Max Payne
PlayStation 2
Nostalgia Factor:
I remember buying a used copy of Max Payne at a video game store back in 2002 or 2003. I played the game off and on for a while, but it never truly caught my interest. I remember I stopped and put the game down when I got stuck on a part where you have to chase a guy across the rooftops. I kept dying over and over again, and I couldn't figure out what to do, and it was frustrating me.
A year passed before I randomly decided to come back to the game. Normally when I stop playing a game for a long time, and then come back to it, I'll start it over from the beginning. Not this time, for some reason. I picked up where I left off, and quickly started making my way through the story. I don't remember much about my time with the game, but an area that stood out in my mind was an area with construction zones, shipping crates, and elevators that moved up and down. And I remembered something about guards standing watch in a watchtower that you had to shoot with a sniper rifle. I also remember having to escape a building that is on fire. Oh, and who can forget the hallucination scenes with the trail of blood and the baby crying? It is what most people think about when they remember Max Payne.
Aside from a few standout moments, the rest of the game was a blur to me, however. Playing through this game in present day was like playing it for the first time in many parts. If I played through this in, say, 2004, that means that 20 years have passed since I last played it. No wonder I don't remember much!
What prompted me to come back to this game after so many years? Well, there is a video game podcast I listen to called The Retrograde. They did an episode on Max Payne a while back. They hated the game, saying its controls were awful and that it did not hold up after all these years. They really ripped into this game, which I found odd because I don't remember it being that bad. In fact, whenever they talk about other bad games on this podcast, they often bring up Max Payne in comparison. It's funny how Max Payne is their standard for how bad games are judged.
It got me thinking, was this game really that bad? My memories of it are somewhat positive. I wanted to see if it held up over time or if it was truly as bad as these guys were saying. So here we are. Let's take a walk down memory lane, shall we?
Story:
The entire game is made to look like a comic book adventure. The majority of the story is told through voice-acted comic book illustrations. When the action is about to get started, things shift to the in-game action and the fighting begins. The comic book aesthetic of the game is something that makes it pretty unique and sets it apart from other games.
You play as Max Payne, a DEA agent with a tragic past. The game doesn't waste any time in letting you know that just a couple years ago, his wife and newborn baby were murdered in his house by some armed intruders. He is haunted by visions of this tragic night, over and over again.
The present day action begins when a meeting with a fellow undercover agent is ambushed and the agent is killed. Max is framed for the murder. The rest of the game consists of Max being on the run, with nothing to lose. He follows a trail of clues that links a new drug V to what is happening to him. He meets up with some mobsters, and blah blah blah. There's backstabbing and betrayal and conspiracies and all that fun kind of mobster stuff. Truth be told, I'm not a big fan of the hard-boiled noir genre, and this game leans very heavily into that. In fact, when I first played through this game back in 2004, I actually started skipping through the story about halfway through the game. I just didn't care about what was going on.
I cared a little bit more this time around, but not much. So that street drug, V? It's a result of some kind of big underground experiment that was supposed to have been canceled a long time ago. There's this rich business tycoon-type lady in charge of this giant operation. She's the one who had your family killed, and she's the big bad lady in charge of framing you.
Or something. I was only kind of half-paying attention to the story. I'm sure I got a lot of it wrong. Kudos to the game for its comic book style presentation, but honestly I just didn't find the story very interesting.
Gameplay:
Ultimately, it doesn't really matter if you don't care about the game's story or not, because it is a ton of fun to play. You can easily just completely ignore the story and still have a good time with the game.
Action takes place from a behind-the-back 3D perspective. Controls are pretty simple: run, jump, climb, reload, and shoot. I'd mainly classify this as a shooter. You face off against waves and waves of enemies sometimes, and the action can get very frantic. This game introduces a feature that I thought was quite innovative considering it came out in 2001 - the bullet time feature. Tap the shoulder button to slow time to a crawl, which allows you to aim at your enemies and fire away as they react in slow motion. You can tap the button while diving to go into a roll where you evade enemy fire in slow motion but can return fire as you dive away. Cool stuff.
Most of the game consists of running from area to area and shooting bad guys, but I found that Max Payne had some surprising depth. I loved exploring every inch of these stages - the subway station, the snowy and desolate streets, everything. This game just has this very fun and unique feel to it that is hard to describe. It does a lot of things that seem commonplace nowadays but were new back then. Like turning light switches off and on, flushing toilets, running the sink, operating a vending machine, opening cabinets and drawers, pushing buttons in an elevator, etc.
This game is surprisingly challenging. I was cruising through the game early on, but there is definitely a difficulty curve. A fair one, I'd say. It gets steadily tougher and tougher the more you play. In fact the game is downright hard towards the end of the game. The trip wires and the random exploding deaths were starting to get a bit frustrating, especially considering the game's long loading times. The first two thirds of the game aren't too challenging, although you will run into a tough level from time to time.
What I like about this game are how the stages are so short. There are a ton of them, probably 30 at the very least. Some of them can be beaten in just a couple minutes. Others can be a bit longer, but overall there are many more short ones than long ones. It adds to the addictive nature of the game where I wanted to keep plugging along and pass "just one more stage."
What didn't I like about Max Payne? Why did the Retrograde guys hate this game so much? Well, the controls do need tweaking. You absolutely have to change the inverted controls right away, as I was very confused by the default control scheme. Maybe that's why they hated the game so much. But I immediately paused the game and changed the controls. After doing that, I thought the game handled fine.
This is an early 2000s PS2 title, so it doesn't control flawlessly. The controls can be a little herky jerky. The dive maneuver got me into trouble so many times, as I'd either dive into a wall and leave myself open to attack, or I'd roll off a ledge or into a bomb or a laser barricade or something dumb like that. I don't know if this is a good or a bad thing, but precision aiming is not required. I often found myself just wildly firing in the direction of the enemy, and I would still hit him and take him down. The worst part of the game is when precision jumping or balancing is required. The trippy stages where you have to follow the blood trail would be super cool if they weren't so frustrating. Staying on that little ledge was tough enough as it is, but then you'd have to jump from platform to platform, with no margin for error, blindly guessing the direction you needed to go. I hated these stages with a passion. The last one in particular took me a large, and I mean LARGE number of attempts before I was finally able to pass it.
All that being said, I really enjoyed my time with the game. Those Retrograde guys are tripping. In fact, I liked this more playing it in 2024 than I did in 2004. It just hits all the right beats for me. And if you pay attention you can see how the game inspires future Rockstar titles like Manhunt, GTA IV (with the large ship/cargo hold shoot out) and GTA V (with the drug trip and hallucinations). The blueprint for so many games seems to be right there in the first Max Payne.
Graphics:
When I first started playing this game, I couldn't get over how dark it was. I was struggling to see anything, it was so dark. I had to adjust my TV settings or the game would have been completely unplayable. I wonder if anyone else has had this experience.
Anyway, the game looks fine. It's an early PS2 title, so it is a little rough around the edges. But it is not an ugly or unplayable game by any means. I think it looks quite good. The comic book presentation is cool, but to me the star of the game is its level design. I love the urban locales you explore, like the rooftops, the bar, the subway, the parking garage, the old theater, the dock, etc. An underrated aspect of the game is its oppressive atmosphere. The entire game is set to the backdrop of a giant winter storm hitting the city, completely shutting everything down. The streets, rooftops, and alleyways seem so desolate, empty, and oppressive in the driving snow. And the fact that it is pretty much Max against the mob all by himself, it all really, really works well together.
Sound:
I like the voice acting in this game. Max Payne narrates most of the action, and I couldn't think of a better voice actor than, uh, this guy, to voice Max Payne. He is perfect for the role. The other voice actors do a good job, too. As I have said many times, the comic book noir-style feel of the game has been captured well here.
This is a game you would be best playing with headphones on. Enemies give audio clues to their locations, which will help you out as you are playing. Also, the nightmare flashback scenes are incredible to listen to, with the intensity of his wife's pleas along with the sound of the baby crying. Even Max's screams if he falls or makes a wrong turn are pretty horrifying. Although there is one scream effect that reminds me of both Kevin from Home Alone when he puts his aftershave on and slaps his cheeks, and the criminals from Home Alone when they are swinging from the rope from the treehouse after Kevin cuts it. I didn't know whether to be scared or laugh. If you are easily scared, this will probably freak you out. But I'm weird and like that kind of thing.
Overall:
Screw the haters, this is a really fun game! It's not without its flaws, like its so-so storyline, its jerky controls, cheap deaths, long loading times, and obnoxious blood trail stages. Despite all these things, I still had a very good time with the game.
The storyline was enough to keep me going. I loved the presentation of the game. It starts out challenging, but not overly so. Enough to get you addicted. Then it slowly starts getting harder. The battles are fun. The bullet time feature is cool. The atmosphere of the game is awesome. The urban locations are a lot of fun. I liked the short stages, and how the game keeps you entertained in short bursts rather than create overly long levels.
I can easily recommend Max Payne to anyone on the fence about it. Play this yourself and make up your own mind about it. I doubt they'll ever read this, but I hope Mikey and Andrew from The Retrograde play this again someday and give it another chance. While I personally really enjoyed the game, I can see why someone would not like it. But to say it is one of the worst games of all time is just 100% wrong, and a complete injustice to the game.
Long story short: Max Payne good.
THE GRADE:
B+
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