Retrospective: Max Payne

By John Walker Published 9 May, 2010

Soft boiled.

The phone rang with a shriek that would wake the dead before trying to sell them double glazing for hell. I answered. It was Tom Bramwell, his words entering my ears as if a lava flow of rage.

"I want a retro of Max Payne on my desk by the morning, Walker. This is your final chance."

I sneered at the wall. The wall looked back at me with blank indifference. "Sure," I muttered, "Sure boss, I can do that for you."

The game was on Steam, not exactly hard to get hold of. Six pounds. Nothing compared to the fee I'd be dropping on Bramwell's desk for getting the job done.

I stared out of the grubby window as the game downloaded, rain beating against the side of my house like an angry window cleaner. One day. One day I'd have my revenge for the mysterious events in my past that I'm only alluding to at this point. One damn day.

It seemed simple enough. I'm no stranger to retrospectives. You play the old game, you write about it. It sounds simple. It's never simple.

'Retrospective: Max Payne' Screenshot 1

Blood splatter forensics are mystified by this crime scene.

The third-person shooter had been our first dance with Bullet Time. Sure, we've all been to bed with the gimmick now, but this was the first flirtation. For reasons unknown, Payne could enter a slow-motion world like a hand enters an oven glove. It doesn't stay forever, but it can handle a lot more heat when it's there. Able to react in real-time, it allowed Max to demonstrate his super-reflexes, filling enemies with bullets like he was making bullet pie with a human crust.

Oh crikey, I can't carry on with that. Tempting as it might be to write the entire piece in the style of the absolutely horrendous writing in Max Payne, it's actually pretty hard to do it any worse. This is a game that contains, within its graphic novel cut-scenes, lines like:

"The cops arrived, sirens singing in the off-key harmony of a manic-depressive choir."

The static cut-scenes, rotoscoped photographs, are laid out like a comic, the narration and dialogue presented in the appropriate bubbles, voiced by actors.

On some level I can only find respect. It's nigh-impossible to come up with a piece of writing that's as equally awful as it is brilliant. However, more often it's just plain bad. Max informs an enemy,

"Vinnie Gognitti, just the man I've been killing to see."

'Retrospective: Max Payne' Screenshot 2

That grimace makes sense here. But it's permanently affixed to his face.

Or how about:

"I hadn't asked for this crap. Trouble had come to me, in big dark swarms."

"I had known there'd have to be a catch in it somewhere, and this one was the Empire State Building of catches."

I'd argue it's something to be treasured. Normally bad game writing is just plain boring. Goodness knows how many shooters seem to have been scripted by a machine more normally used for brewing instant coffee. (Oh dear, it's happening again.) Dreary nothingness, excusing one scene of shooting enemies into the next. At least here the endless scenes of shooting enemies are strung together by what might well be a form of poetry that's simply above my head.

However, rather more importantly, those scenes of shooting people are still really rather a lot of fun.

There's not really much to Max Payne. You're put in a building, and you have to kill everyone inside it. Room to room you go, picking them off from your extensive arsenal of weapons, occasionally slipping into slo-mo for trickier situations. But like any shooting gallery, that's more than enough to be entertaining.

At its original release it was a remarkable thing to behold. Now, because absolutely everything else has copied it, it's a very familiar place to play. Since it's in third-person you use the super-cheaty trick of swinging the camera to look around corners without having to put Max in the line of fire, then jump out, ideally in Bullet Time, and let loose your shower of metal fury. Like a furious thunderstorm.

(Okay, before we carry on, here's another favourite line: "He was trying to buy more sand for his hourglass. I wasn't selling any.")

My memory likes to pretend Max Payne came before the first Matrix film, but it's quite significantly the other way around. The Matrix was 1999, Max Payne 2001. It seems remarkable that it was two years before a game effectively incorporated the effect the Wachowskis had made look so cool. But Max Payne is equally influenced by the films of John Woo, and any number of hard-boiled detective fictions. Jumping sideways with guns in both hands, in slow motion, it's a small wonder doves aren't flying everywhere. Before Max comments on how their wings somehow remind him of the death of his mother.

And let us not forget the dream sequences. Max's anger is fuelled by the deaths of his wife and baby a couple of years earlier. His dreams always take him back to that house, to that night.

Walking along peculiarly decorated corridors, the game dolly zooms to create a sickening sensation of distance, the screams of his wife and cries of his child floating in the air, moving around your surround sound speakers such that you can never catch up with them. It's enormously effective, somewhat bolstered by the game still looking really fantastic a decade on. The character models look daft, but the cities and buildings hold up magnificently.

'Retrospective: Max Payne' Screenshot 3

Enemy AI is a little daft, but fire one bullet and you're in for a tough fight.

The second time Max dreams, this time in a drug-fuelled nightmare, things get really interesting. The first time you learned what the house looks like (although perhaps without quite such a long landing, and it's unlikely to have ended in a path of blood floating in space), especially the baby's nursery. This second time the nursery wallpaper has spread across the whole building, a building that now defies logic.

This climaxes in a looping moment where Max finds himself entering the same room repeatedly, a message on a desk and a ringing phone delivering him increasingly meta thoughts. "You are in a graphic novel," explains a letter written by his wife. Presented in the style of a graphic novel, it's hard to argue with the logic.

"All of my past was just fragmented still shots. Words hanging in the air like balloons."

Then it loops. You're back in the room, there's the letter, the phone's ringing.

"You are in a computer game, Max."

Again, tough to disagree. The middle image shows the weapon options above Max's in-game grimacing head.

"Weapon statistics hanging in the air, glimpsed out of the corner of my eye. Endless repetition of the act of shooting, time slowing down to show off my moves. The paranoid feel of someone controlling my every step. I was a computer game."

'Retrospective: Max Payne' Screenshot 4

Man, that's so meta, dude.

You then shoot another version of yourself. It's one of those sorts of moments.

There's something about that description. It's almost confessional. That's what Max Payne is - endless repetition of the act of shooting. Sometimes you slow down time. There's nothing more to it than that.

In fact, that shooting is remarkably primitive. There's no regioning of the enemy's bodies. A headshot counts for nothing. The targets are also very unevolved. They have no useful AI beyond their scripting, although this is often smartly done. Of course, reload and repeat and they'll walk right into any appropriate trap you might set up. (And the joy of playing the game now is that reloading is instantaneous.)

But there's so very much to love about Max Payne. How about that instead of med packs you have painkillers? They have the same gaming mechanical effect, but it's a statement. Max isn't the sort of guy who stops to put on a bandage. He just knocks back some opiates and gets on with things.

The work was done. I walked into Bramwell's office and dropped the files on his desk with the disinterest of a tree dropping its autumnal leaves. He looked up at me from his morning paper, cigar smoke blowing around his head like a silver curtain parting to begin the play.

"This it?"

I grunted yes. He took the file and flicked through, barely looking at the pages.

"You still here?" he asked, eyes pointed at his office door. I took the hint and turned to leave.

"Oh, Walker?" said the editor through ashen clouds. I raised an eyebrow. "You're in a videogame retrospective narrative device. Now get out."

Picture of John.

About John Walker

Read more articles from John by visiting the John Walker archive page.

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Comments (74) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Windypops #1 2 years ago

    Max Payne was the first game for which my first PC didn't meet the minimum spec requirements. It was the first game I bought for my second PC. I love Max Payne. No game has caught the sound of a hand grenade bouncing on concrete quite so well.

  • Frybird #2 2 years ago

    The Story and Storytelling of Max Payne was always an interesting sort of mixed bag for me.

    Obviously cheesy and most of the time very self aware, this whole aspect of the game striked me always as much more interesting than most other "serious" video game stories. Maybe because, despite those rediculous amounts of cheese, Remedy still seemed to care about it. And that made it so much more engaging.

    And there was always fun to be had when a level....errr, "chapter" had a stupidly awesome and pun-ny title that was actually dropped by Mr. Payne himself during a cutscene ("Put out my flames with gasoline" will always rank among the best names for any video game level ever)


    The obvious question is, does Alan Wake ever reach the nightmarish weirdness of Max Payne's Dream Levels?
    And if not, why? After all, it's probably the closest they have gotten to Twin Peaks Level yet.
    The lack of mentioning something like that in Alan Wake deeply worries me....

    @pswii60: Buy Max Payne 2. Now! Despite being still noir-cheesy, the writing and the overall story was much better, lots of awesome levels, better gameplay with more interesting tweaks to bullet time, great humor....Max Payne 1 might be awesome, but Max Payne 2 easily ranks high among my most favorite and best games of all time.
    Edited by 2 at 09/05/10 @ 10:52

  • Lexx87 #3 2 years ago

    I loved that the writing was like that it was awesome :p

  • DDevil #4 2 years ago

    I love the Max Payne games, and I've been playing the first one recently. It's still a whole lot of fun and the bad wannabe-noir writing holds a certain charm for me.

    Everything blown apart in a New York minute...

  • Andeus #5 2 years ago

    The idea behind Max Payne's writing was that it was supposedly a modern detective Noir setting. All those lines mentioned in the review were ok for me in that context. Shame that it wasn't mentioned.

  • Hendo #6 2 years ago

    I much prefer the second game, there's nowhere near as many problems with it.
    The nightmare levels are a frustrating mess and the sound design is often terrible. The sound of Max's footsteps is really annoying and loud and the voice work is really quiet but bizarrely you can't adjust them separately so if you want to hear the voice acting you have to put up with even louder footstep.
    And in the second game they got someone who actually looked like a hard-boiled detective rather than someone who looked like a script writer for videogames.

    Mind you, I'm going by the Xbox port of the original, so no idea if the sound problems are there on the PC version. I've played the sequel on the PC and Xbox and couldn't tell any difference.

  • Clive_Dunn #7 2 years ago

    Enjoyed that retrospective, was reading in Max Payne's voice without even noticing it.

  • YoungPayters #8 2 years ago

    love that game, i was young when i played it so actually thought the writing was so edgey, must look back and see how awful it really was. but i dont want to ruin the dream that is in my head of it though.

  • Saladin #9 2 years ago

    Did anyone play the Kung Fu mod that one guy produced? It added in wall running/jumping, a big stick to hit mafia guys with and a silly bend-over-backwards bullet dodge ripped straight from the matrix. It was amazing work, and all by one guy working entirely on his own.

    Also, the TV shows you could watch on the various sets around the game were great too. Who could forget the classic Address Unknown, with the sinister pink flamengo (which I seem to recall having a theme park dedicated to it as a level in the sequel).
    Edited by 1 at 09/05/10 @ 11:04

  • Inquisitor #10 2 years ago

    I love these games, especially the writing. It's not great but it inspires everyone who writes about them to imitate their style. I thought maybe this article did linger on the quality of the monologues and one liners a little too much, if nothing else it's different and interesting. Good retrospective though, here are my awful attempts at reviewing the games,

    Max Payne:
    The disc spun to life sounding like a jets failing engines struggling to keep it in the air. Ageing, decrepit graphics creakily loading up in a bordered screen, the blackness that surrounded it threatening to swallow it up like a cheap whore down on her luck.

    Thick, claustrophobic atmosphere swum around me, taking on a darkly comic tone as I struggled against archaic controls. A by gone era. I could tell this was the start of something big, or something lasting approximately 7 hours, time has a nasty habit of telling. Nightmarish visions haunting me, following blood trails, who thought that was a good idea...

    Eugh, sorry, I can't keep that up. Still, I loved the game. A very dark comedy, lovely noir styling's, great voice acting and dialogue for Mr Payne along with some awesome (and awful) dream sequences.

    Max Payne II

    Einstein was right. Time is relative to the observer. As the end credits danced across the faded backdrop my hours with the Max Payne series flashed by, a bullet from a rifle.

    Trapped in the emotion of the final scenes like a deer in the headlights, this time it was better than before. Controls no longer fighting against their master, a clearer vision, wider, crisper. Progress in the form of a corpse, crumpling like a puppet without its strings, physics had the last laugh.

    Somehow it all seemed like a joke. Smooth talking bad guys, pantomime in their mission. Bloodlines forgotten but the nightmares haunted me still. A stroll down an abandoned fairground a metaphor for the game. Explanation shouldn't be necessary, if you've walked the path I did you'd understand.

    Sorry, sorry, I just can't help myself. Another brilliant entry in the Max Payne series. I can tell why a sequel has taken so long, the way this ended I'm surprised there's even one on the drawing board. The long and short of it though is this game is a marked improvement over the original. I'm not sure if I can give it a higher score due to some frustrating 'escort' missions but what the hell, it deserves it.

    9/10

  • anomagnus #11 2 years ago

    off topic, i know, but has anyone ever seen the movie?
    So bad, so terribly bad.

  • Frybird #12 2 years ago

    @Saladin: There was. In fact, the "Adress Unknown" Television Broadcasts in MP1 were sort of a prototype for the "full" Adress Unknown Series you could watch on TV sets in Max Payne 2, often reflecting stuff that just happened in the story of the game.

    ...And of course, Max Payne 2 also had Dick Justice ("It was raining like all the angels in heaven decided to take a piss at the same time. In a situation like this, you could only think in metaphors";) and Captain Baseballbat-Boy, wich led to the most arkward hilarious level of MP2



    ...Also, i wanted to mention that it's almost a crime that the music hasn't been mentioned yet. It was really great and moody, only surpassed by (once again) the sequel.

  • Sharzam #13 2 years ago

    Ironically was simlier for me as it was for Windypops. Ive been in PC gaming for years but max payne was the first where my PC couldnt quite handle it so i upgraded the PC and it worked great now iam stuck in a never ending loop of upgrades and love it.

    Max payne 1 & 2 are great games still have the discs however Mr Walker makes a good point they really are just shooting no innovations other than bullet time but sometimes thats all you need.

  • Ged42 #14 2 years ago

    MiRRorS aRe MOre FUN thAN TEleViSioN!

  • Hunam #15 2 years ago

    I loved all the cliché dialogue in Max Payne, I still do actually. It's never bad though and I've always kind of resented people saying that about Max Payne because it will either make you cringe or paint a giant smile across your face as you revel in the melodrama. Both of them entirely intended and give massive personality to the game and Max himself.

    The gameplay is tops still. I never realised head shots were useless, but it makes sense really as the camera can make targets fairly small. New York still looks like New York, it's grime and attention to detail brought to life and whilst the animation is as you'd expect from 2001 the actual in-game cutscenes are wonderfully brief as to not show how primitive they are. It's almost like they were aware what people 9 years down the line would think about it.

    The bit at the start with his baby is still as unnerving as ever too.
    Edited by 1 at 09/05/10 @ 11:31

  • FogHeart #16 2 years ago

    I'm sure I've seen an interview with Remedy where they say they conceived and developed bullet time before The Matrix was released. Both of course influenced by John Woo, with its short snaps of slow motion in action scenes. Not a case of imitation, more convergent evolution.

    I found the soundtrack somewhere and downloaded the brooding cello intro music, into my 'music from films and games' playlist. Gorgeous.

    And I've lost count of the number of times I described the buildings in Canary Wharf as 'sleek and sexy and soulless', to other people while I worked there. Blatantly stolen from the last level of the game.

    Best TV series? The period drama...there were far too many of them at the time, and the genre needed sending up.

  • VibratingDonkey #17 2 years ago

    I stare into the gaping abyss of the document recounting past experiences, memories washing over me like a snowstorm in the night trying to wash away the dark. Reading it I realize there's no way Rockstar will be able to live up to the legacy. The truth was a burning green crack through my brain. You're a beerbellied bald bum in Brazil.
    Edited by 2 at 09/05/10 @ 12:14

  • sfp_noodle #18 2 years ago

    Max Payne was excellent. At the time at least, my parents could not afford to buy me a PS2 so I made do with watching my cousin play through the whole thing on his PC. Awesome game, and the first to do bullet time properly. When I eventually got a PS2 the game kind of flew me by but I did manage to get the sequel which was also excellent. But again, my cousin had it on the PC which made my PS2 version look rather poor with its overly long load times and visual shortcomings.

  • miiiguel #19 2 years ago

    But I bet PS2 hadn't limitations at the time. God forbid such insult.

  • sfp_noodle #20 2 years ago

    ^^

    Well, no console could touch the PC until the 360 and PS3 arrived. Anyway, let's focus on how awesome Max Payne was eh?

  • Markitron #21 2 years ago

    My Lord!.......... My Lady!

  • Eraysor #22 2 years ago

    Brilliant game, and the biggest shame is that my Dad, of of the Max Payne series' biggest fans, can't play Alan Wake because they canned the PC version!

  • GooseUK #23 2 years ago

    @squarejawhero

    "A giant eyeball in a TV droning "die die die die"? Very MP"

    You sure it wasnt a teacher with a dumbell? lol

  • Zerobob #24 2 years ago

    I never finished Max Payne, but it sure was an interesting game, especially the trippy dream level.

    With bullet-time ironically done better than the licensed matrix games and a great dirty New York cop feel going on I really enjoyed it.

    In the end though the levels and gameplay got repetitive so I stopped playing, but at least they didn't bung some half-baked driving sections in there for the sake of breaking up the gameblay *cough* Along In the Dark *cough* . I hate it when developers do that, apart from when they integrate well with the overall gameplay and feel of the game, like Halo.

  • frostcircus #25 2 years ago

    MP2 was the perfect action game sequel. Came out of nowhere, improved upon the original in every way, yet somehow didn't feel rehashed at any point.

    And yeah, I'm not sure what to make of the writer's abilities either. The hard-boiled dialogue is so amazingly pitch-perfect, and completely adorable from start to finish, but the actual plot (in both games) is delivered quite badly and isn't really much different to the sort of plots other games of the era were using.

  • NunianVonFuch #26 2 years ago

    Loved the game, good retro too. As for the "bad" dialogue I remember copying the narrative word for word for an essay I did in English class - the teacher gave me an A and said it was one of the best she'd ever read and she loved the style!
    Take that John Walker, but more importantly should Max have won a Pulitzer prize?

  • Guitarnerd87 #27 2 years ago

    ^^

    Just like that I had to do an opening chapter to a "macbeth style" story

    I just ripped off GTA3, grim fandango and max payne, even the names...got an A* teacher absolutely loved the whole mafia thing I went with!

  • wellzy4eva #28 2 years ago

    For me, Max Payne had such fun replayability, I remember I'd save before going into a room full of bad guys and set challenges for my brother and I, like clearing the room using only a pistol or something, very fun game

  • danjfor #29 2 years ago

    There's a great bit in one of the dream levels in Max Payne 2 where you go past a load of cells with Max doubles in them - the first Max is ranting angrily about what he's gonna do to his wife's killer, the second Max is sobbing and apologising for killing his wife himself, and the third Max is ranting about the fact that he's played by a different actor in this game and how uncomfortable the game's debug mode makes him feel. Or then there's this bit where Max calls a phone sex line. A lot of this stuff is both funny and tragic, cracking character development for Max, and really adds to the atmosphere in what's an otherwise standard shooter.

    Mercy me I loved Max Payne 2. Dunno why they're even bothering with a sequel, the games've already passed into legend.

  • X3Entente #30 2 years ago

    The flesh of fallen angels! Come to me, all!... Astaroth, Beelzebub, Asmodeus, Baphomet, Lucifer, Loki, Satan, Cthulhu, Lilith, Hela! Blood to you all! I dont know the words!!! im beyond the words!!!!!

  • Trigga_Tybalt #31 2 years ago

    Is there any widescreen fix for max payne 2?
    Been trying to play through it again before 3 but it's all flat and fat looking and you can't seem to make the game constrain the image at 4:3.

  • OrgasmicMutton #32 2 years ago

    "For reasons unknown, Payne could enter a slow-motion world like a hand enters an oven glove. It doesn't stay forever, but it can handle a lot more heat when it's there. Able to react in real-time, it allowed Max to demonstrate his super-reflexes, filling enemies with bullets like he was making bullet pie with a human crust. "

    That brightened up my Sunday afternoon, cheers John.

    ---

    @ Saladin

    Yeah that Kung Fu mod was great fun, particularly the Matrix style bullet dodging.

    ----

    As for the Max Payne games, I loved 'em. In a rare occurence for me I actually went back to complete both of them on tougher difficulty levels. The dialogue somehow managed to be enjoyably naff and fit in perfectly with the tone of the game and the shooting was always fun. The second one tightened up the action nicely and the various television parodies of the game running throughout were brilliantly executed and provided a nice break from the action. Plus the Captain Baseball bat boy level was sheer slapstick excellence. I've very fond memories of the series and really hope the sequel doesn't disappoint.

  • trip919 #33 2 years ago

    The Max Payne games exist in their own warped universe and the writing is integral to the feel of it. Not great writing, but I wouldn’t change a word of it!

  • minimong #34 2 years ago

    Loved max payne, like the second game even more.Who can forget Mona Sax in her lusciously tight jeans.

  • dagas #35 2 years ago

    Only played Max Payne 2, but I remember it was a great game.

  • Yossarian #36 2 years ago

    Surprisingly awful retrospective, given its John Walker.

  • jonnex #37 2 years ago

    Fantastic, thanks very much Eurogamer, this article really brought me back to what it was like playing Max Payne. Like some others have been saying here, I wasn't really aware of the writing being in any way bad at the time I played it. I really can see how it could be perceived badly now, though I still find it pretty awesome and right in context with the whole tongue-in-cheek style. One thing I love looking back on in Max Payne is the blatant photos of some guy's face that act as Max's face texture. Such brilliantly ridiculous expressions - and yet if you take a freeze-frame at any moment in the game Max still looks right; his expression fits!

    @Frybird, that quote ("In a situation like this, you could only think in metaphors.";) is brilliant, it surely sums up Max Payne perfectly in one sentence.

  • LionheartDJH #38 2 years ago

    I absolutely love this game. Played it for the first time at my dad's friend's house and I instantly loved it. Had to wait 3 years until I had a PC good enough to play it, and I'd owned and completed the PS2 version by then, but even so I still loved it. Completed it 3 times, and Max Payne 2 twice, and I still play them both occasionally. Think it's the simple but addictive gameplay, coupled with the dark but sort of OTT graphic novel story and slight nostalgia that makes me like them so much. Not to mention bullet-time was so cool when the original MP came out (before every game and their dog had it in, no matter how superfluous it was).

  • DDevil #39 2 years ago

    Actually, the first time I played Max Payne was Sept 11th 2001. I was sat in the shop I worked at. I played all the way through the game while listening to the reports on the terror attacks. Doubt I'll ever forget Max Payne because of it.

  • Avaloner #40 2 years ago

    Great retrospective. Excellent read. Give this man a raise!

  • reinhart_menken #41 2 years ago

    Max Payne was among one of my all-time favorite games in PC gaming history. I thought Max's monologues were great for what they were and what they were trying to be. It's just a huge shame that they're making Max Payne 3 with this stereotype that I don't even have a name for - 'roid-ed muscles, shaved head, big beard, like a stereotype city bad guy slash badass. The whole point with Max was that he wasn't super buff, he didn't look remarkable; he was just this decent lean cop on the warpath of revenge armed with super-human reflexes. He didn't wear "wife-beaters" (tank top) and show off his big shoulders and back; he wore a suit and a black leather jacket (or not leather) like a normal person, and you imaged that was what a city detective would wear to his desk job (or maybe that's a Hollywood 70s-80s image as well). It was like Max was showing you and proving to you what he could do, in the game, by doing it, instead of showing it. Max was just an ordinary guy (again, with super human reflex) that took on the entire city and its criminal empires because they killed his wife, not some guy whose look just makes you think he's angry all the time, maybe because of the steroids he's taking.

  • ph101 #42 2 years ago

    Nice piece! :)

  • space_ace #43 2 years ago

    the screenshots' aspect ratio is as rotten as a low-life noir thug

  • rogueleader360 #44 2 years ago

    "For reasons unknown, Payne could enter a slow-motion world like a hand enters an oven glove. It doesn't stay forever, but it can handle a lot more heat when it's there."

    LMAO!

  • frankfurter209 #45 2 years ago

    These comments are incredibly heartwarming to read. I, like most of you, adore Max Payne and its deliciously amazing/awful writing.
    Edited by 1 at 09/05/10 @ 20:55

  • Windypops #46 2 years ago

    Was it the first one in which you could shoot the speaker that was feeding muzak into the lift, and Max would thank you?

  • Dave #47 2 years ago

    Great stuff John, a very nice retro!

    I think I only played MP once or twice, I´m more a fan of the sequel. But as a game it stands out in my memories, it really made it's mark in my gaming history. The "bad" writing was a crucial piece of this, it really fit in. As did the music by the way. I remember the `I was in a computer game` section, it was hilarious!

  • Wyrm #48 2 years ago

    2nd game was way better, but the 1st was still very good.

  • Andrefpvs #49 2 years ago

    I was young (12/13 maybe) when I played the first one. I remember cheating my way through the dream levels, because they really messed with me psychologically.

  • TurboBailey #50 2 years ago

    the dream scenes still freak the hell out of me !

  • oerhoert #51 2 years ago

    Thanks for that, John, great stuff as always. Loved the game altogether, mostly for the atmosphere and the weather and the grit and the ludicrous script.

  • ljvasey #52 2 years ago

    I loved the attention to detail in this game, from the modeling of the bullets, tons of debris flying everywhere when you shot, slides actually operating on the pistols, it was all great. The second game was even better, even if it was purely a 'typical' shooter.

    I have to admit those dream sequences were awful, though.

  • BBIAJ #53 2 years ago

    I've been playing the first one via Xbox Originals again recently, and have found that the only way I can traverse the dream sequence with the red blood trails, is to quick save after every single jump!

  • albertofustinoni #54 2 years ago

    Am I the only one who genuinely thought the writing was good and loved it? In any case, absolutely loved the series, even though I would disagree with most and say the first game was the superior one. Aesir Corporation's building and the final face off against the helicopter are so much more memorable than Max Payne 2's ending.

  • E-Raz0r #55 2 years ago

    One of the best games ever and my favorite game of all time. And the Kung Fu Mod added a whole new dimension to the game.

  • Ilinx #56 2 years ago

    "Am I the only one who genuinely thought the writing was good and loved it?" Hell no, although I can never quite pin down why I loved it so much. I can never understand why there are many who deride it. Philistines!

  • kipper #57 2 years ago

    My absolute favourite feature of Max Payne is the photo-realistic faces of the characters. Certainly the character bodies are a bit lacking in polygons by today's standards, but I really prefer looking a photograph of a real human actor wrapped onto a characters face, than the purely CG characters in all games since. There will never be a CG face as realistic as a photo of a real human face. All they needed to be perfect was for the faces to be properly animated.

  • ruckus #58 2 years ago

    Man I thought this game came out well before 2001 but it appears it was announced in 1998 for a pc release in spring 1999 (via gamershell.com game pr). Seems strange I was playing this in 2001, and not late 90's.

  • dr_swin #59 2 years ago

    yeah - I really enjoyed that piece as well. You might call that style of writing bad but I find it really entertaining. (probably makes me some sort of tard!)

  • Haradan #60 2 years ago

    "In fact, that shooting is remarkably primitive. There's no regioning of the enemy's bodies. A headshot counts for nothing."

    Whaaaat?! You mean to say you've never made a headshot in Max Payne? A headshot most definitely does much more damage than a normal hit in that game. Max Payne's combat is *all about* headshots. Just look at this walkthrough and see how many times it mentions headshots:

    [link url=http://ww w.mahalo.com/max-payne-walkthrough
    ]http://ww w.mahalo.com/max-payne-walkthro...[/link]

    Spoiler: the answer is 17.

  • M_of_the_sys #61 2 years ago

    Following a trail of blood through the darkness with a babies cry echoing around you. The memory still sends a chill down my spine.

  • Goteki45 #62 2 years ago

    Such good memories of MP2. I repeatedly played through the game on different difficulties and I haven't played challenge rooms in a game so much until Batman AA last year. I spent hours trying to beat my high scores on 'Deadman Walking'. I remember Remedy would release new levels in patches as well.

    The simple shooter gameplay was made so much sweeter with the fun, over the top, movie style physics. I cant remember any other game, at the time, that had the same satisfying bullet impact on the bad guys.

  • Mooglepies #63 2 years ago

    Max Payne 2 is one of the few modern games I put into "Classic" territory. It just nailed everything down properly.

    You can cut through the atmosphere in MP2 like a sharp thing poking into a soft thing. Yeah, I suck with metaphors.

  • KillallHippies #64 2 years ago

    "There's no regioning of the enemy's bodies. A headshot counts for nothing."

    Pretty certain that's not true. I remember the shotgun being two shots at distance in the body for a kill or just one in the head at distance. Likewise the desert eagle was usless unless you aimed for the head.

    My favourite cheesey dialogue from Max Payne "I don't know about angels but it's fear that gives men wings"

  • darleysam #65 2 years ago

    You lost me at 'horrible writing'. Those whose only enjoyment from Max Payne is the ability to jump around in slow motion and shoot guys, are missing a huge slice of what's to love about it.

    edit: okay, seriously, way to miss the entire point. It's completely self-referential and tongue-in-cheek. Max Payne 2 has a tv show, Dick Justice, which is entirely a piss-take of the first game, down to referencing a 'consipated grin on my face'. The whole world is deliberately littered with references to its own absurdity. I'm not some analytical genius, but to dismiss it as a single-layered shoot-em-up with hokey writing is a horrible miscalculation.
    Edited by 1 at 10/05/10 @ 13:18

  • rudedudejude #66 2 years ago

    Can someone explain what occurred with the film then?

  • mcbain23 #67 2 years ago

    I loved this scene - just after you blow up the furnace in the block of flats -

    Thug 1: What du!?

    Thug 2: Told ya...

    Thug 3: God damn! I thought it was a bomb for sure.

    Thug 2: Nah, the Russian wouldn't dare. This has been waitin'
    to happen.

    Thug 3: Heh heh heh, I thought it wuz a bomb!

    .. also I will never forget the sample they used for "feet stomping around on floors above and below" on that level - brilliant.

  • schachmatt #68 2 years ago

    Max Payne is such a complete work. Probably the most perfect game I've ever played.

    The writing AND story-telling are excellent. John Walker shouldn't look too far for bad writing considering he hilariously shoots an own-goal from the kick off when failing to emulate the style of the game.
    The rest of the text are factual errors coupled with things not mentioned and strange interpretations.

    It also conveyed more horror and feeling of lonesomeness than any horror-game I had experience with. Batman AA's nightmare levels could have gotten there, but they stopped long before probably to be more teenage-friendly.

  • Gecks #69 2 years ago

    i think the supposed 'tongue-in-cheek' nature of the dialogue was more of a MP2 thing, perhaps after the reception to MP1!

    when i played MP1 it certainly seemed to be taking itself very, very seriously. or was the entire game supposed to be self-concious poke at its own dialogue? that's a bit of a questionable idea in itself...

    did love the *game* part, though!

  • darleysam #70 2 years ago

    Well Max is explicitly told (as mentioned in the article) that he's in a graphic novel and then a video game. That's a fairly clear pointer to its post-modern intentions..

  • Lunatic4ever #71 2 years ago

    I actually think that max payne lines are among the best lines in videogaem history.
    many of them are so incredibly cool and profound.
    Some lines i just cant get out of my head:

    "I don't know about angels, but it's fear that gives men wings."
    "I might have laughed, if I had remembered how."
    "But dreams have a nasty habit of going bad when you're not looking."

    :)

    these are awesome!

  • makeamazing #72 2 years ago

    I loved the writing and style of both MP1 and 2, thats why i fear for MP3... it doesnt (from initial looks), look like it has any of the qualities of the first two. I dont say cheesey, i say excellent writing.... just love it

    The dream sequence/family death is particularly disturbing (but great)... Both games Ive completed at least twice... in fact its about time to play them again :D

  • UnConeD #73 2 years ago

    Here's the Max Payne Kung Fu mod mentioned earlier... this looks effin awesome:
    [link url=http://www .youtube.com/watch?v=RIhjtSY-nxg
    ]http://www .youtube.com/watch?v=RIhjtSY-nxg
    [/link]

  • frankfurter209 #74 2 years ago

    And maybe the most fitting, emotional theme music for any game. No, that's Max Payne 2's theme.