Gangsters 2: Vendetta is sequel to Hothouse’s Gangsters, released a couple of years ago by Eidos. If you don't remember the original Gangsters, Gangsters 2 makes the jump to fully-realized RTS gameplay, while the original used a mix of RTS and turn-based gaming. In the huge single-player campaign, you assume the role of Joey Bane, a WWI vet who's returned home to Buffalo Falls during the 1930s Prohibition era. After his father is gunned down whilst trying to earn a few dollars running liquor for the mob (which was illegal during that time) and Joey's uncle is also badly wounded, Bane tracks down and slays the gangsters who pulled the trigger that killed his father, then sets out to kill Cain Langham, the top mobster and the man who gave the order for the execution.
The game goal is to create a criminal empire in the fictional, Chicago-like city of New Temperance. You have to do lots of things such an analyzing a large array of message windows, graphs, charts, and plan the coming week's strategy while keeping an eye on your competition across town. You also issue orders to your criminals, telling them to recruit new faces, extort money from local business, or take out enemy mobsters, all with the goal of raising profits and gaining territory. Your gangsters are specialized in areas such as explosives, running rackets, assassination and the art of  persuasion ..I wish to control so many smart guys in real life to protect me :) Fortunately the game is not only a static, you can switch to a real-time mode, where you watch and aid your thugs at work (hehe Crime doesn't pay ) in an animated 2D city. It's probably the biggest difference in comparison with the original game). In addition Gangsters 2 features day and night, context sensitive orders, multiple cities, specialist skills (see above), the family tree, non-grid cities, street maps, weapons bombs and much more. The street maps are probably most important thing in the game. There are now several levels of magnification for the overhead view city maps. I bet you will need it, because play this game without maps is quite impossible :( You can get a truly micro or macro view of the city. Maps have been rotated by 45° so movement of people on the overhead map matches the isometric view. Hothouse claims more intuitive interface in Gangsters 2 - Well, maybe I'm crazy, but the interface in Gangsters 2 sucked me badly, especially movements and map navigation, though the interface is very simple-most actions require only one click.
So, is gameplay is cool or sucks? Well, the scenarios don't offer much variety (look at screenshots), though they'll get bigger, and the enemy will get stronger. I spent couple of hours with this game and I found many various frustrations. For example , if you will want to hire business manager, you must do several annoying steps instead simply hire a manager directly from the building screen. Also combat is pretty boring and ability to control you gangsters are very limited. So I cannot say this game rocks or something like that...To find more about this controversial let download this playable demo (152.6MB).