Can you feel the payne? Get it? Payne, pain? Huh? Huh? Ah forget it.

Author's Rating:

Pros: Visuals, sound, interactive environments, comic book layout dialouges

Cons: Placement of the bullet time and shoot dodge buttons, Payne's dreams

The Bottom Line: 
Even if it's a "kill everything that moves" kind of game, it's a damn good one. You owe it to yourself to play this game.

Author's Review
I always wanted to own Max Payne. Ever since it’s debut on the PC system, I wanted to experience all the hype the game was given. Unfortunately though, my computer didn’t meet the standard requirements for running the game. I was left with one option, and that was to wait. I had waited, and waited, until finally! The PC smash hit was ported to the XBOX and PS2. Naturally, I picked it up ASAP and I knew that this game would be the game that would set new standards for 3rd person shooters. I knew that the groundbreaking visuals and revolutionary game play alone would make this game a must own. So was I right? Did the hype live up to all that it was worth? Read on and find out.

Presentation

-1 Player
-Bullet Time
-Interactive Environments
-Plot twists
-Revolutionary Game play

Plot

“Max Payne is a man with nothing to lose in the violent, cold urban night. A fugitive undercover cop framed for murder, and now hunted by cops and the mob. Max is a man with his back against the wall fighting a battle he cannot hope to win.”

Graphics:(9/10)

The characters in Max Payne are basically your stereotypical kind when playing a game set in the mean streets of NYC that includes the N.Y.P.D, thugs, drug addicts, and mob. Yet it’s easy to tell that the designers decided to spend more time creating the mafia and their henchmen with detailed outfits, audio speech, movements, and such compared to the pretty much useless bums that simply mutter to themselves while in one hand gripping their hand gun. The animations are pretty accurate and smooth as you play the game and see how the characters respond to your actions if it were chucking a grenade at them and then seeking cover to charging in the room with automatics wailing as you claim your rightful territory. My only complaint for where the character design goes though is that their faces are horrible to look at. Basically a either humorous or disturbing slapped on face in which doesn’t interact with when the characters speak or anything.

The environment in which Max Payne takes place is incredible. In one moment you start out in a subway station over taken by henchmen, to a abandoned night club in which a cult holds it’s conventions at, and much more. Plus, nearly everything in which you see in a room, no matter if it were a toilet or vibrating bed, it will be interactive. Don’t like seeing yourself broadcasted on news? Turn off the TV, or better yet, blow it out with your shotgun. Want to wash your hands and get those bloodstains off? Use the sink. Plus, with the XBOX’s hard drive, your able to splatter blood stains and bullet holes (along with bullet shells) wherever you please, go on with the game, come back to that scene moments later and still all the damage in which you have created.

But in order to get the best of what the visuals have to offer is by using the bullet time mode in stops everything around you to a near halting stop (except yourself), similar to what has been used in most action movies, especially in The Matrix. With bullet time enabled, you’ll be able to see bullets ripple in the wind as trails are left behind with a short flash of brightness seeping through the gun with bullet shells slowly twirling in mid air as the actual bullet itself strikes your opponent, giving a short spray of blood to slowly escape and land on wherever it falls. It’s with this mode in which you’ll only be able to actually notice all the small things where as in normal speed would happen within the blink of an eye.

Sound:(7/10)

Sound in Max Payne can go from being mind-blowing to down right hilarious in mere seconds; First, the mind-blowing part. The spoken dialogue cut scenes are actually done quite well, and flow with the comic book layout. Payne sounds exactly as how his character is thought to sound, by being a dark pitched voice that gives the appearance the only thing he wants in life is to get revenge on to those who had destroyed his life. The other characters within Max Payne really get into character by putting a lot of emotion within their cut scene segments. It is as if you can sense the fear or hatred they have against Payne. Plus, even during the game, will you hear the mafia carry a conversation with a fellow friend. If you can manage to restrict yourself for a few moments from blowing their heads off, you’ll actually be hearing a full conversation. Conversations range from knowing how to set a bomb, to vampire movies, yet the moment you’re spotted, the guns do the talking from there. My only gripe with the voice acting though, is how at times, you cant help but laugh at the poor attempt some of the dialogues depend to much on emotion and appear to be comical, just listen to Payne yelling “Noooo!” at the beginning of the game, priceless.

The firearms, ranging from big to small, each carry a realistic sound when fired, so realistic that it will make you crap your pants once your in a room and outnumbered with 4 henchmen who are each carrying a pair of Uzi’s with bullets tearing through the wind, directed towards you. Molotov cocktails and grenades explode in a crackling blaze of flames until the wind slowly puts them out. Even the sound of teeth being knocked out by a face full of baseball bat and crowbar sounds great as you hear your weapons make contact with an unfortunate enemy’s flesh. However, most of the time spent on the realistic sound effects may be ignored unless you enable bullet time and listen to each bullet burst out and actually hear it whiz by you as the shells cast a booming sound while gently hitting the floor. All the interactive objects within the game sound realistic as well. Toilets flush, Electronic bids vibrate, and some go even further; Televisions may broadcast a looped segment with flashing pictures, and radios may broadcast the news. The setting in Max Payne is eerily realistic thanks to the time spent on sound effects, there is never a silent moment within the game, no matter if your standing still, or in a fight for your life against the mafia, there is always something to listen to.

Control:(8/10)

The control in Max Payne is simply smooth. Controlling Payne requires the use of both thumb sticks, where the one on the left controls his movement, and the one on the right controls the camera, directing Payne as to where he should go. It may be complex to control your character at first, but within mere moments, you’ll get the hand of it and be able to move yourself through the environments. The face buttons work as this; X allows your character to jump, A is the action button or when using the sniper rifle, allows you to zoom, Y reloads your weapons, and B allows you to use pain killers (health) when in need. The shoulder buttons allow you to fire your weapon (R) and enable the bullet time / shoot dodge combo (L). However, if your like me, and don’t like to depend on the L trigger for 2 things, the black and white buttons are a good alternative to the bullet time / shoot dodge combo, since each button is for used for one of the effects, but knowing which one does which can be frustrating when in battle. Finally, the directional pad is used to show case your inventory screen in which you can select your weapon of choice.

While it may seem like a lot to remember and use, the control is very fluent and makes it so each action was perfectly placed on the XBOX controller. Aiming the cross hairs or white dot on to an enemy is easily done, sensitivity problems don’t exist in this game. Actions are responsive and never take to long to perform, even when in bullet time. Dodging incoming fire and maneuvering around enemies is easily done thanks to the combination of working the camera and character movements together. The only gripe that I can possibly mention within this game is how at some moments in the game, when you try to activate the bullet time by pressing L, but accidentally enabled shoot dodge instead because you moved into a direction while pressing down on L, you not only activated the wrong action, but you also waste a portion of your bullet time meter. And while the black and white buttons prevent this from happening, it takes a while as to memorize which button does what. Other then that, the control is spot on.

Replay Value:(7/10)

Warning, for those who solely play games for the extras and not for the pure game play in which creates the game, don’t bother with Max Payne. There are hardly any extras worth getting for, and yeah, the game is a mere 10 hour action / adventure game; so why the high score? I suppose it’s a matter of taste. Most of the action / adventure games I have recently played all seemed to be to linear and repetitive as to what task needs to be done. The characters in these games are dumb-founded and are predictable as to how they will attack you. However, Max Payne has never once given me those impressions, but instead, surpassing my expectations.

Max Payne focuses solely on its story mode. However, there are numerous amounts of ways as to how you play the game. In Fugitive Mode, you play the default version of the game. This mode enables the game as a self-adjusting skill level system. The enemies will change their strategies depending to how well you are doing. So for example, if your doing horrible, then the enemies will have no choice but to accept your lack of skills, however, if you play the game with skill, then the enemies will pick up and attempt to challenge with their enhanced skills. Hard-Boiled mode is a more difficult then Fugitive Mode due to the fact Payne’s healing factor is slower then before and is open to receiving more damage from oncoming fire, plus the auto-aim may not be allowed as much as it was before. Dead on Arrival Mode is much more challenging then the previous modes. Auto-aim is removed; enemies can withstand more damage, while Payne can’t. What’s more challenging though is the fact that on Dead and Arrival Mode, you’re only allowed 7 game saves on each map, making you think carefully before saving. Lastly, there is the New York Minute Mode, which is a real challenge since your given only 1 minute to complete each area, and the only way in which you can add more time to the timer is by defeating your enemies; however, when the timer reaches zero, the game is over.

As you can tell, the story mode does have a lot to offer, the variety of game types and difficulty levels within Max Payne allow you to play the game by the same story and environments, but never experiencing the same event twice. Meaning that there are hundreds of ways to handle each situation, the freedom is endless as to how you get from point “A” to point “B”.

Bottom Line:(9/10)

Max Payne was built on a lot of hype. It took years to create, 2 of them spent solely on the bullet time and shoot dodge effects. The plot may seem corny to some, but it’s the way it’s told that will you want to play this game until the very end. The sheer freedom given in this game by deciding how to eliminate your enemies, to the interaction with the environments really makes Max Payne stand out from the other 3rd person shooting games. So I make Max Payne my top recommendation as for where 3rd person shooters go, if you’re a fan of this genre and don’t own this game, do yourself the favor and pick up a copy.