A 2016 open-world game is now free for some PS5 users, who are set to bypass a $30 purchase on the PlayStation Store in the process. The PS5 game is specifically free for those who own a PS4 copy, and rather than charge an upgrade fee or make owners rebuy the game, as many others have, the publisher of the game is offering free upgrades. What makes this more noteworthy is the fact that it’s a 10-year-old game. When free upgrades are offered, it’s often for games more recently released than this. On top of this, this new PS5 version has dozens of upgrades and additions, which normally come with an upgrade fee.
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As for the game in question, which is free for seemingly millions of PS5 users, it’s Hangar 13 and 2K Games’ open-world action-adventure crime game, Mafia III, which, on PS5, is known as Mafia III: Definitive Edition. This new version has progression improvements, better NPC and companion behaviour, improved checkpoints, changes to vehicles, improved mission scripting, improved lighting, improved draw distance, better physics, and more. It’s not being dubbed a remaster, but it’s certainly a substantial upgrade on the PS4 version of the game. And all of this is free, similar to a new PS5 exclusive.
An Underrated 2016 Game
Mafia III was released in 2016 as the sequel to Mafia II, the third game in the series, and the first game from Hangar 13, primarily comprised of many 2K Czech developers, which previously made the series. To this end, many of the developers who previously made the Mafia games were absorbed into Hangar 13 when the team was closed, though some went on to found Warhorse Studios, the makers of the Kingdom Come: Deliverance games.
Mafia III is considered the weakest game in the series, and by some margin at the time of its release. Since then, Hangar 13 released Mafia: The Old Country in 2025, which was of a similar level, but it was off the mark compared to its two predecessors. To this end, it has a Metacritic range of 62 to 68. A considerable contributor to its underwhelming scores was its substantial technical issues at launch, all of which have been mostly smoothed out. This is to say, it’s created an under-rating of the game, as perhaps best evidenced by its solid 4.1 out of 5 stars on the PlayStation Store after more than 63,000 user reviews.
In the game, you play as Lincoln Clay, a veteran returning from combat in Vietnam, betrayed by the Italian Mafia, which has left his surrogate family, the Black Mob, dead. Seeking revenge, Clay must put together a new family and take down the mafiosi responsible. And it’s a pretty good story, with solid performances and some great set pieces and scenes along the way. Where the game struggles sometimes is with its open-world design, which was dated and lackluster in 2016, and even more so in 2026.
Those who decide to check it out via this new release will get not just the base game, but all of the DLC. Not even including the DLC, Mafia III is 20 to 50 hours long, depending primarily on how much side content is engaged with, away from the main story, which represents the bottom end of the range.
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Courtesy of Ubisoft
