Anyways, just finished my first playthrough of Max Payne 3, and I liked some things, others not so much.
The game looks damn great, especially the animations and all the details. I did dig the 80's VHS visuals in place of the traditional noir comic book style MP was known for, especially how they represented Max's drunken stupors. The background detail and Brazil looked pretty as shit.
Unfortunately there are CUTSCENES every fucking where. Cinematic experience indeed. On the first playthrough this isn't as bad, but on replays they get seriously grating, especially when you have to deal with loading times without a SSD. I just want to move on and kill shit without any hold-up. The chapters were there was the least cinematic crap to deal with (airport shootout) were my favourite because of this.
I liked seeing a bit more emotion on Max, but he suffers from a problem most modern shooters have, which is that the MC must narrate every single fucking thing. From picking up painkillers to reminding the player what needs to be done, it gets tiring fast. Max's self-deprecating 'god I'm so drunk pathetic and a failure in life, all I know is how to kill people and do dumb things' shtick lasts for the entire fucking game and gets older than the man himself, move the fuck on, man.
I did like the gameplay even if some design decisions were questionable. Like shootdodges being canceled when you collide into something, the Last Stand mechanic restraining your ability to aim rather than depleting what Bullet Time you had left like what Vanquish did, the presence of an aim button rather than a permanent crosshair on screen, shootdodging constantly draining energy rather than consuming a fixed amount, the focus on being a cover shooter, and the general 'weightier' feel of the controls, but outside of that I still think MP3 is worth a play for its shooting alone. I guess where BT in MP1 was like a targeting aid and was god mode in MP2, it's a temporary Rambo mode in MP3 considering all the shit that gets thrown at you and how fast it drains (on Hard).
So I'd say 1 > 3 > 2, only because 2 is 2ez and has that construction site chapter which goes on for fucking ever, though 2 lends itself better to replays than 3.
Anyways, post your thoughts or reaction images on Max Payne
Max Payne 3 was fucking trash The dialogue, the art style and most importantly the story. Max is depicted as a literal retard in every cutscene despite being more than capable of doing everything the game throws at you from getting mugged by 3 niggers with an AK to being fucking retarded and blowing every advantage. Rockstar is notorious for this with both GTA 4 and 5 and it seeps through here too. The levels are another massive failure in design with the game trying to rush you through them with nonstop dialogue while also having collectables and random world tidbits. They are very generic "real world location in a game" instead of levels designed for a game. The game is trying to ape Man on Fire so hard that it forgets that its a video game.
Jackson Watson
It always seemed funny to me how Max thought it was insane that so many BRs were after his ass when one man killing all of those BRs by himself is somehow normal. The game really suffers from ludonarrative dissonance where there are sections in which Max could've shootdodged in and killed everyone but instead Max does more dumb shit as Max once again goes 'GOD I'M DRUNK AND STUPID'. Level design in MP3 also suffered badly from cinematic pacing, even though level design in MP1 and 2 wasn't always that noteworthy.
It always seemed silly to me how MP3 was another redemption story when he already thought everything was alright at the secret ending of MP2. MP2 was already a downwards spiral in Max's character arc which does eventually resolves itself, but MP3 then starts at rock bottom only to resolve in the same way as MP2 did.
God, I feel like replaying MP1 again.
Joshua Torres
You can skip the intro cutscene on replays by starting from checkpoint 2, but the game never tells you this
That's every Max Payne though. In Max Payne 2 you suddenly try to arrest people and can't even take out two guys. Hell, in Max Payne 1 you could probably take out Nicole's ambush with the grenade launcher and some quicksaving if they had let you. Like every Max Payne game, and they have every boring real world location explored and made use of to the maximum amount. You go through a police station from the holding cells to the garage filled with swat cars to the shooting range, and all of it's set up to make different and engaging gameplay arenas.
Benjamin Scott
In the first level of Max Payne 1 you go to a subway, crash the train into a bank robbery in progress and then blow yourself to another subway entrance using dyanmite. Then there is the level where you are tailing a bleeding man jumping over trains and rooftops. Even Max Payne 2 has the shootout in the defunct fun house. Max payne 3? A rooftop shootout where the only interesting thing happens in a QTE segment. A club shootout. A stadium shootout with a sniper escort.A chop shop shootout where you can kill every enemy before they even get into the level. The game has a fucking boat chase rail shooting segment. Its like the culmination of all modern lazy level design tropes. I feel like you haven't played Max Payne 1 at all but are just defending Max Payne 3 with rhetoric.
Matthew Hall
I had a lot of fun with MP3. The shooting was fine, some of the areas were absolutely god-tier (and others complete trash) great music, great visuals, story was fittingly like a 90s Action-movie, don't know if that one as intentional tho.
For some reason i just can't motivate myself to play it again though, so i guess that tells something about the game.
Caleb Morgan
I completely forgot about the final boss too. Max Payne 1 and 2 didn't have that good of a final boss but Max Payne 3 shits itself. You had more control in the final boss of Max Payne 2 and that boss actually blew the ground you stood on.
Jaxson White
What I really hate in Max Payne 3 is that they really don't give a reason why Max is a drunken dumbass.
Like okay, Mona died, but he had come to terms with his family's death by the end of Max Payne 2. Why the hell is he such a wreck now?
Also like many people said it feels way too "cinematic", even the gameplay. Like the constant distortions, shaky cam(check out the shitty ass sprint button for this), how very stiff max felt to control compared to the rest of the games and just this idea that super cool cinematics and scripted sequences taking control over the player's own ingenuity making a fight cool just got to me. I know MP1 had fall damage but MP3 felt like it went overboard with it, and this mechanic of Max colliding with walls every time he shootdodges into them would be fine if the shootout areas were more open and the enemies were less reliant on cover(I fucking hated how many times I had to wait somewhere for some enemy to pop out of cover because he was in a place I couldn't flank or reach).
Which do you consider the final boss? The police midget or the airplane chase?
Brayden Ross
I just realized how much cooler it'd be if the player had to seek out opportunities like dangling on a chain while raining hell from above or shooting grenades in the air by himself rather than the game automatically doing that for you. Even better when said opportunities result from various mechanics interacting with eachother rather than placing setpiece triggers by hand, like those things you can crash in in the NFS games to make things fall apart and obstruct opponents. So you feel like you did something really cool by yourself.
Nolan Phillips
Also one big complaint I have with MP3 is the weapons. Weapon limit aside all the weapons feel very alike with the only real distinction being auto/semi auto/explosive. Compare this to Max Payne 1 where you can switch(and will switch if you're playing at a higher level) between like a dozen weapons each with their own feel, distinct sound and uses.
Bentley Peterson
Yeah, I guess you're right with all the early 2000's scripted environmental fun stuff Max Payne 1 had, but the design in Max Payne 3 is still in no way bad.
People bitch about the shootdodging, but I've never experienced any of their problems. You jump in, you use situational awareness so you don't smack into anything, and you keep jumping until everyone's dead.
Jackson Gutierrez
Yeah this reminds me of another completely retarded design decision in the game. No fucking grenades. What were they smoking when they made a game filled with chest high walls, railings and cover and didn't add grenades to flush enemies with? It fails at even having standard shooter things.
embed related The entire section is a massive disappointment. Like the designers looked at what they could do and chose the worst idea. They could've had a shootout in the plane but no gotta waste the player's time. I completely forgot about the ending rail shooting segment too.
Carson Richardson
With the recovery time on his jump the only one who is going to do the dying is you unless you jump into cover.
Gavin Jones
I was wondering where the grenades were, considering there was a button for grenade throwing in the controls menu. Seems like that was multiplayer only, for some goddamn reason.
Noah Morris
It just doesn't feel smooth to me. To me shootdodging is that one cool ass final card you play in a shootout. But because the rolling in MP3 is so gimped Shootdodging is the way you can actually dodge bullets outside of sticking yourself in cover. Problem is with how linear and how closed every level is. Like the place is always littered with chest high walls, enemies stay in cover for way too long with destructible cover being something you meet in like two chapters and no way to flush enemies out, and the way movement works outside and inside of cover is just out of sync. Play something like Vanquish for example, where the game banks on you to move as quickly as possible and as such as very smooth controls and movement. In Max Payne 3 a lot of things felt wrong. For example
Adam Morales
Also is anyone else getting a "Thread deleted or pruned message"? The thread's still on the catalog so I don't know what gives.
Would have probably been more useful than that joke sprint button
Dylan Sanchez
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Angel Scott
That's really what kills replaying the game for me.
Adrian Thomas
I dropped a 2nd run through in the arcade mode because of this. I'd rather go to China and have my organs harvested than go through the organ harvesting story again.
Easton Myers
Rockstar wanted to make a movie. Cutscenes after 5 minutes of gameplay.
They butchered the characters and tone of the original games.
Honestly the game is a mess.
Hunter Peterson
Yeah, but it was one of the few recent games where the guns actually have weight. If you remove the story entirely, it would go from a 6/10 to an 8/10 for me.
Jose Taylor
Well I gave up after being fucked in the ass by an invincible checkpoint. Maybe the game gets better after the favela's whorehouse?
Nicholas Gonzalez
Invisible.
I hate this phone.
Carter Davis
payne in the butt
Isaiah Rogers
You're killing me.
Cameron Brown
Just die enough times and the game will practically push you through it. You get more painkillers, ammo, better weapons and then less enemies if you die at a point too many times. This cannot be turned off even in the hardest difficulty and is just a massive crutch in the already lackluster level design.
Tyler Cruz
I enjoyed Max Payne 3. Certainly not as much as the first two, but it was OK. What bothers me the most is the need to transform Max into a drunk piece of trash, because muh dead family. You'd think it's all water under the bridge after MP2 (with chasing the Mona booty and all), but no, let's get him out of his job, throw him in Brasil, drown him in Whisky and pills and make him loathe himself. Truly, I liked him better when he was in a bloody vendetta like in MP1.
It was like this in the other games IIRC, but it was more about the AI and not extra health/ammo : the faster you progressed in "Fugitive", the more the enemies punished you. The other modes like "Dead on Arrival" kept the difficulty rate at maximum, and limited the number of saves.
Robert Gomez
I agree.
Although I'd say the gameplay in 2 is not quite as flawed as in 3, 3's pros were a lot better and almost made up for some of its flaws (though not entirely). 2 didn't really do much for with gameplay beyond giving you a spinning reload trick and breaking bullet time beyond belief.
Grayson Sullivan
The "other games" did not use checkpoints and had manual saves. The AI was completely scripted with enemies actually becoming completely stupid if you fuck up the script. The levels in those games were actually designed so memorization could help you instead of pure trial and error.
Evan Hall
...
Brody Nguyen
My problem was that I like to play games SLOW.
I wanted to explore. Game stopped me from backtracking.
I opened up the 360, yanked out the DVD and threw it in the trash.
Andrew Robinson
well, there's your problem
Blake Jackson
2 will spawn painkillers on every enemy if you load a save enough times. I really hate it when games put any of this shit in.
Joseph Bailey
I have such a love-hate relationship with this game. It does so much wrong but I kept playing it simply because it has some of the most satisfying shooting physics I've ever experienced in a video game. This game came out back when I was obsessed with John Woo movies so I had a raging hard-on while mowing down enemies in this. All it needs is some RE4 style head explosions and it would have been perfect. Definitely than the first two for all the reasons already mentioned but I can still get a ton of enjoyment out of it (Unskippable cutscenes can still suck a dick).
Btw what do you lads think about Stranglehold?
Michael Turner
If you mean the "LOADING" in the cutscenes, that's a total fucking bald-faced lie at least part of the time. My old shitty HDD that's five years old and my new SSD with a read/write of like 550 mb/s take the exact same amount of time before I can skip a cutscene, and most of the time that moment is "coincidentally" right after the next scene's established or some plot-relevant dialogue is said.
Aaron Turner
I like games like CS:GO (1k hours) and I thoroughly enjoyed Max Payne 3 because it's a shooting game that allows you to take advantage of your aim and positioning. I played Max Payne 2 as a kid but never played the first game.
I dont think Max Payne 3 excessively limited the gameplay into being a cover shooter; you can still exit cover and use cover manually e.g. rounding the corners of a wall while walking/crawling. You can play the game without the use of the cover system except for specified parts of the game.
I feel there are very very few SINGLEPLAYER shooting games that allow you to succeed through raw mechanic skill. The AI in Max Payne 3 attempt to all emerge out of cover at the same time so you'll get shot, and try to flank you intelligently.
You can still go fast and run and gun because there is no movement accuracy penalty for Max's guns, and you can play the game that way if your aim is that good. Or you could also play intelligently and control how you move and aim around corners and shootdodge so you have better positioning (I can get into a gunbattle with minion X and be able to ignore minion Y because this cover allows me to do so). I have grown tremendously irritated with FPS or TPS games where weapon accuracy is determined by aiming down sights and nowdays desire a more arcadey approach.
Being able to sulk around and take down enemies systematically or going rambo is great because you kill enemies like a hot knife through butter. Also, the guns feel fantastic.
Nathan Wright
IDK I rented it when it first came out and came away with mixed reactions, they really advertised the hell out of the destructible environment shit(that wasn't even really a thing in the game) and I didn't like the shooting as much as a the max payne games.
Colton Wilson
Play Max Payne 1
Levi Ramirez
yea he needs to play MP1 then he needs to play it again with Kung Fu mod.
Christopher Wood
While I enjoyed the original setting of MP1 and 2 I feel like this was the correct way to go. Revisiting NY/NJ was fun in short sections but setting the entire game there would just have been an inferior rehash of better games.
Brody Wilson
The game really only gets worse. Like I said, if your mind wasn't polluted by the writing, it would have been a great game.
Isaiah Gutierrez
3 is fucking garbage for forcing Cuckstar Social Club DRM alone.
1 > 2 > 3
PC version is even worse.
Jordan Young
The writing in MP3 was so fucking terrible…..None of the tragic or serious characterizations from the previous game even had an influence. Then by the end of the fucking game even max becomes a goddamn cuck…… Rockstar can't write anything beyond LOL SO XD GOOFY RANDOM LOOK AT THIS THIS IS CRAAAAZZZZZYYY!!! The only game that rockstar made with good writing was Manhunt 1 and that was because of it's minimalism.
Ian Smith
Setting aside the shitshow that is Social Club the port for MP3 was actually pretty good. By R* standards it's fucking brilliant but then R* are terrible at porting shit to PC so that isn't saying much.
Another crime MP3 committed was preventing mods particularly with the large scene there was for 1 and 2. In fact 3 in general feels like someone took the solid base gameplay and tried their level best to fuck it up squeenix style.
Nathaniel Watson
The sad thing the gameplay in MP3 was actually really fucking good. Everything else though is total shit. It's also sad to think that MP2 was kind of half baked as well.
Jaxson Stewart
actually scratch that I think GTA3, and Red Dead Redemption(eh I liked about half of it but rockstar cannot write characters beyond XD look how goofy this is) had ok stories, but once again that was due to it's minimalism and it's schlocky imitation of gangster films. Rockstar should get back to ripping off classic films because they can't write for shit and their social commentary doesn't extend past "look how retarded these people are" and "Straight man in an insane world." These people are fucking hacks and it's a damn tragedy that they are allowed to write the same damn story over and over again without anyone getting the wiser. Seriously just look at MP3, Red Dead, and GTA5 it's always "Sane man forced to do crazy things to exist in a world gone mad." it's stupid, it's lazy, and worst of all it's getting gay.
Brody Stewart
Nope, shit port of a shit game
Landon Cox
Is it really? Flashy animations aside what really makes the gameplay so good? Because if the enemies all die in one headshot, the level design ranges from okay to terrible, the weapons feel very alike, the fights all really like reusing this "max gets spotted while sneaking, gets into cover and then you're fighting half a dozen enemies while you're already in cover", and most of the cooler setpieces are scripted or rail shooting segments, then what really makes MP3 have "great" gameplay?
Oliver Brooks
I would recommend only paying attention to the game during the police station raid and the airport level. Those are the only better levels of the game as it goes on.
James Price
The AI was really good, the movement was the best I have felt in a 3rd person action game in a long long time, I liked all the little nuances in the movement mechanics, The animation was probably the best I have seen, The physics were really good, etc. It comes down to personal taste. I also think my fondness for the gameplay revolves around the fact that they don't make good 3rd person shooters anymore.
Jaxon Nguyen
I miss Smod
Aiden Robinson
>The sad thing the gameplay in MP3 was actually really fucking good. Everything else though is total shit. It's also sad to think that MP2 was kind of half baked as well.
I'm not sure I'd say everything else as it wasn't too shabby graphically and I did rather like the destructible environments on the rare occasion they showed up but otherwise I'd agree. MP3 could have been something amazing rather than a good game buried under a bunch of unnecessary shit. It does improve a bit if you play it in the arcade mode, particularly New York Minute which neatly skips half of the cutscenes (and almost all of the walking cutscenes) but it still has issues.
That flaw lies more with the original game than it does the port. While you can skip cutscenes once 'loading' has completed I have a suspicion that the devs actually wanted to force you to watch the cutscene rather than use it to hide loading. Someone could surely test this with an SSD.
The biggest improvement was shootdodge and the general feeling of weight. I particularly like the little things like being able to stay on the ground after a dodge and roll around etc. 1 doesn't allow this and 2 makes you get up the moment you stop shooting. There's more subtle differences but shootdodge's changes are not merely flashy animations, they have a noticeable effect on how the game plays.
What happened to SMOD by the way? It seems like there was a concentrated effort to remove it off of every major mod site out there. I know you can still find updated/remixed versions of it but it the original seems to be much harder to find that in should be.
Sebastian Rodriguez
The best way to play mak payne is to play MP1 with the kung fu mod.
Then you uninstall the whole thing and just play Vanquish.
Carter Hernandez
If you start a level normally, it forces you to watch the opening cutscene no matter what. If you choose to start at checkpoint 2 from the level select screen, you skip the opening cutscene and nothing else.
Jonathan Walker
yea I only play on New York Minute…… When it first came out I was obsessed with trying to beat it on NYM hardcore, but every time I got to the airport my brain would start to crap out and I would make some stupid mistake
Isaiah Wood
You can also skip it by choosing arcade mode. What is strange is starting the level normally won't let you skip it until 'loading' is complete (normally halfway through the custscene). This is what makes me suspicious that the developer really just wanted you to watch them.
I've done NYM but I've still got Hardcore to do. The game improves massively in arcade mode since it strips out most of the shit and focuses on gameplay.
Matthew Lopez
Ok here is a tip for NYM hardcore. You have to select the character model that has a bullet proof vest. I am dead serious the bullet proof actually works.
Ryder Ward
Really? I've not actually tried NYM Hardcore but after working through the rest of the difficulties and modes I can reliably do the campaign in 5 hours or so. I'm just concerned that a silly death near the end would result in a broken monitor or headset. I died to a silly fuck up during the fucking easy boss fight at the end of the police station during my NYM run and broke a mouse in anger.
Liam Moore
NYM hardcore is the ultimate test of concentration and patience. Also since the ai is very "fluid" you find youself in alot of various scenarios that you can't really prepare for so improvisation is required. Also my computer crashed a few times during my NYM hardcore runs. I'm never going to do it again.
Gabriel Rivera
I've always thought that max Payne went into a downhill slide after they changed the model from his model in the first game. Just as a character, he looked a ton more interesting than his bland action-hero look in subsequent games
Jordan Sanders
This would not be pleasant. All I've got left is NYM Hardcore and the challenge mode and I'll be done everything that isn't the shitty MP mode.
I think it's just that constipation Max was a sign of the first game having a small budget but a lot of care. 2's larger budget let them use actual actors for the faces but in other ways they lost touch with things like the humour that comes with being a smaller dev.
Jonathan Bell
man you should have just done a 360 and walked away.
Adrian Powell
The fucked up part is that NYM hardcore actually caused me to fry my graphics card….. Before I was just playing it on xbox 360 and then I selfishly wanted a boost so I moved to PC for the mouse aiming….. Then I was freaking out after my computer crashed and Spilled a bunch of Ice Tea and cigarrette butts into the top of my computer after sperging out. The graphics card just started frying.
Justin Martin
I once did a similar thing with cider and a sound card. Not good.
Leo Richardson
I think that was also due to Max Payne 2 being a much more straight-forward story and less tounge-in-cheek and melodramatic. Unfortunately that meant the comedic moments in the game, while being funny in isolation, clashed with the overall tone (Vinnie in the CBB suit didn't sit well since it was during the 3rd act with the tension and drama at an all-time high just after Max discovered Vlad betrayed him).
Nathaniel Ortiz
That's a fair point actually user. It's a lot easier to slip humour into the first game's story because a revenge plot doesn't necessarily need to be serious outside of the start (i.e. what you're avenging) and the actual revenge at the end. Shit like a love story and betrayal needs to hold its tone a lot more.
Chase Williams
I wish the Max Payne movie starred Nicolas Cage.
Steampipe and Steam updates in general started raping the mods dead, the already small community started dying and many turned to Gmod or just outright left like most of the HL2 modding community nowadays. Fuck man, I miss the golden years of HL2 mods.
Gabriel Gutierrez
Would you fuck Max Payne in a New York Minute?
Elijah Allen
No
William Moore
If I were pozzed I would fuck this incarnation of max payne. He started to get uglier after this game.
Jaxson Taylor
Back to SA you go
Hunter Lee
And mods in general. In this day and age of mass shovelware on places like Steam mods are ironically less popular because they don't come with a price tag. Back when shit cost more and I was a little younger I'd regularly hunt for mods (more HL1/goldsrc than Source) but nowadays there's much less motive.
Aaron Cruz
what you never heard the term poz? it's more a Holla Forums term and it means aids.
Camden Garcia
anyone here like Hidden source? That was the most fun I had with a source mod.
Completely unskippable. The one set in Max's bedroom is immediately skippable, but the one actually on the balcony for the party is "STILL LOADING" up until gameplay starts. The scene where Max actually jumps is immediately skippable, the one right after where Max meets up with the other guy is unskippable until he climbs into the elevator and doesn't actually skip until he finishes the "firing squad of muzzles" line. All skippable immediately Totally unskippable. Totally unskippable until right after the random guy says that he has an "interesting investent" for Marcelo's brother, then it's immediately skippable.
Julian Garcia
You've got good taste user. The Hidden still has a small community or at least it did last time I played ~6 months ago. I still regularly play it with friends too though as people get older it's harder and harder to get enough people together.
Jason Ross
The Hidden is fantastic.
David Bell
thanks, but yea I haven't played any hidden source in a while. Like all great mods the community dies out besides a few hardcores.
Yea I know I wish there were more game developers out there trying things like Hidden.
Nathan Watson
So it's as I suspected, the 'still loading' is bullshit as often as not. I know from memory that: Is exactly where mine lets you skip and I've got it installed to a HDD so I think we can confirm that SSDs don't affect the loading speed and thus 'still loading' is a lie.
Jackson Wilson
Well, there's Dead by Daylight and the upcoming Friday the 13th game, but most people say they're kinda meh. I think Evolve really put off asymmetrical multiplayer games for most devs.
Leo Sullivan
I can't get Max Payne working on my PC at all. Only game I can't get to run no matter what even with fixes on my AMD rig.
Also I did indeed miss your post earlier up the thread so my mistake. Fucking bullshit from R* right there. They could have let us skip the biggest issue the game has instead of forcing us to watch a piss-poor rehash of a frankly uninteresting film.
pcgamingwiki?
Christian Allen
I could never get into Evolve and I haven't tried the others yet what do you think of Dead by Daylight.
Adam White
Haven't played it myself, but the survivors get OP as fuck perks that can be unlocked early by editing a fucking .ini.
Cameron Long
I get that, but why did they replace him with such a boring-looking actor.
Josiah Lewis
...
Cameron Barnes
is there a game called mad marx where i can save america from corrupt corporations and politicians?
Gabriel Morris
...
Josiah Ward
still on for poker thursday night
Ian Torres
Max Payne 3, in combination with Hitman: Absolution, are why I started pirating games again. My ISP was being a dick about torrent traffic Being out of games and dropping $60 for MP3…it was maybe one of the worst feelings of my life while on a graduate student's budget.
