, all to earn respect, as well as the almighty dollar. Negotiating with lowly shop owners, either via diplomacy or roughing up them and their shop, and taking over rackets, such as gambling rings, brothels, counterfeiting operations and weapons dealers, nets you a weekly income that can be used to bribe cops to look away and FBI agents to stop mob wars, or to buy weapon upgrades and new clothing.

More important than any dollar amount in the world of The Godfather is respect, however; you can't make it in this gritty life without it. Every action, job and mission you engage in boosts your respect level, and as it increases you gain skill points to upgrade your character, much like an RPG. Points can be put towards skills in fighting, shooting, health, speed and street smarts, and as each of these attributes increases, your mobster gains new benefits and abilities. Also in an RPG-lite manner, your mobster rises in rank as you progress, going from Outsider, Associate, Soldier, Capo and Underboss to the Don, and eventually Don of NYC (at 100% game completion). None of these ranks have any direct impact on how your character evolves in a physical sense, but it's still nice to know you are always progressing based on your actions.

In The Godfather, NYC is separated into five main areas run by the five major families. As a member of the Corleone family, your turf rests in Little Italy. The Tattaglia family runs Brooklyn, the Cuneo family takes up shop in Hell's Kitchen, the Stracci family rests in New Jersey and the Brazini family resides in Midtown, and throughout the game you're at constant war with these other families for citywide domination. By striking a specific family's turf, your Vendetta level rises, and once your attacks reach the breaking point then the Vendetta level caps out and a full on mob war begins between the Corleones and whichever other family you've been targeting. Once a mob war has been started, a time limit for the war is posted and you and any other Corleone member entering the opposing family's territory will be open game for an all-out assault, so be careful. To end the war you must destroy one of the opposition's major installations or find an FBI agent to bribe - but if you don't do either before the time limit expires, you will lose the war and your operation and businesses will take a serious hit.

As far as actual gameplay mechanics go, The Godfather plays similarly to other third-person action games of this type, with a few interesting twists and tweaks to spice things up. Melee combat has received the most unique touching up, thanks to what EA calls BlackHand control. In what seems like paying homage to the Fight Night series, melee actions are tied to the analog sticks, not the face or shoulder buttons. After locking onto a target, the right analog stick becomes your fists, and by pushing the analog stick in different angles you perform different types of punches. For example, pushing the stick forward performs quick punches, while pulling back on the stick before pushing forward winds the punch up for a much stronger blow. Going even deeper, you can grab targets while locking onto them and bash their head into a desk, slam them into a wall, toss them over a ledge, execute them with a stranglehold or crack of the neck, or simply throw them onto the ground. It's a very slick system of melee mechanics and it handles remarkably well, so don't go worrying that this is some sort of crummy analog fighting system like that found in Death by Degrees or anything like that.

Shooting is an important aspect of the gameplay as well, and its mechanics are handled equally as wonderfully - well, for the most part. The shooting portions emphasize the use of cover and a typical lock-on targeting system to get the job done, and generally speaking the gun battles in The Godfather are quite intense and challenging. The lock-on system can have some issues when attempting to take out a handful of goons amidst a crowd of innocent bystanders, but overall the system works well, and when it doesn't you can switch into manual targeting to pinpoint your aim with precision. Enemy AI also has its spotty moments, but again, nine times out of ten you're dealing with tough enemies that know how to use cover to make your aim of taking them out much more difficult. Really, the only thing I continually found myself hassling with was the inventory system; pressing left and right on the d-pad cycles through your stock of weapons, ranging from pistols, shotguns and Tommy Guns to dynamite, Molotov cocktails and baseball bats, with down and up keyed to brandishing and concealing the selected weapon respectively. The problem here is that in the middle of a heated battle or immediately after leaving a vehicle, cycling through the inventory can be somewhat sluggish, which can cause aggravating deaths when enemies start swarming your position and you need to pull out or change weapons in a hurry.

Another bothersome element, for me anyway, is the travel. While the driving mechanics and controls are fine, there are only a few different car models in the entire game, and although the game world is gigantic, it always seems like you are traveling back and forth between the same handful of locations. And since the playing area is so large, traveling from point to point can take a few minutes, which makes the frequent backtracking become tedious after a while. Speaking of recycled models, the interior level designs leave a lot to be desired; buildings are separated into categories, such as warehouses, shops, banks, hotels, family compounds and so on, and while each building type is unique from the next, every building in the same category is exactly the same. This means that every single warehouse you enter is exactly the same as the next, and that trend continues down the line. Essentially, once you've memorized a building layout you know what to expect from there on out, and so certain portions of the game can grow fairly predictable. I'm sure EA had to recycle these interiors as much as possible due to the streaming gameplay engine (there are no load times during gameplay whatsoever), but come on, at least change the layouts up a little.

Fortunately, the open-ended nature of the game world didn't affect the quality of the graphical capabilities, as The Godfather is a fine looking game for its genre. The environmental geometry is a touch on the rudimentary side and some of the character animations are a bit stiff; however, the characters themselves look stunning, especially those created using the likenesses of the actors from the film, and 1940s New York is rendered with tremendous authenticity to the time period and source material. The game also boasts a solid draw distance and cool special effects, such as papers blowing along the city streets, steam spewing up through manhole covers and layers of cigar smoke fogging up indoor settings. The audio is also handled quite well, headed by vocal performances from many of the major actors from the film, including James Caan, Robert Duvall, Abe Vigoda and Marlon Brando himself. The musical score is taken straight from the movie, but although it sounds great and lends the needed authenticity to the source, the main theme and only a few other tracks are repeated far too often.

One final topic I haven't touched on enough is the expansive content and high replayability. Yes, the main collection of twenty-plus story missions last roughly ten hours, but after that you'll be spending at least two or three times as many hours striving for 100% game completion and the ultimate ascension to Don of NYC. The Godfather is loaded with side missions and collectibles: 100 safes to crack, 24 safe houses to purchase (they act as save points mainly), 22 execution styles to perform, 100 film reels to find (which unlock clips from the movie), 20 contract hits to cash in on, 6 bank heists to pull off, additional weapon upgrades to buy at Black Market dealers and countless businesses to extort, rackets to take over and apparel items to buy - I think you get the picture. Even better, if you spend the extra ten bucks to pick up the special limited edition version, you'll get more than your money's worth out of the included bonus DVD that features strategy insights on the gameplay, behind-the-scenes interviews and voiceover sessions with James Caan and Robert Duvall, "Making of the Game" videos, concept art and other features fans of The Godfather will not want to be without.

The Godfather does base a lot of what it has to offer on the GTA formula, and because of that there really isn't anything incredibly new or innovative here that'll wow you out of your seat. However, in its use of the Godfather license, and its subsequent introduction of stylized touches and gameplay mechanics, this doesn't come across as a blatant GTA rip-off, like so many other big-named copycat franchises continue to do. The Godfather is no imitator, but instead a completely successful expansion upon the genre that Rockstar built, and for that EA certainly deserves a lot of credit. I'll admit, I had been exceedingly worried about how the game would turn out leading up to its release, but now that it has finally arrived we can all sit back and enjoy the satisfying gameplay experience that it delivers.

Reviewed by Matt Litten for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).