I haven’t really seen any pre-release coverage of Max Payne 3, like other Rockstar games I rather see the final product than see the previews and coverage beforehand. What I only had seen is some screenshots of bald Max smoking fools and seen no comic-strip in those shots. However I really wasn’t that anticipated for this game since it’s announcement, I just turned a blind eye on other games that I was excited and when the GTA V trailer was released, it got overshadowed by that game.

Anyways, I am always fond of the Max Payne series, I remember writing some fan fic and getting me into those hard-boiled cop movies specifically John Woo (even though I watched Hard Boiled before) and the fascination of a riggid cop who’s family is murdered and presumably girlfriend too. It’s what strives Max Payne to be all emotional and pathetic and the only friend he needs is Jacks and a dozen painkillers which seems to be consumed more than food. To be honest, I really liked the Fall of Max Payne (the second one) more than the first, not only of the difficulty that the first one has but I liked Mona Sax’s character and the storyline even though it’s sillier than the first one. I remember how difficult those damn nightmare sequences are in the first one than the second one, there is one level where you have to carefully balance yourself on fucking beams made out of a blood trail and do some platforming which I failed plenty of times back then. That level specifically after in the mansion (I think) when Payne gets surrounded and gets injected by that bitch was fucking hard, although it felt like they just made the same level earlier, more difficult with a bigger maze and a even worse platformer.

Other than that, the gameplay was quite dynamic and unique to me back then along with bullet-time, enabling you to go into slow-motion, jump whether sides or a leap-dodge and smoke fools was impressive at it’s time. And it still is, although unlike Fall of Max Payne, bullet time doesn’t speed things up for you but slows everything down to make it more challenging which sometimes infuriates me due to it affecting other gameplay elements such as Last Man Standing, where I often fail at. When your mortally shot (even if your health is full), it turns on slow motion and you have to kill the last person who did that and then you regain your health.

At times, it’s really frustrating due to the fact that if your no careful on the cover or trying to do a melee on someone, your death because you ran out of bullets and cannot shot the guy or you’re too slow on shooting him. Although if you have a painkiller it will automatically consume it but painkillers are often hard to find unlike the previous games generously. Which goes on saying that the painkillers and the health system itself does not regenerate your damn health but it could relief your addiction; it do like the fact that the painkiller affects you unlike the previous games where it felt like popping candy to your mouth. It adds up the difficulty and frustrating I have for this game, there are times that I really need it and have to play the game not doing all the slow-motion flips because I end up dying.

The Kill-cam was the most useless feature in the game, how did even add it – I am sure in previous games, it has moments like these but there were sparse all around and this felt too repetitive and me wasting bullets to overkill the last enemy is dumb especially when physics kick in. The good thing about the returning features however is that they did not change the HUD which I like.

Unlike the previous Max Payne games, you cannot carry an arsenal of weapons from a sniper rifle, machine gun to dual guns but three, two sidearms and one two-handed gun. The amount of realism that exists in this game astounds me and having less firearms at times when you are out of health and luck, it’s very annoying. You do however combine side-arms such as a Uzi with a revolver or a pistol but you have to drop the damn two-hander although I find it better just using the dual pistols rather than other weapons not only because it’s his signature choice but it’s more effective to me, spraying dudes. There are collectibles in this game which is almost like Goldeneye but throughout the game you have to collect several parts to unlock the golden version of it; it is almost like Resident Evil 3 where you collect gun parts from different places. When I was using the golden pistols, I thought it would do more damage because I found it more accurate and took less to kill the enemy.

Now, Max Payne 3 is criticized especially Giantbomb’s Quicklook for it’s controls and Max Payne himself being a mopely bitch which like I said, he’s quite that before. They had address the fact that he’s been quite negative in his attitude in the previous games but the fact that this dude’s family (even killing a damn baby which is fucking messed up) and Mona Sax has been killed. He made more of a effort to drink more than the previous ones even though I rarely seldom see him drink before but

The controls is somewhat terrible I had to say, maybe it’s just because I had been playing the first two on the PC and how smooth the controls are but it almost felt like L.A Noire or the same sort of engine in regards of the shooting mechanics (except the bullet-time). I really wanted to play this game on the PC and I hope Rockstar would get on ahead to release a fucking PC version even though I don’t have a computer to run the damn thing. There are three options on aiming, soft aim which is the default one (on medium) which gets some use to as it’s does not quickly locks on the enemy, the hard lock which seems to disable achievements (or so they say) and free aim like the name says.

I am still getting acquainted with the controls as I still stumbled on the difficulty and have a learning curve to overcome. It’s just the sloppiness of not going on Rambo-style and killing dudes and trying to converse ammo while hiding behind cover and not having the damn AI flushing you out with a grenade. It’s like the difficulty with everything adding on top of it makes it even harder than the previous games.

The art style and graphics like what Ryan talked about is like Man on Fire, from the dynamic lighting, the blurry version every time Max takes pills to Payne being a bodyguard to a wealthy family with the exception of Dakota Fanning.

In her place is some spoiled trophy wife, Fabiana that was however kidnapped by terrorists called the CS (Commando Sombra) which demands ransom for three million from his rich husband, Victor that Payne and Passo protects. When they hit the sports arena to exchange money, they were ambushed by paramilitary forces with antiquated weaponry, severely wounding Max. Him and Passo must then find Fabiana in the Tjete River where she is held and this is where I left off.

The graphics itself that borrowed elements of Man on Fire (the film) with the blurry effects felt like a reverse version of WET and the cool aesthetic that these two games has though WET were to look terrible without that, this game felt like it would look better without the aesthetic-art style. Although, the design on the female especially Fabianna looks terrible to me, she just looks like some creepy doll that looks robotic (as Payne says) and throughout the game so far (that I played) doesn’t even that emotions in characters. Along with the aesthetic, these cutscenes makes it more like a realism comic-strip instead of a visual novel, it’s a cutscene in the comic strip. At times I hated the text that appears, it just annoys me and just destroys the purpose for me to enjoy the cutscenes aside from all the fucking rich idiots showed on screen or Paulie-D fags that I killed.

Just like the previous games, there are amounts of douchebaggery in the characters, you just really want to torture and kill them. The opening missions says a lot to that with rich boiled brats and frats boys partying and one mission that I had been satisfied on killing is those fucking Jersey Shore faggots that seems to be connected to the Sop… I mean mafia. Heck, they even reference that putrid show and The Sopranos, the two douchebags that bothered Max looks like Paulie D and Jackie Jr from The Sopranos since they were in New Jersey in a flashback. Although in The Sopranos, there are Jersey Shore look-alikes as well (the Second Season) and they were fags and assholes.

The story so far, I am currently at Chapter 5, I don’t really care of this Fabiana bitch that I need to rescue. I ended up stopping the beginning seeing how it looks like some sort of stealth mission and you having a silent pistol which I don’t remember anything about previous Max Paynes having a stealth mission. Anyways, I don’t think I would want to play the game due to how the gameplay has changed from the previous ones and the stature of realism that Rockstar is often fond off but I might give it another try in the future. An interesting thing I pulled out after I had rewatch the Late Goodbye Music Video by Poets of the Fall is that the effects they use also felt like they got some inspiration from that seeing that they provided the music for Max Payne 2.