Playing Again in 2020: It Doesn't Hold Up

[BLOOD ASYLUM]

I loved this game when it was released. Playing today, I still loved the sound and gunplay, but the glaring flaws were in the overuse of bullet time being required for almost every encounter with enemies, constant pausing because of cutscenes, and a good example is the amount of damage max can take and what enemies can. Ii am on board with the character feeling mortal, but a few shots does you in with fairly accurate ai. I'm on the machine gun/armor dude now on the embassy level, He's killed me over 8 times. Anyone else have a similar experience?

[Narumanu]

I'm in a similar situation since I'm redoing all the max payne and for me it's still holds up perfectly if not more since nowadays shooters have become bland.

Its biggest flaws are that not all cutscenes are skippable and the beginning of certain chapters have you slowly walking until the shooting happens.

Aside from that, it's still one of the best shooter to exist imo, at least one of the more fun to play.
You're supposed to overuse the bullet time, the whole series is build on that mechanic. I don't even see how someone playing Max payne can complain about it ! Managing the bullet time gauge is also part of the fun, especially in that game.

Max doesn't have a lot of health exactly because the game needs you to go bullet time and keep moving to avoid bullets. Also 95% of ennemies can be killed in one shot in the head.

Once you keep moving and manage your bullet time successfully, the game is plenty easy (at least in normal). I must have died 4 times max during my whole playthrough and I'm at chapter 12. As for the armor dude you speak of, bullet time -> aim for the head -> shot five times and he's dead, of course while keep moving.

Don't bother with the cover system as it's not meant for this series, it's only handful when you don't have any bullet time left or need to heal.

[FredoWizard]

No.

[Mihai]

Yup, it doesnt hold up. It goes over. Best action game ever. Great gunplay. Great characters. Great game overall.

[WhitePhantom]

You can actually do really well without bullet time as you get better at the game.
Aside from the fake loading that stops you skipping cutscenes this is still one of the best third person shooters ever made.

[lofi space papillary muscle]

Originally posted by WhitePhantom:

You can actually do really well without bullet time as you get better at the game.
Aside from the fake loading that stops you skipping cutscenes this is still one of the best third person shooters ever made.

Agreed on this being one the best tps ever made. Also

"overuse of bullet time being required for almost every encounter with enemies" you couldn't be more wrong. I played this one xbox 360 and this is very far from true. i got so good at the multiplayer, the community being so small, that people would leave the room whenever i joined mp games. i only played on free aim though. I am suprised playing this game now on pc, with their being as little players as there is, theres only players in soft lock.

must be using controllers? i wonder why because the game feels amazing with key board and mouse

[BLOOD ASYLUM]

I use keyboard and mouse, I feel like the constant bullet time is a crutch due to the mechanics not really holding on their own.

[UmbralPenumbra]

My biggest gripe is Steam never saved my progress properly and I'm not playing through all the sh*t levels I don't like to unlock the ones I do like again

[trenchmat]

nah you just suck

[Multihog]

I think Max Payne 1 and 2 are better than this, though it's still a good game. Why? Because the shooting is hitscan. You don't get that satisfying feel of seeing your bullets travel and hit enemies. Place crosshair over a head, clickety click, and the enemy is dead instantly. The shooting feels a bit like playing whack-a-mole with the enemies' heads. No sense of proper ballistics.

[Nachtmahr]

The cutscenes with the hidden loading times are what kills MP3. It's a great game, the last game before R* became greedy and less loved by the masses, but the replay value really goes down the drain because of the long cutscenes that can't be skipped.

[Smokey]

Originally posted by passmetheblow:

Originally posted by WhitePhantom:

You can actually do really well without bullet time as you get better at the game.
Aside from the fake loading that stops you skipping cutscenes this is still one of the best third person shooters ever made.

Agreed on this being one the best tps ever made. Also

"overuse of bullet time being required for almost every encounter with enemies" you couldn't be more wrong. I played this one xbox 360 and this is very far from true. i got so good at the multiplayer, the community being so small, that people would leave the room whenever i joined mp games. i only played on free aim though. I am suprised playing this game now on pc, with their being as little players as there is, theres only players in soft lock.

must be using controllers? i wonder why because the game feels amazing with key board and mouse

I just tried multiplayer, I was like base level vs 40-50+ level players. Was the most unfair experience ever. Some dude with health, bullet time & dual wield was obliterating me. I had a pistol & an ak, that wouldn't have been a problem if they didn't have health like GTA IV's multiplayer.

I wish more people played MP so I could actually have a fair shot at playing it. But my first time in was with what felt like veteran players...

[zack0niel]

bullet time is the worst part of the game, its nothing like mp1 or mp2 where bullet time actually let u see the bulllets and dodge them

[TheTeamKillingBastard]

Originally posted by zack0niel:

bullet time is the worst part of the game, its nothing like mp1 or mp2 where bullet time actually let u see the bulllets and dodge them

I agree; the Bullet Time in Max Payne 1 and 2 was more about moving while everything else is slowed down (with 2's Bullet Time getting progressively slower with each kill). Max Payne 3's Bullet Time is more about aim, as everything in the level gets slowed down, even Max himself. Even in Max Payne 1 Max wasn't that slowed by the Bullet Time.

Also, while I like the level design and cinematic element of the game, it doesn't go well with the previous games' film noir style and comic book pages. I would've preferred if there was an option for players to choose between watching the cutscenes, or get them as comic pages.

And, as mentioned by other users, the loading-during-cutscene is ineffective. Even with today's PCs, the loading is basically done in the last 10 seconds of the cutscene, by that point why bother?

No cloud save is also a bummer, because re-doing the levels and the grinds for the nth time because I'm playing on a different machine is annoying.

I like the game and it's enjoyable, but it doesn't feel like a Max Payne game, rather as a game that merely has the Max Payne moniker.

[Cypher]

Also playing this again in 2020, however i don't agree with the "over use of Bullet time" comment, that's a player issue rather than a game issue; I often forget that the bullet time function is there, barely use it! And this is from someone who played Max Payne 1 &2 to death (back when games came in big boxes!)

My only gripe is the loading cutscenes! How in the hell can a hi octane action game force this much downtime on players!?

[UmbralPenumbra]

The way Max Payne 1 did bullet time was kind of bizarre, in most cases making the game harder than just ignoring its existence unless you exploited it by rapidly togging in and out of bullet time

Max Payne 2's bullet time made the game too easy. Of course you can just not use it if you want more of a challenge

Max Payne 3's bullet time is just... I don't even know. The 'cinematic bullet time' segments, for lack of a better word, would usually catch me off guard and so the first time playing one of those parts I'd end up going into slowmo and then dying because I didn't know what exactly the game was trying to get me to do

Originally posted by Cypher:

My only gripe is the loading cutscenes! How in the hell can a hi octane action game force this much downtime on players!?

Because Rockstar missed the point of the comic book panels in the original game, that they came primarily from budget constraints, and that the charm was mostly due to existing in a relatively low budget game that was voiced by the developers and their friends, and they actually added to the tone and story of the game, and more importantly, that they were skippable. As opposed to Max Payne 3, where it's jump cuts of conversations or Max complaining happening in-engine and Rockstar won't let me skip them because they'll be damned if I don't look at this crap for the tenth time