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Clonehunter

Your True Opinon On... (#Who Cares): Max Payne

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Well shit, it's been a while since one of these topics, but I feel it's only right with the next sequel to some rather great games coming out soon.

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Okay, so I guess I can't make as big of a history section, but what the fuck ever. Max Payne, a 2001 third-person shooter developed by Remedy Entertainment and followed the story of an undercover cop trying to uncover the truth of his family's brutal murder and un-earth some sort of drug plot. Released for the PC first, and later for PS2 and Xbox, and even later a Game Boy Advance port and a Mac port. The game won something called a BAFTA (Fucked if I know), and is probably best known for it's bullet time effects, where you can enter some sort of flying shoot mode where you can soar like Neo from The Matrix and gun down hordes of enemies while keeping your health up with bottles and bottles of painkillers (and some how not die or enter a coma from overdose). It's kinda like Doom, but in the third person, a named protagonist, a story, no demons, no (real) hell, and drugs and mobsters instead of said demons. So, the only relatable thing I guess is all the shooting and killing of many enemies. It was also notable for it's John Woo blood soaked action and it's comic strip style cut-scenes and narration and it's intricate-ish plot and television sub-plots (I want Address Unknown to be a real TV show). The game also gave way to many references to Norse Mythology. Max Payne later received a Sequel (With a much bigger budget thanks to the first game's success) where Sam Lake got to spend more time writing and less time filling in as Max for cut-scenes and game modeling (Though for whatever reason he still portrayed himself as John Mirra in the Address Unknown tv tidbits and as some other guy in a dumb TV show called Lords and Ladies (Also form the first game I think. The only added TV show was some cartoon called Captain Baseball Bat Boy or some shit). Anyways, this new game sub titled The Fall of Max Payne: a Film Noir Love Story, held more of a focus on Max's inner demons and torment as he struggled with feelings for some gal who had a small role in the first game (And assumingly died in the end too). It also brought back a couple other non-dead characters form the first game too like some mobster shit head cartoon nerd addict (An adult man, liking children cartoons, the fucking nerve) named Vinnie and some bald one eyed senator named Woden (Unfortunately we don't seem to have any real one-eyed senators today). Max Payne 2 was also released for a few consoles, and featured (Supposedly) improved bullet time effects (including the ability to reload when in bullet time, which is actually useful in some rare occasions) and also gave us a (slightly half-assed) survival mode I was surprised not to find in the first game, other than the practice mode. Anyways, a movie was also made sometime later starring Mark Whalberg, the guy from Boogie Night's (Not that he does anything near as interesting the Max Payne movie as he did in Boogie), and now, after a very long absence from the franchise as a whole, Max Payne 3 is on the way. This time, he's bald. It's not set in New York. But he's still shooting mobsters, gangsters, and guys who like Navy Seals. Anyways, I'm excited. Though I'm rather interested if the game will still contian those comic book style cut-scenes.

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Anyways, my quick ass reviews as I'm getting bored righting this fro-fro. So, I got both games on Steam for some Christmas Santa Give Me Shit game people sometimes do, so I got both of them from that. I ave to say I had always seen the first game on shelves at Half Price Bookstores, but being primarily interested in FPS games, I was never too into buying it. But when I was given on Steam the choice of two Max Payne games or Dungeon Defenders or Dungeon Siege or some shit, I decided to go with Max Payne, seeing that I could try them for free now. I gotta say, while it was a lot of trial and error game play, I fucking loved the first game. I loved the story, the gameplay, even the hammy voice acting (Even though it didn't work at all mostly through out the entire game because of a compatibility glitch, though I have it fixed now). The end boss was a bitch to figure out, though I face palmed rather hard when I realized I just needed to shoot the tower with a 'nade launcher after shooting the ropes. The second one I enjoyed as well, but a little less maybe, though I'm not sure why, but I still enjoyed it much, especially the Address Unknown Fun-house level. The atmosphere in the second game I know I enjoyed much more than the first game, but I just found the first to be more fun to play. I anxiously await Max Payne 3. (I also want to get my hands on the Alan Wake video games too as they also have Sam Lake doing the writing.)

So, here's my lowdown:

Max Payne (PC) - 9/10
Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne: A Film-Noir Love Story (PC) - 8/10
Max Payne 3 (PC) - ?/10

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I also only recently picked up the Max Payne games. I remember playing the demo ages ago, but it was fairly low on my game radar until a Steam sale. I've only played the first game, still haven't beaten it yet, but I have to say of what I've played, I've thoroughly enjoyed. I love the atmosphere, I love the gun battles, I love the film noir style...

My only real qualm is that I've found the game to be a bit difficult. Maybe it's my play style, in that I'm not used to strategically planning out my every move - I'm more comfortable running into a room guns blazing and shooting until everything is dead. However, I just find the game seems to rely a lot on trial and error, at least for me. Sometimes it feels like I have to die a couple of times in every room just to advance.

Basically, my success in any given scenario seems to depend on me memorizing the enemy layout in any given area. After I've died a couple of times, I have all the enemy locations memorized, and I know who's carrying what weapons, and it's a breeze, but I absolutely suck anytime I come into a new area where I don't have advanced knowledge of where the attacks will be coming from.

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A few days ago after seeing some info on MP3, I felt like playing the first again which I just bothered to finish today and already started the second.

I have my doubts about the third turning out to be as good as the first or even the second, I kind of dislike the whole idea of of Max being bald with a beard and there not being any graphics novels like the first two, the multiplayer seems like a pointless thing to be added to it.

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Technician said:

Does anyone remember the flop movie?


Yah. It sucked.

Avoozl said:

and there not being any graphics novels like the first two


Wait, so they're not doing that? Goddammit.

K!r4 said:

The one is awesome because of that face:


"A Permanent Constipated Grimace on my Face."

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Max Payne 1 was pretty cool. I was young when I played it and couldn't adjust to using bullet time so I just played it with cheat codes. I remember having a lot of fun in the later missions when you're taking out the Aesir building. Also Nightmare levels, while difficult to play, were pretty horrifying, with the walls soaked in blood, infinitely long hallways with wife and baby screaming, following the trails of blood, and the final conflict with a duplicate of yourself. (I think you called em the Address Unknown funhouse levels)

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I like both games and look forward to the newest installment, even if it makes some changes.

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40oz said:

Max Payne 1 was pretty cool. I was young when I played it and couldn't adjust to using bullet time so I just played it with cheat codes. I remember having a lot of fun in the later missions when you're taking out the Aesir building. Also Nightmare levels, while difficult to play, were pretty horrifying, with the walls soaked in blood, infinitely long hallways with wife and baby screaming, following the trails of blood, and the final conflict with a duplicate of yourself. (I think you called em the Address Unknown funhouse levels)

The Address Unknown levels were in the second game. In the first game they were just whacked out Dream levels as he apparently fought his inner demons. Or something like that, but they were creepy.

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i didn't really think they were creepy, and the annoying blood-trail mazes pissed me off, but the graphic novel scenes that broke the third wall by saying he was in a videogame and a graphic novel were awesome and made up for it.

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K!r4 said:

The one is awesome because of that face:


Hahaha, I remember this face! :D
I had never played this game, but I often looked inside the videogame magazines my brother bought back in 2001 and I remember laughing about a similiar screenshot of that face. Aah, those were the times.

Does my memory fail me or do I even remember reading about an article that told you to send a photo of your face to Remedy Entertainment, so that the graphic artists there could make you a custom texture out of it?

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I have the first game, but haven't gotten around to playing it yet. I probably should.

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MSPaintR0cks said:

Hahaha, I remember this face! :D
I had never played this game, but I often looked inside the videogame magazines my brother bought back in 2001 and I remember laughing about a similiar screenshot of that face. Aah, those were the times.

Does my memory fail me or do I even remember reading about an article that told you to send a photo of your face to Remedy Entertainment, so that the graphic artists there could make you a custom texture out of it?

I remember the pc gamer magazine with the funny Max Payne screenshots which were sent in from players, one looked like Max was trying to hit a flying gas container with a baseball bat and another showed one of the guys pants being sucked into a drain.

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This is actually a game where I won't play the latest installment if the story isn't up to snuff. The first game is great... I actually remember it being one of the defining games I played on PC. The second game takes the first game, the great narrative and gameplay and refines both. Max Payne 2 is arguably the best game in the series and the entire story wraps up everything in Max Payne's life.

Max Payne 3 will probably just be a decent but generic AAA 3rd person shooter. There's no really good reason to bring the character back and no story that really needs to be told about Max. It would be like making a sequel to Taxi Driver just to see what Travis Bickle was up to these days. Maybe it would be OK... but what's the point?

Just a cash grab like Bioshock 2... no need to exist.

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Isn't Rockstar making this one? What's with all the hate considering there is a ton of love poured into almost every game they make?

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Ralphis said:

Isn't Rockstar making this one? What's with all the hate considering there is a ton of love poured into almost every game they make?


I wonder why nobody cared when Red Dead was given to Rockstar after Capcom dumped it.

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Technician said:

Does anyone remember the flop movie?

Barely. I can't really remember much about it, other than it was pretty awful. At least Doom, Mortal Kombat et all didn't take themselves too seriously.

As for the games. Max Payne is one of those titles which almost everyone except me has played.

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Max Payne 3 looks pretty decent, especially compared to the shit that's being released these days. Also no regen-life :D

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Ralphis said:

Isn't Rockstar making this one? What's with all the hate considering there is a ton of love poured into almost every game they make?


I'm not sure about that. Maybe it's just me but I feel as though Rockstar really dropped the ball with Grand Theft Auto 4. Which is a boring slowmotion acting gig compared to the previous games. Especially Grand Theft Auto 2, which is an action-packed killfest. (quick hijacking, fast cars, explosive vehicles, interactive gang rivalries, machine guns at the hospitals, etc.)

Grand Theft Auto 3 was only marginally less action packed but it seems as though the series is getting super slow paced as they started giving the protagonist more personality, more interaction with story characters and misc. NPCs, and less explosions and dead cops. From what I've read about the up and coming Grand Theft Auto 5, The series is peaking at being totally catered to boring losers and their obsessive roleplaying and excluding those who want to create a violent mass murder in a nameless city.

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Ralphis said:

Isn't Rockstar making this one? What's with all the hate considering there is a ton of love poured into almost every game they make?


Like I said, I'm sure it will be a fun AAA shooter game. But why the Max Payne Franchise? There is no story to tell and that was half the allure of the games. Probably a fun game, but it will be a poor Max Payne experience.

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Avoozl said:

I wonder if it'll have a music style similar to the first two.


Well the trailer seems to recycle the menu track from MP2, so, maybe? But I kind of doubt it really, with all the other changes they've made. At least they got the same voice actor back.

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Never played the game.... never wanted to. Not surprised it made it to movie theaters and that it wasn't in development hell like Vice City and God of War movies.

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Played a bit of this and was blown away, it's been almost 10 years since a game has made my jaw drop, definitely going to pick this up, its no doubt one of the most fantastic and fun games I've ever played - coming from a dude who hates practically everything.

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I've seen reviews and it looks like every other game only with a bald dude that has a beard.

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