Max Payne

"Max Payne: A man with nothing to lose..."

Max Payne: A man with nothing to lose...

Max Payne is the main character of this game, fittingly called... Max Payne. It falls into the genre of First Person Shooting (action), but that's not all there is to this game. The storyline is seriously intense, and frighteningly realistic. It is one game you must own.

GRAPHICS - 10/10: The graphics are so realistic it is unbelievable. When shooting, the bullets actually chip paint from the walls. The game's release date had been delayed, but once you see the graphics it's not hard to understand why. Every little detail is taken care of, and there is a special mode in the game called ''Bullet Time'', which slows down time for a little while. When shooting in this mode, the bullets move through the air in slow motion and you can actually see the ripples in the air as the bullet moves through (reminiscent of the Matrix, very much so).
STORYLINE / PLOT - 10/10: Incredible. Max Payne works as a cop, but one day as he comes home to his loving wife and small child, he finds his house trashed. Max is shocked and bewildered when he finds this, and upon the realization that his family are still inside the house, he rushes upstairs to find them. When he discovers what has happened, that's when the story really gets going.
PLAYABILITY - 9/10: Once you have played this game through once, you'll want to keep going anyway, and the fact that you can download new weapons and levels from the internet makes this even more of a bonus. Plus, there are several difficulty levels, including ''New York Minute''. This game will keep everyone addicted until (and past) the end, and will give most gamers one or two weeks playing time at the least.
SOUND - 8/10: The sound is excellent, and throughout the game there are very few glitches, if any. In the extremely tough battles, action music is brought into the game and this gives it a real ''movie'' type feel.
OTHER COMMENTS: ''Bullet Time'' is a great idea for an action game, so for a limited amount of time, you can actually slow things down which allows you to dive, dodge, roll and get a better aim on your targets in slow motion. The only thing that is disappointing in this game really (aside from the title!) is that it is only one player, but when you consider it, it would be almost impossible to get Bullet Time working in sync, and if the programmers left it out, it could ruin the ''Max Payne'' feel. Loading times seem quite slow, but when you consider that the game never has to load again throughout a level, these are really quite fast.
OVERALL SCORE: 10/10. There are very few faults with this great game and it is well worth buying.

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 10/19/01, Updated 10/19/01