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Continuing the series of articles about the games I loved, here is one about Max Payne. I will especially discuss the second game because it is the one that anazed me the most.
The first Max Payne was released in 2001 while the second was in stores in late 2003. Both games were developed by Remedy, which is a Finnish game company and is now working on Alan Wake (for those who know about it). They are third-person shooters involving the Matrix's "bullet-time" technology, meaning you can slow the game down and chain some combos to get easy shots at enemies.
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A Noir Story : Max Payne
First of all, if you want to play a game that is fun or colourful, stop reading further. Max Payne is all about desperation, darkness and gloom. You might smile here and there because of some references the developers added here and there (especially in the second opus) but mainly you won't be jolling around.
Max Payne is a New York detective who discovers his family dead when coming home one night : both his wife and baby were brutally assaulted in their house by junkies. The game starts right when Max comes home and sees the house turned upside-down. After a short sequence, you learn that he asked to be transfered to the DEA and that three years later, he is investigating through all the narco traffic involved around his family's murder.
As the plot develops, you'll see that nothing is simple in Max's world, especially not his dreams.
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Introduction : some parts of the story are told using a comic book style
I liked this game a lot as it was mildly difficult and very interesting. The scenes where the story is told in a comic book style are great and contribute greatly to the atmosphere. But the weirdest moments are Max's nightmares : endless mazes, creepy voices, distorted and blurry vision... it really is disturbing.
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In this one, you must find your way out of a maze made of blood trails...
All in all, Max Payne is a good shooting game. Not the best one out there, but very decent. Good story, good background, great atmosphere, nice gameplay.
Max Payne II : The Fall of Max Payne
This sequel takes place two years after the original episode. I didn't play it right away ; critics were good but I didn't enjoy the first episode that much so it just went over my head. I tried it a couple years after and I wasn't disappointed.
The graphics engine remained the same but with better textures, so it was kinda easy to run the game smoothly with all options on. The environment remained the same : dark places, sad story, gangsters, etc... Many characters came back from Max Payne 1 and some bits of the story reference it, so it is important to play the first game before this one.
The beginning is banal : Max is called to investigate about a call from people who have heard gunshots in some warehouse. Turns out the owner is being tortured by gangsters in disguise and while chasing them, he runs into Mona Sax. Max's and Mona's paths will often cross during this journey into the night and they'll meet different kinds of gangsters.
Most aspects of the first game were reused : bullet-time, comic book sequences, nightmares.
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A usual battle in Max Payne 2
Now that game really blew me off. Not only the storyline was great, but the feeling was even better than in the first episode. More jokes or allusions - especially through the TV episodes you can find here and there - added a bitter taste to the general atmosphere. Moreover, the fact that you can at some points play with Mona instead of Max and the whole levels where some sort of co-op play happens with both characters is huge. It added an extra dimension to the game, giving a real in-depth immersion to the player.
Though very linear, the game becomes really interesting to the point I was not able to let it go until I completed it in all modes. I wanted MORE story and was thrilled to know the ending was different in the hardest game mode.
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Mona is the coolest character in the whole game
On the minus side, it has to be mentioned that :
- The game is too easy. Really, it's not that hard to finish it in the normal mode replaying it again and again to see the alternate ending is a bit boring.
- Many levels are repetitive, sometimes you play the same map 3 times in the whole game (e.g. Mona's playground). The good guys at Remedy should have made more different areas.
What next ?
Max Payne 2 supports natively modifications and offers an SDK to build your own mods. So of course, there have been tons of mods for Max Payne 2. I haven't played them as much as I would have wanted to ; I needed a fucking good story, a sequel to the original one at least as good. But I must admit I haven't taken a good look at what was proposed anyway.
I've seen there's a rumor about Max Payne 3 being under development at Rockstar. I don't know, it's not the same team, not the same writer (or is it ?) so I'm not as ecstatic as I should be. We'll see as we get more information about this.
There's also the movie that will be released soon, with Mark Wahlberg as Max Payne and Mila Kunis as Mona. The trailer looks OK, but I'm a bit skeptical with it. Again, we'll see when it's out.
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Finally, I'd recommend playing the Max Payne series to any reader here that plays shooters. It is very different from your usual FPS so you might not like it, but it's definitely a must-try.
Thanks a lot !
