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Mafia 3

Mafia 3 is a game that wants to portray the times of 1960s New Orleans. To do so,
they had to go a step further into portraying the abuse of black people, and how the racism
was affecting them. And as the player of this game, you will experience it first hand, as
you walk through the streets of the fictional New Orleans, New Bordeaux after your
personal goal. Yet the first thing that appears when starting the game is a message from the
creators of the game, the studio Hangar 13. The message reads:

"Mafia 3 takes place in a fictionalized version of the American South in 1968. We

sought to create an authentic and immersive experience that captures this very turbulent
time and place, including depictions of racism."

This message clearly states how the developers have seen this as an issue, but
decided to include it to portray what such aggression does to a person, and how they were
perceived back then.

The Developers at Hangar 13 did speak about how and why they had to include
racism in their game, and their response was:

“Most importantly, we felt that to not include this very real and shameful part of
our past would have been offensive to the millions who faced — and still face — bigotry,
discrimination, prejudice, and racism in all its forms."

Our protagonist, is a black man, a Vietnam Veteran, named Lincoln Clay, which was
trained by special forces and under the CIA initiative.

The story of the game unfolds as a documentary, as each time we advance slighty
closer to our goal, cutscenes take over and we see the aftermath of our story, bit by bit, as it
slowly unfolds. The most interesting line said by a character, Father James, the one who
raised Lincoln Clay, as he was an orphan, abandoned by his mother and nothing is known
about his father, points out to say that Lincoln was not entirely black, but biracial. Half
white half black. And cement the understanding of racism of those times, Father James
follows that with:"Not that it mattered — back then if you look black, you black. Same as
today, I suppose."

So you are told that you will be treated as a problem , as an outsider from the start.
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As we know, racism cannot be complete without racist groups that use the
Confederate flag or use a series of racist slurs toward our protagonist. Such a group is the
Dixie gang, a group under the Italian Mafia that controls the underworld of the city.

Watchdogs 2

The game is a surprising work of art in terms of story told, and how it handles the
aggression encountered by black people in the modern age.

One interesting instance of micro aggression is during a mission when the DedSec
group steals a Knight-Rider type of car that is a prop for a movie, as we all know the
Knight Rider from the 1982 TV Series, Including the 2015 reboot of the series, with only
one season sadly. The mission seems fine and on point, until the car talks to our
protagonist and tells him that it cannot recognize him because his skin is too dark. This
points out to maybe unintentional flaws in our technology, or maybe some darker intent
behind it.

The Turning point of how they tackled racism was during a mission when Marcus
Holloway had to infiltrate a company tech company named Nudle, being a satirical version
of a huge company, in Silicon Valley, with his only other black hacker by his side, Horatio.
Marcus tells Horatio that he is scared. Then Horatio questions his statement by asking him
why is he scared? Marcus replies with : “Nobody here looks like us.” This points out to a
major issue in the work environment in the world. This is not a necessity to hire more
racial diversity, but to also acknowledge the merits of other individuals and hire them for
their performance. And to tackled the issue, Horatio makes use of some humor, saying a
rather interesting joke: “Hey man, what do you call a black man surrounded by white
people?" the answer that followed was “Mr. President.” This directly acknowledged the
ability and responsibility of an individual, making their race a trivial matter. Simply put, in
this day and age, race is not a huge issue anymore, just a minor one. Some people prefer to
play the victim, others are bigots and are aggressive against others that are not the same as
them.

As they enter the cafeteria, Horatio is “welcomed” by a fellow employee that is

suspicious of Horatio, as on his own set of principles, black individuals are involved in
illegal businesses. Thus, Horatio is under his suspicion of illegal activity within the
company. He keeps pressuring Horatio with his accusations, and says that if he is not
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willing to tell him the truth, maybe he would like to be honest with the ones in Human
Resources, denoting to spill the truth while he`s being investigate/fired.

There is a powerful contrast between how racism is depicted in Mafia 3 and

Watchdogs2, as it denotes the way the world evolved from the 1960s and towards 2016.
Racism was strong and extremely hurtful to Afro-Americans during the 1960s, and slowly
declined its intensity as time passed, yet it never disappeared. Nowadays racism is not
gone, but subtle, hidden behind other words.