I got Max Payne last week, here are my gripes

[The Baskinator]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by rgnjc:


</rant>

[ 11-19-2001: Message edited by: rgnjc ]

[ 11-19-2001: Message edited by: rgnjc ]<hr></blockquote>

hey, you can't close a tag you didn't open.
images/icons/grin.gif

[rgnjc]

In a nutshell, I was a little let down.

Firstly, the game has some problems which really tick me off and take away from the gameplay. Let me explain

First, as soon as you see an enemy, as soon as you are within sight of him, even if he has his back turned on you, he aggro's. This aggravates me alot, its unreal. The game should have been programmed like GoldenEye, where you can sneak up on an enemy if you approach them from the rear slowly. In the game, as soon as you are within sight of the enemy he instantly magically aggro's on you as if he has eyes in the back of his head. It would have been nice to be able to sneak up on an enemy from the rear and whack em with the bat.

Secondly my gripe is with the auto aim target code. Lets take for example you enter a room with 3 men, one man stands there, with the two men behind him, but to the left and right.

back left man -> .___. <-back right man
front man--------> .

You start shooting, the game will automatically shoot the front man. You aim at the back men, and shoot them, but cant hit them because the bullets go to the front man, even if he isnt in your sights. This is especially annoying because the back 2 men are able to shoot you, through the front man, and you have no way of shooting them unless you strafe around the front man.

Thirdly, I felt that the game's interactivity was a over hyped. There was no more interactivity in Max Payne than there was in Half-Life.

We should have been able to pick up rolls of toilet paper and throw them around, pick up needles and throw them like darts, we should have been able to eat the candy/soda from the vending machines, we should have been able to turn lights on/off, take a piss in the toilet, kick over chairs, use the fire extinguishers, make use of the stuff around us!!! The extent of the interactivity is blowing up a few small boxes, making a piece of candy pop out of the soda machine, and flushing the toilets...the interactivity(I cant even call it that) was over hyper, there is little interactivity with the environment. I'm sorry this is not as interactive as I have been told.

Last but not least, my final gripe is with some of the models. Sure the death animations were good, bullet time was cool, they moved realistically, but I was under the impression that when you shoot somebody, you will see their wounds and see their clothing get bloody. This was in Half Life and should be standard but it wasnt in the game. I was under the impression that models would show damage after being shot because in one of the max payne movies they show Max limping across a room clutching his chest with blood dripping down him. Would have been nice to see a wound on the enemy when you shoot them.

</rant>

Anyway, the textures were nice, I found the graphics beautiful. Story line is pretty cool, but I cant ignore the things that should have been worked on more. Graphics usually mean very little to me, id say 25% of my opinion is graphics and the other 75% is gameplay and originality. The game gets the full 25% for the beautiful graphics and effects, but only gets another 55% for the gameplay and originality. My score is 80%.

[ 11-19-2001: Message edited by: rgnjc ]

[ 11-19-2001: Message edited by: rgnjc ]

[Sleepwalker]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> First, as soon as you see an enemy, as soon as you are within sight of him, even if he has his back turned on you, he aggro's. This aggravates me alot, its unreal. The game should have been programmed like GoldenEye, where you can sneak up on an enemy if you approach them from the rear slowly. In the game, as soon as you are within sight of the enemy he instantly magically aggro's on you as if he has eyes in the back of his head. It would have been nice to be able to sneak up on an enemy from the rear and whack em with the bat. <hr></blockquote>

Ay, I hear you man, I really hated this too...I dont know why remedy did it like this? I also dislikes game that when you shoot an enemy with the sniper rifle, his buddy standing next to him dont notice that the guy just collapsed to the ground!

Give us an option between these two extremes please!

[marcusparcus]

Tend to agree with you on the interactivity front. The game is by no means trail blazing in this respect as was the claim made for it.

However, I'm not sure how important interactivity with no purpose is. It has novelty value I guess but soon wears pretty thin. A game can never be as interactive as real life and shouldn't be. Imagine being able to open every draw of every chest? Would soon become very tedious wouldn't it? Also you can't tie and untie Max's shoelaces! But then again, would you really want to?

[rgnjc]

I understand there is a point of interactivity that shouldn't be crossed, but I felt Remedy cut the game short of reaching that line. Not many things were breakable/shootable, well at least not as many as there could have been. And the only source of health is pain killers, I was dumbfounded why they did not make the candy machines/soda source of health. Im sure their reasoning behind that was "Well you cant cure a wound with candy/soda" But you cant with painkillers either, and its only standard throughout the evolution of games that food be a source of health(Hey it worked in Rune!) At first I stood in front of the soda machine trying to pick up the soda can, took me a few minutes to figure it out, after situating myself around the can in different angles, I gave up and realized you cant pick it up. I guess I expected it(after seeing Duke in DNF was able to eat soda/food from vending machines)

PS. 2 more things. 1 thing I loved was the windows that you can break, it was beautiful you could see every shard of glass, it was done excellently. And what was up with the mirrors in the game? There was none, and where there should have been there was the same redundant shattered glass texture. If you dont know what I mean play the beginning in the house, there is like 3 mirrors in there that have the same broken texture, I guess reflections were something that just didnt make it in.

[Guest]

While it's not proper html, most browsers will ignore it just as they will ignore the lack of </p> tags. Be careful when you start correcting HTML, with the number of badly coded pages out there you may never stop.

[Hatch]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> A game can never be as interactive as real life and shouldn't be. <hr></blockquote>

I agree with that bigtime! The whole point of games is taking a break from the real world (imho).

Peace
Hatch

[ 11-19-2001: Message edited by: Hatch ]

[Castor_Troy]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>You start shooting, the game will automatically shoot the front man. You aim at the back men, and shoot them, but cant hit them because the bullets go to the front man, even if he isnt in your sights. <hr></blockquote>

You can toggle off auto-aiming, you know. It's a bit harder, but it's more realistic and you don't encounter the problems you had.

[Hatch]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr> Hey it worked in Rune! <hr></blockquote> Yeah it would've been cool if Max could eat lizards!! graemlins/hhg.gif

Peace
Hatch

[rgnjc]

Yea I turned off auto aiming. It is much harder and it fixes the problem I had. But boy did auto aiming annoy me, I would aim like 3 feet to the right or left of a guy, and it would still hit him, and not the guy I was aiming at behind the guy it hit.

PS. I loved the butane tanks, they were one of the coolest effects in the game.

[SkavenRMD]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Not many things were breakable/shootable, well at least not as many as there could have been.<hr></blockquote>

It was partly a framerate issue. A large number of dynamic objects in the scene slows the game down. This imposed a limit on the number of breakables that could be put in.

[rgnjc]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>It was partly a framerate issue. A large number of dynamic objects in the scene slows the game down. This imposed a limit on the number of breakables that could be put in.
<hr></blockquote>

I figured that performance value was the reasoning behind that, and its probably the reason why there isnt more things to interact with.

[Maws]

In Halflife the enemy bodies didnt get bloody and damaged as they are shot up. Friendlies from opposing force & blue shift limped but that was about it..no model changing or anything. And to me, MP seemed just as interactive as HL .. eg opening closets pressing buttons it was on both

It would be good also for MP to have dismemberable bodies Quake3/SOF style and bloodied bodies. How about Geomorph walls ala Red Faction? Rockets/grens blow straight through walls

now that would be a perfect Max Payne

[SkavenRMD]

The perfect game: put all features and gimmicks from all games into one.

Right? images/icons/rolleyes.gif

[mysteryperfecta]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by SkavenRMD:
The perfect game: put all features and gimmicks from all games into one.

Right? images/icons/rolleyes.gif <hr></blockquote>

Right. Also, the game prints money.

[Daedalus]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>we should have been able to turn lights on/off<hr></blockquote>

If I'm not mistaken you can turn lights on/off in Max. I remember seeing some light switches in some levels and using them.

Anyway, you can switch TVs on/off. Ofcourse I must admit that it would been better to switch channels, but come on, Remedy did a nice job! Just wait for DNF and I'm sure you'll see all that interactive stuff you missed in MP.

[rgnjc]

I cant remember if its Half Life or what, its been so long, maybe it was Unreal, or Quake 3, or some other game, ive been hooked on Everquest for so many years its hard to remember any details from anything else.

Print money, yes good!

As for light switches, i saw some but they werent working for me.

[Daedalus]

<blockquote><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><hr>As for light switches, i saw some but they werent working for me.<hr></blockquote>

Yes, I can remember now... there are some light switches. If you press the use key on them you hear a click sound. But I don't remember anymore if they are just broken or if they activate light. You know, it has been about 2 month ago when I played and finished Max Payne. After that I was busy with my mod and with level designing, so I can't really tell if you switch light without checking all the levels.