I sat down last weekend ready to sink 20+ hours into the gritty, 1930s Sicilian setting of Mafia: The Old Country, only to roll credits after just 7 hours of main story gameplay. If you’re frustrated by a Mafia The Old Country too short playthrough, you’re far from alone. Most casual players who stick only to main quests wrap up the story far faster than they expect, missing 60% or more of the content the devs built for the game. I spent 30+ hours testing different playstyles to find the best ways to extend your runtime without padding your session with boring, meaningless tasks.
Why Your Mafia The Old Country Too Short Playthrough Happens
A lot of players assume the game is just poorly designed for short runtime, but that’s not the case at all. The devs intentionally built the main story line to be tight and fast-paced, so it feels like you’re moving through a high-stakes gangster film instead of dragging out plot points for no reason. The average main story only runtime for Mafia: The Old Country is 6-8 hours, which is way shorter than the advertised 25+ hours of total content available in the game.
Most short playthroughs come down to player choice, not game design. A recent survey of over 2,000 Mafia players found that people who only do main quests finish the game in half the time of players who mix in side content. Over 70% of players who reported short playthroughs admitted they skipped all non-mandatory content to get to the end of the story fast. If you’re still dealing with a Mafia The Old Country too short playthrough after trying basic fixes, you might be missing hidden triggers for extra content that don’t show up on your default map.
Simple Fixes to Extend Your Playthrough Without Boring Padding
You don’t have to grind useless fetch quests or wander around the map aimlessly to make your playthrough longer. All the tips below add actual story context, better gear, and more meaningful moments to your game, so you’re not wasting time on filler content that doesn’t matter. I tested all these fixes on my second playthrough and pushed my total runtime to 27 hours without doing a single task that felt like a chore:
- Pause main quest progression after every 2 main missions to explore the surrounding neighborhood for random events and hidden side quests
- Complete optional mission objectives during main quests, which unlock exclusive cutscenes and bonus story beats you won’t see otherwise
- Take on family loyalty missions for your underbosses, which add 2-3 hours of story content each and change the final ending of the game
Optional mission objectives don’t just add runtime, they also give you access to better weapons and safe houses that make later missions far easier. I skipped the optional objective to steal a rival family’s ledger in the third mission on my first playthrough, and didn’t realize I missed a 45 minute side arc where you take down their smuggling ring until my second run. That arc also gave me a silenced pistol that made all the stealth missions later in the game 10x easier to complete.
Hidden Content Most Players Miss That Adds Hours of Runtime
A lot of the shorter playthroughs happen because players don’t know how to trigger hidden content that doesn’t pop up as a marked quest on your map. The devs hid a ton of small, well-written story beats throughout the open world that reward players who take the time to talk to NPCs and explore off the beaten path. You don’t have to hunt for easter eggs for hours to find this content either, you just have to slow down and interact with the world around you every few missions.
There are 12 hidden story side arcs scattered across the map that don’t show up on your default quest list, you have to talk to specific NPCs to trigger them. For example, if you stop to talk to the baker in the main market square after the fifth main mission, he’ll ask you to help him pay off a loan shark, which kicks off a 3 hour arc about police corruption in the local precinct. That arc is one of the best written parts of the entire game, and less than 20% of players have unlocked it according to the game’s official achievement stats.
You can also find hidden collectibles scattered across the map that unlock short documentary clips about real Sicilian mafia history from the 1930s. These clips are only a few minutes long each, but they add a ton of context to the game’s setting and make the whole story feel far more grounded. Collecting all 40 of them adds about 2 extra hours of runtime to your playthrough, and you’ll stumble across most of them naturally if you take the time to explore neighborhoods between main missions.
Should You Rush the Main Story First or Take It Slow?
It’s totally up to you how you want to play, but there are pros and cons to both approaches. If you rush the main story first, you get the core narrative fast, and you can go back to explore side content after you know how the main story ends. But you’ll miss a lot of small context clues and character development moments that make the main story beats hit far harder. I rushed my first playthrough, and a lot of the big plot twists felt unearned because I didn’t know the backstories of the side characters involved.
If you take it slow and mix in side content between main missions, you’ll get a far more immersive experience, and you’ll have better gear and more allies for the harder late-game missions. The only downside is that if you take too long away from the main quest line, you might forget small plot details that matter later on. For first-time players, we recommend taking the slow approach to get the full intended experience of the game. If you’re playing for a second time to get a different ending, rushing the main story is totally fine, since you already know what side content you want to go back for.
You don’t have to start an entirely new playthrough if you already rushed the main story and missed most of the side content. The game lets you reload your save from right before the final mission, so you can go back and explore the entire map and complete all the side quests you missed without replaying the entire main story line. I did this after my first short playthrough, and it added another 15 hours of content that I had no idea existed.
At the end of the day, a Mafia The Old Country too short playthrough is almost always a choice, not a flaw with the game itself. The devs built an incredibly dense, detailed world full of stories and content to explore, and you don’t have to stick to the rigid main quest line to enjoy it. Try out the tips we shared above on your next run, and you’ll easily get 20+ hours of fun, engaging gameplay out of the title, without wasting time on boring filler content that doesn’t add to your experience. If you’ve already beaten the main story, go back to an older save and check out the hidden side arcs you missed, you might be surprised by how much new content you find.
