Max Payne

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Dom Cruise said:
love the first 2 games, but I still need to play the third one
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I held out playing 3 for a long time because I just didn't want to see Remedy's baby in the hands of someone else. It felt... gross, and that's coming from someone who loves Rockstar.

When I finally did play it, I was incredibly impressed by what Rockstar did with the series. They did a great job paying tribute to the series up until that point, but they also rightly took the series in a bold, neo-noir direction that was entirely their own. Aside from perhaps too many cutscenes (every time you walk through a door it seems like you lose control for an establishing cutscene), I can only complain that Rockstar hasnt given us Max Payne 4 yet.
 
frozenrunner said:
I held out playing 3 for a long time because I just didn't want to see Remedy's baby in the hands of someone else. It felt... gross, and that's coming from someone who loves Rockstar.

When I finally did play it, I was incredibly impressed by what Rockstar did with the series. They did a great job paying tribute to the series up until that point, but they also rightly took the series in a bold, neo-noir direction that was entirely their own. Aside from perhaps too many cutscenes (every time you walk through a door it seems like you lose control for an establishing cutscene), I can only complain that Rockstar hasnt given us Max Payne 4 yet.
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Yeah, that was what has kept me away from it for so long is the idea of it simply not being Remedy's game, but I will definitely get around to playing it eventually.
 
Max Payne 2 was one of my favorite surprises of buying Xbox games on the cheap when I got the OG one at the end of its lifespan. This thread making me want to play it on the Xbox again.
 
Dom Cruise said:
Yeah, that was what has kept me away from it for so long is the idea of it simply not being Remedy's game, but I will definitely get around to playing it eventually.
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If you can do so, I highly advise you to play it on PC. Max Payne 3 is a game that really benefits from you having a mouse. It's fine on controllers, but the limitations of the analog stick force you to play it closer to a traditional cover-based shooter. Some sections also force you to be super-accurate and they're way harder than they should be on consoles because of it. Meanwhile on PC, you can nail headshots like there's no tomorrow and the feeling is so cathartic. The ease of aiming also makes the game less frustrating in general.

Plus it's one of the only Rockstar games that has good PC optimization. Hell it runs better on PC than on consoles and that almost never happens with Rockstar games.
 
frozenrunner said:
I can only complain that Rockstar hasnt given us Max Payne 4 yet.
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A 4th game would be nice just to close the franchise but I doubt that Rockstar is capable of making a good game now.

Duncan Hills Coffee said:
Max Payne 3 is a game that really benefits from you having a mouse.
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I've replayed Max Payne 3 on PC for the first time a few months ago and damn what an experience, it's so much better than the PS3 version (I've never tried the 360), it's just a shame that the multiplayer is dead.
 
Miller said:
it's so much better than the PS3 version
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I have the PS3 version, and I don't know if it's just me but the game was poorly optimized for it. For one thing, it would always crash in this one specific spot during the cutscene beginning Chapter 2, before the chapter really starts so when I load it up it's back at the final part of chapter 1. I've played the game several times on PS3, and it would always happen like clockwork. Plus a few of the cutscenes would have their audio drop out completely, most notably the one starting Chapter VII (the one where Max enters the favelas), which, for a game as cutscene heavy as Max Payne 3, is really fucking annoying.

I chalk it up to Rockstar having a poor track record on PS3, because some of those issues I experienced with GTA IV, which was also optimized like shit on PS3.
 
the franchise is already closed. it could also have been ended at the 2nd game, but the 3rd one was a good addition. the series could have also ended with max payne 2 ending when max says "i had a dream of my wife, she was dead but it was all right". max payne 3 gives full closure to the plot, the last scene where he doesn't speak any inner dialogue at the beach says he is finally at peace with himself. after that, it isn't important what happens next.
 
Smaug's Smokey Hole said:
For anyone thinking of playing the first two games on a modern system check out pcgamingwiki for any problems that might pop up.

Max Payne - PCGamingWiki PCGW - bugs, fixes, crashes, mods, guides and improvements for every PC game

www.pcgamingwiki.com www.pcgamingwiki.com

Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne - PCGamingWiki PCGW - bugs, fixes, crashes, mods, guides and improvements for every PC game

www.pcgamingwiki.com www.pcgamingwiki.com
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I remember these games having real issues with widescreen and just played them windowed, has that been fixed?
 
Dom Cruise said:
I love the first 2 games, but I still need to play the third one.

I fucking love the whole style of those first 2 games, yes a lot of the dialog is ridiculous, but that's the point, there's so many phrases that stick with me like "the fear that gives men wings", they're some of the best written games ever made even if they're kind of supposed to be parodies.

I've not played the second game since 2010 and the original game since 2013, one of these days I need to replay them again and finally play the third game.
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I'd argue MP 1 and 2 are less parodies and more homages to the noir genre. Its just hard to tell the difference when noir is bleaker than 2020 and dryer than the Aral Sea.
 
Snekposter said:
I'd argue MP 1 and 2 are less parodies and more homages to the noir genre. Its just hard to tell the difference when noir is bleaker than 2020 and dryer than the Aral Sea.
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"Parodies" probably isn't the right word, but I do think some of the dialog and moments are meant to be a bit tongue in cheek, but really we're talking a wholly unique tone, I've never seen anything that quite has the same tone the first 2 Max Payne games have, where it's serious... but not, at the same time.
 
Agreed on that. They're really a tongue-in-cheek homage to noir, I feel. It just comes across as working because it ends up as noir that doesn't take itself too seriously. Like the best parts of 40k, where it knows how grimdark and over the top it is and just rolls with it.
 
Dom Cruise said:
I remember these games having real issues with widescreen and just played them windowed, has that been fixed?
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They used a very nice [Finnish?] middleware solution for occlusion culling, don't know if anyone fixed that.

(timestamped, look at the left, boxes and lockers)

Dom Cruise said:
"Parodies" probably isn't the right word, but I do think some of the dialog and moments are meant to be a bit tongue in cheek, but really we're talking a wholly unique tone, I've never seen anything that quite has the same tone the first 2 Max Payne games have, where it's serious... but not, at the same time.
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Max Payne is hammy. Dramatic without jokes but also very funny, like the Emperor's Speech in Empire Strikes Back or Merlin in Boorman's Excalibur.
 
Smaug's Smokey Hole said:
Max Payne is hammy. Dramatic without jokes but also very funny, like the Emperor's Speech in Empire Strikes Back or Merlin in Boorman's Excalibur.
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There's just so many phrases in the game that stick with you as being so bizarre and unique, "the sun went down with practiced bravado", "the fear that gives men wings", "the flesh of fallen angels", "cartoon violence is a fascinating thing", "mirrors are more fun than television" and my favorite, "funny as hell, it was the most horrible thing I could think of"

That quote in particular has always stuck with me, "funny as hell, it was the most horrible thing I could think of", what does that even really mean? And yet somehow it's a phrase that makes perfect sense, even if you can't really explain why.

I'm also fascinated with just how creepy the game is, especially the nightmare sequences, it feels close to a horror game at times even though it was sold as an action shoot 'em up.

I'm just a very big fan of Sam Lake's writing, the dude is without a doubt one of the best writers video games have ever had.
 
Dom Cruise said:
I'm also fascinated with just how creepy the game is, especially the nightmare sequences, it feels close to a horror game at times even though it was sold as an action shoot 'em up.
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The fucking nightmare sequences where you're navigating trails of blood while listening to Max's baby's cries still unnerve me whenever I replay the game. It's such a morbid concept that you never see in modern games either. Hell the concept of a baby getting murdered at all, complete with close-ups of its (covered-up but still) corpse is something nobody would ever do today which makes Max Payne just as powerful as it was 20 years ago.

Dom Cruise said:
I'm just a very big fan of Sam Lake's writing, the dude is without a doubt one of the best writers video games have ever had.
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I've been playing Alan Wake recently and what surprised me was how Lake was able to seamlessly transplant his style into a different genre. It's got similarities to Max Payne for sure, but the horror genre fits Lake's writing style like a glove. Lake's got a major talent for writing stories that appear simple on the surface, but when you start peeling back the layers you find an insane amount of depth to the characters and the world.
 
Smaug's Smokey Hole said:
Sin might have stolen the drug-mutant thunder from them. Did they really turn into mutants in old MP trailers? I remember the ultra big hulking dudes but read them as huge goon enforcers.

Exactly right about Max 1 having by far the best plot. In 2020 people joke about this being the end times and the end of the world was built up in Max 1 in a way that I really got sucked into. After a while I actually expected that there would be this big turning point in the game where the norse mythology was no longer just names of people and places. Not fighting mythical beings or directly encountering any of them but maybe there would be a shape of what could be Fenrir moving on the other side of the bay and sudden streaks of light in high up in the sky as if Thor was riding his chariot and cracking skulls. Down on the streets stands the human Max Payne realizing that his revenge doesn't matter but it's all he's got so he keeps trudging forward through the blizzard.
No god have ever known or cared who Max Payne is, it seems fitting for his character.
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There’s a bit where the game looks like it might go that direction with that one mob boss at the end of act one (the one who owns the nightclub and is some sort of satanic/Norse cultist) but no he was just tripping on drugs.
 
Thebag$$$ said:
jack lupino, scared me shitless as a kid.
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His presence is just so tonally different from the rest of the game which is a revenge/noir/crime drama story for the first 2/3 before becoming a conspiracy thriller in the third act then Jack comes in running at you with a lot mmore health than every other enemy in the series rambling about his wierd schizo religion... and then immediately after tht you have the first nightmare sequence
 
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Notgoodwithusernames said:
His presence is just so tonally different from the rest of the game which is a revenge/noir/crime drama story for the first 2/3 before becoming a conspiracy thriller in the third act then Jack comes in running at you with a lot mmore health than every other enemy in the series rambling about his wierd schizo religion... and then immediately after tht you have the first nightmare sequence
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the game constantly throws ball between a nation level conspiracy and a cop drama.
 
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