Hey all! MaxMok (aka Garrett Barkley Spillman) has bought and subsequently reviewed Max Payne, what appears to be the kick-ass game of the year (so far). A hard-ass New York copper with no family (thanks to the Mafia!), with great noir-esque storytelling, a robust and Matrix-esque playing environment. Sounds cool. Anywho, read Gary’s review below
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I bought Max Payne yesterday. Normally, I never buy computer games, much less software of any kind if I can’t help it. In this case – I couldn’t help it.
Basically, Max Payne is John Woo’s wet dream wrapped in a windows-compatible video game.

You play Max – hard-boiled New York cop with a dead wife, dead child, hatred for the mafia that killed them and currently being employed by the DEA as an undercover agent posing as a mob thug in order to bring down a large drug ring.
Oh – did I mention Max, having lost his entire family, has shit to lose and therefore, gives fuck-all about blowing holes in people with high-caliber firearms?

So… Isn’t this like… Soldier of Fortune meets Serpico? Not really.
The game is a 3D, 3rd person shooter. Much like tomb raider however with better camera angles and a hero not built like a brick house.
Furthermore, to distinguish Max Payne from previous shooter games – the game is frighteningly realistic. From the chrome on a car bumper, to the snow falling, to the cracked tiles in the subway, to the bloodstains on your meaty, cop hands – the hardware T&L and the modeling as well as motion-capture are the best I have seen in any PC game to date. I mean, shit looks real – Max looks and moves like you or I would (albeit, a little more angular and much more surly). The endless hordes of mafia thugs, placed in the game for the sole purpose of getting shot multiple times by you even have this air of individuality. The game engine goes as far as to randomly generate the models and textures of the thugs as so its possible that each and every thug has a slight bit of distinction from the last guy you plugged full of lead (providing you have that feature set active in the game options and you openGL hardware can deal with it).

Oh – did I mention the Bulletime ™ ?

Oh yes – this game has Bulletime ™ and its yours to command. You see, the designers of this games are a bunch of Scandinavians – who we know to have frequent and easy access to all kinds of drugs from across the borders in Holland. Take that in account and the fact that these gifted programmers have a penchant for watching lots and lots of Hong Kong action movies and have probably seen the Matrix 23 time already and masturbate to the quarterly Heckler & Koch firearms catalog. Now you may have an idea of what direction this game takes. By the way, this goes without saying but this has to be the most violent game I have ever played.

The game mechanics are easy to understand and take forever to master. The game is broken up into chapters, which are then broken up into episodes. Plot and story are interjected between killing and rampaging though stylized graphic art sketches, giving the game an overall comic/graphic novel appearance. The levels play out just like an action movie. Its easy to imagine Max Payne being translated into a feature film starring Bruce Willis and a shitload of Eurotrash terrorists. The level puzzles are about as oblique as the plot to many an action flick – “Bad guys coming up the stairs, doors are locked, hmmm… I know – I’ll shoot and the window and jump for it! Yeah!” The rest is elementary – ratatatat yo.

The real meat and cheese of this game is of course, the shootouts. As much of an action movie this game emulates, you’d think this would be cake, especially on the introductionary difficulty level. This is not so. Max can only soak up so much damage before he keels over in a spiraling 3D death throe and the difference between a flesh wound and instantaneous death is evident in the games physics. In other words, aim for the head… Because the other guys are aiming for yours.
The best the game gets is of course, the firefights. The first major gun battle of the game takes place in a NYC subway station. In most FPS I’ve played, the formula is simple – walk in, pick off guys or more aptly, run in and dismantle opponents with a blaze of assorted guns and ammo. In the middle of the mayhem, there’s pretty bump-mapped and light-sourced scenery for which to feast your eyes upon. It’s a kind of laid back firefight. This is not at all the case with Max Payne. I made the sad mistake of trying to take in the rich, geourgous and realistic scenes of the dirty substation control room, despite the fact that there’s a horde of bad guys with bad dispositions and itchy trigger fingers. Oh shit – I’m dead already!?

And that’s the frustrating part of this game. Unlike John McClane – you’re not bulletproof and your ass will die… Many, many, many times. Often in the same spot.

This however, I feel is the intended design put forth by the programming team. Each battle is an action set piece. The real game is to figure out how to execute stunts and use Bulletime ™ to keep from getting killed. Let me paint you a gory picture.

I walk up to the door of the substation control room. I open and upon entry, there are six armed thugs waiting in the room. The thugs do not waste time, nor catchy but ultimately bad jokes, they just go for the sawed off shotguns and glocks they be packin’.
I however am armed with two 9mm Barettas, which in HK terms would make me a walking god. In this case, I guess you could see it that way. I hit the Bulletime ™ switch and everything goes all Matrixy as I dive headlong over as desk, firing at anyone in the room. Shots fly out, leaving little slow-mo vortexes behind them. I take a shot in the arm just before I hit the ground and roll. Its pretty easy after I get to my feet, as I dodge multiple rounds from the gangsters. The important thing here is to keep moving. If you stand still, you will surly die. At this point, I am actually, physically screaming, “die motherfuckers, die!” as I Bulletime ™ my way around some poor schmuck while I unload an entire clip into his chest. Keeping with the Hong Kong traditions – ammo is as plentiful as water in this game. I go though 78 rounds in seconds. All 6 gangsters are really, truly and utterly dead. I’m not. Woo haa!

To conclude – this is the best PC game I’ve played all year. If you like gun violence, the Matrix, Dirty Harry and Hong Kong action cinema, just go buy the game today at your local retailer.