Good. Bad. I'm the guy with the gun.
After nearly a decade we are finally offered up another Max Payne game by none other than Rockstar. As someone who was not entirely a fan of the originals from Remedy I went into Max Payne 3 with varied expectations. Thankfully Rockstar has not only made a great game but they have brought an aged franchise into modern times and done it quite well.
The gameplay is typical of Rockstar third person games in the essence of Red Dead and GTA. However unlike in GTA the character movement doesn't seem so loose or sloppy but is tight enough to feel like you have good control. Max Payne 3 rides hard on the shooting between cut scenes idea. With a good story, varying environments and a decent array of gun options it does it very well. Max Payne 3 could have run aground on the "consolized" issue of controller aiming but has done themselves a service by adding in varying levels of snap to target aiming. Max Payne 3 is meant to be action with heavy story and getting mucked up with the games art and aesthetics making aiming more difficult and tedious with generally smaller targets would be an issue for some.
Max Payne 3's story is a great one. I truly enjoyed the 12 or so hour experience and always wanted to see the next story beat. That alone is rare for me and is a testament to the quality. However great the story may be it is mature, dark and slightly depressing the entire way down the spiraling world of Max Payne. But.... in the best way if that's possible. Max even has a layer of dark comedic value throughout which is fantastic. Rockstar has done an impressive job of telling such a dark and gritty story without leaving you feeling like complete shit or having an ending that left you curled up in a ball or angry. You get some closure and feel as though you have done something in such a messed up world which makes it even that much better. The characters might not all be likable but they do a great job of making you feel exactly as they were meant too, they are not lifeless boring characters. Voice acting and character progression especially for Max was terrific. Max Payne 3 is another game we can add to the very short list of near movie like story telling.
In my 12 or so hour experience I only had one issue with the game where my character got stuck in a late chapter of the game twice. It was frustrating but thankfully was a very rare occurrence as that could have been game ruining. Max Payne 3 is a massive game data wise, near 30gb of data. You can thank the cut scenes for that and in the end the size is justified as the there is quite a bit of story to tell. I played this on 360 and it still looked great, animation and environments were top notch as far as consoles go. I would imagine on PC this game would look stellar.
Max Payne 3 surprisingly has earned a strong spot on my 2012 Top Ten list. It pulls you in and does a great job of making you want to keep playing. Just know that there is a story to be told in this game so don't be put off by it with faulty expectations. I'm happy to say I can add Max Payne 3 to the list of games I finished and thoroughly enjoyed, a very short list indeed.
