#MAX PAYNE 4 GAME NEWS MOVIE#
The tale is so ambitious and features such massive set pieces that at times the game feels like Rockstar’s R-rated answer to the PG-13 action movie shenanigans of the Uncharted series. The cut scenes are beautifully rendered with facial animation that must have borrowed a little tech from LA Noire and flow into gameplay beautifully with no load times (the cinematics cleverly mask the loading screens).
#MAX PAYNE 4 GAME NEWS SERIES#
It was definitely a risk to change the style of the series this much and it pays off. There are flashback levels to the old trench-coat New York days, yet the new world with a bearded Max sporting a shaved head (looking very much like Walter White’s alter ego Heisenberg on Breaking Bad, probably a direct influence on this new approach) proves to be far more compelling.
His personality is just a little deeper and harsher while the game’s sense of humor has become more dark n’ twisted rather than campy. Max Payne is still the same guy in a new world.
As a fan, that seemed worrying at first, but those concerns quickly vanished. There was clearly an attempt to reinvent the character/franchise in this new outing, if only to create a little distance from the vomit inducing Mark Wahlberg movie. You know, just like the old days only bigger and dirtier. Payne dangles out of helicopters, stumbles through urban war zones, blows up decrepit buildings, kicks off a prison riot, and murders hundreds of people on his quest for redemption. Of course, a quick kidnapping has him back in action and soon the guy is traveling the country in search of his missing clients. Payne was never a happy camper, but feels particularly burned out by this gig, self-medicating with gallons of scotch and handfuls of pills. His job is to protect the absurdly rich Rodrigo Branco and his spoiled siblings as they have coke parties on skyscrapers and yachts while counting their riches. We meet up with our buddy Max at the bottom of his latest bottle, working as a bodyguard in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Simply put, it’s 12+ hours of the finest violent video-gaming on the market that should get mouths watering over how Rockstar has plans to top themselves with GTA V. It continues the company’s ever-evolving skill with mind-boggling graphics, long-form storytelling, and lovingly graphic violence. Longtime fans should be pleased, but newcomers can still appreciate it as the next hard R genre movie flavored outing from Rockstar. Despite the change in locale and color palate, the threequel is still rooted in the endless gunfights and hard boiled crime fiction of its predecessors. At first this visual approach seems excessive, but gradually things calm down and it settles into an eyeball pleasing groove. He’s off the rain-drenched seedy streets of New York and killing legions of bad guys in the sun-burned, poverty-scarred, and war-torn world of South America.įull cut scenes connect the levels rather than animated comic book panels, with a jittery, blown out visual style filled with split screens and abrupt edits to mimic both the visual aesthetic of directors like Tony Scott and the Crank team of Neveldine/Taylor and Payne’s deteriorating booze n’ pain killer fueled mental state. Delving deeper into alcoholism, pain, and failure, our buddy Max is no longer a cop, but a gun for hire.
Diving bullet time remains the bedrock of the gameplay this time out, but the visual style and world is a little different. In previous generations, the game came out with obvious John Woo and The Matrix-influenced slow motion bullet slinging ballet, with film noir underpinnings and graphic novel cut scenes. The series was one of the first to incorporate cinematic storytelling into video games and that is a continued focus here, now taking influence from a wider array of movies to reflect a new era.
In his long awaited return in, glorious HD much has changed, but much has stayed the same. It’s been years since we’ve seen the grizzled sharpshooting detective Max Payne.