Overview
The Sopranos: Road to Respect is an action game adaptation of the HBO crime drama series The Sopranos. It was developed by 7 Studios and published by THQ as an exclusive to PlayStation 2 in 2006.
The game serves as a side-story to the TV show, taking place between seasons five and six. You play as Joey LaRocca, the illegitimate son of Sal "Big Pussy" Bonpensiero, an infamous rat in the Soprano crew. After attempting to rob a pedestrian outside of Satriale's butcher shop, Joey is taken under the wing of Tony Soprano. The game has you completing missions for him, most of which are comprised of be-em-up levels. The game was released on the Playstation 2 November 7, 2006 and was developed by 7 Studios and published by THQ and HBO.
Gameplay
The missions in The Sopranos: Road to Respect mainly consist of beat 'em up style combat throughout. You're given a gun, but using it too many times during a mission will ultimately cause you to lose all of your respect, and thus getting "whacked" via cutscene by Tony and the gang. There are a few chase missions that ultimately lead up to you using the gun in a primitive targeting mini-game. A target reticle is placed on the screen and you must aim it correctly to pull off the shot. There are also timed button press finishers that can be performed when near an object such as a file cabinet, toilet, or table saw. When the player has worn an enemy down significantly, they can proceed to finish them off by performing a gruesome finisher. There is also a poker mini-game accessible from the game's main menu in which you play against the Soprano crew.
Synopsis
Setting
The Sopranos: Road to Respect takes place between the fifth and sixth seasons of the TV series.
Plot
Joey LaRocca attempts to rob a purse from a vacant car until he is stopped by Tony Soprano outside of Satriale's Pork Store. Tony contronts him inside the store and chastises Joey for his decisions, bringing up how his father would be ashamed if he were still alive. After some reconcilation, Tony offers Joey up for some work in his crew.
Some time later, Joey LaRocca beats up a drunken patron of the Bada Bing! nightclub under the orders of Silvio Dante for harassing one of the strippers. Shortly thereafter, Joey goes around the club taking sandwich orders from Tony & crew. As Joey visits Paulie Walnuts in the main lounge, he gets into an argument with a patron for insulting him which leads into a beatdown in the bathroom. Joey takes over from Paulie in beating the man up, but unintentionally kills him which angers Paulie. He orders Joey to clean up the mess he made with the help of his old friend Reggie.
The pair take the body and drive to the docks, take care of a security guard and go through the restricted area where they plan to dump the body into the ocean. As they find some chains to weigh the body down, Joey and Reggie return to see that the man is still alive. They track him down his blood trails and Joey shoots the man dead. While Reggie loots his corpse just before they dump him, they find out that the man's name is Mario from his watch that Reggie keeps as a souvenir. Once Joey dumps the body and Reggie returns for the car, Joey sees a brief vision of his dead father Big Pussy - who gives some brief words of encouragement to his son.
Joey and Reggie head for the Nighthorse casino to stash Mario's car, until Reggie manages to lose the watch to a prostitute. Joey fights through floors of thugs and pimps in order to retrieve the stolen watch. Meanwhile, it becomes known within the Soprano crew that the guy Joey killed was a close relative to Angelo "Angie" Buscetta, the head of a mafia family in Philadelphia.
As Joey and Christopher Moltisanti arrive at a gym to collect on payments and get some action in on the gym owner's steroid selling business, Joey rekindles a relationship with Trishelle. Sometime after, Joey confronts Reggie and chases him through his apartment and onto the rooftops in order to kill him. The player can choose to kill or spare Reggie, but he is killed eitherway at the hands of Tuzzio who also targets Joey. After a quick fight, Tuzzio falls several stories down to the ground and is seriously injured.
At a Bar Mitzvah at Vesuvio's, Joey meets up with A.J. Soprano who offers some security work for one of his upcoming rave parties. Joey agrees to the offer and fights of unruly guests at the party, Jamaican gangsters arrive as a drug deal goes wrong and A.J.'s friend is killed in front of him. They steal A.J.'s car (which actually belongs to Tony), and Joey tries to find a lead on the car soon after.
Once Tony's SUV is found through the body shop, it is quickly stolen again outside of Neil's law firm. Joey tracks the Jamaican gangsters down at the gym and A.J. tries to fight them, but is injured in a scuffle. As A.J. arrives at hospital in a stable condition, an enraged Tony demands answers from Joey. Meanwhile, Joey finds out from Angie that Tuzzio is also at hospital, with his injuries stabilizing and Joey decides to finish him off before he can reveal anything.
Joey destroys a porn studio with the help of Vito Spatafore, but goes back in to save his girlfriend Trishelle from the fire. Shortly after at the Bada Bing!, Tony's SUV is returned and heavily damaged. Inside the SUV is Trishelle, who is beaten up and implies that she had been raped by 2 of Angie's associates. Joey angrily vows for revenge and heads back to the docks in order to kill Angie before he leaves.
Sometime after Angie's death, Joey is just about to become a made man in Tony Soprano's crew. He receives good words from his associates, including Paulie and Christopher before seeing one last visage of Big Pussy who explains that he is not bitter of his son's choice to work with the same men who killed him. Not long after, when Joey takes the oath and swears by the omerta, the crew celebrates as Joey is offically endorsed into the Soprano family.
Soundtrack
The soundtrack of The Sopranos: Road to Respect consists of licensed music from several artists. Songs can only be heard on in-game speakers.
- "Girls, Girls, Girls" by Motley Crue
- "Ooh La La" by Goldfrapp
- "I Begin to Wonder" by Dannii Minogue
- "Monsters in the Parasol" by Queens of the Stone Age
- "Crab Louse" by Lords of Acid
- "Babysitter" by Morningwood
- "Disasterpiece" by Slipknot
- "Stranger in You" by Lullacry
- "Hell and Consequences" by Stone Sour
- "Like This" by Mack 10
- "Gonna Get U" by Untamed
- "Ghetto" by John Gold
- "Baby Got Back" by Sir Mix-a-Lot
Reception
The game received mostly negative reviews due to its highly repetitive gameplay, short length, weak graphics and poor collision detection. In a Gamespot review of the game critic Greg Mueller said the game was "...The Sopranos: Road to Respect is a straightforward mission-based action game with a strong cast of identifiable characters and a fairly interesting story, but it's also ugly, short, riddled with bugs, and just no fun to play."
Trivia
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