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..It Was Etched in Stone For the World to See, and Suddenly it All Made Sense, "Max Payne Rules." It Was Finally Over.
Max Payne was one of the most intriguing enjoyable shooter experiences I have had in a very long time. It's been a long time coming for a believable, hip, action-packed shooter to come out, and Max is the one. I can at least hope that this will be the start of a nice long running series. I hope in sequels they focus less on the mob, and more on the more climactic powers that be, though. The levels involving that sort of thing were far more fun (though less environmentally stimulating) than the mobster maps. If you don't need multiplayer, but are looking for a great shooter experience that immerses you in a dark action flick, you won't know what living is until you've experienced Payne.
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| Graphics
- Sound - Gameplay - Depth
- Multiplayer | Reviewed
by John Del Percio |
GRAPHICS
100 % |
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Max has the best third-person shooter graphics engine I've seen to date. Unlike the eye-candy that looked more like an amusement park that was given a bit too much juice called Quake III, Max is a great engine for displaying real-world scenarios. The true radiosity rendering for the lighting gives that true to life appearance that has been missing from most modern games. The only thing that is needed now in a game engine is realistic specularity and diffusion. Somehow, I think that's a long time coming, given current hardware.
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SOUND
96 % |
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The sound was great. Gunshots and effects were great, all environmental sounds, and distance effects were great. The theme piano music was an excellent touch, and the rest of the music (what little there was) was equally as great. The main character's voice, as well as a few other lead voices were exceptional, though some other voices for both in-game speech, and even a few graphic novel characters didn't sound as good as they could have (though still not as bad as some of the later ones in Deus Ex.)
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GAMEPLAY
99 % |
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It's been some time since I've actually had this much fun with the single player mode of a shooter. I still think the game was way too short, but It's hard to blame them for that considering the attention to detail that was put in the game, and the attention to fun in the gameplay.
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DEPTH
95 % |
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The game is both deep and shallow at once. The story is quite intriguing and well orchestrated, though it's difficult to call the story entirely original, either. The game is also a bit too short to fully develop the story as much as I would have liked to have seen it. In terms of game depth, the weapons and tactics were about the deepest I've seen for this type of shooter, and was certainly worth a bit of thought.
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MULTIPLAYER
0 % |
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n/a
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It's rare that my expectations for a game are entirely realized, and usually results in some disappointment. In this case, it was actually better than my anticipation had hoped, though the length of the game was somewhat of a let-down. Still, I'm willing to let them off the hook considering I'm shuddering to think how long those maps took to design. With that number of independent textures, it would take about a week and a few gallons of Jolt to get one job done. One nice thing, though, that extends the playability is that the map editor is included on the CD, so hopefully the fan community will keep the game running for a long time. Max is most certainly up for nomination for Best Action Game and Best Game for the 2001 Top Pupil Awards. Perhaps we'll see more of Max within the next year, if we're lucky!
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