![]() ![]() In conjunction with traditional cover-based third-person shooter mechanics, bullet-time works extremely well, and the challenge is tough enough to ensure that a combination of both techniques is often needed to get through an area. The fact that the bullet-time metre refills over time also ensures that you need to use it strategically – in my case only during the times when I was seriously outnumbered. Bullet-time is as impressive now as it was the first time around, giving you the opportunity to go in all guns blazing as time slows down and you attempt to get clear head-shots on your opponents. Enemies arrive in such vast numbers, also using cover, that diving behind a car or a wall soon becomes second nature. Locations are littered with spots to hide behind. One thing new to the series is the cover mechanic. Rockstar has paced the game very nicely too so that during the latter third of the game the challenge and intensity gets even more ferocious. Largely though, gameplay is about clearing areas of enemies before you can move on to the next bloody encounter. Noire-style clues that plump up the back-story and pieces that make up the collectible golden weapons. Indeed, gameplay is just as linear as previous games, though players can stray slightly off the beaten track to search for L.A. Just like the original game, the focus is firmly placed on all-out action and gun battles as you take down a ludicrous amount of bad guys on your way from point ‘A’ to ‘B’. ![]() Though many of the locations in Max Payne 3 have been seen before in other shooters, with the likes of an airport, abandoned warehouse, football stadium and a cramped shanty town being among the backdrops, there’s plenty of variety in terms of level design with multi-tiered open environments giving way to claustrophobic bouts of up-close-and personal office-to-office warfare. The graphics are superb throughout with interiors of nightclubs and bars just as impressively detailed as the memorable stroll through the dangerous ghetto of Sao Paulo, where you can almost smell the marijuana and gun powder. ![]() The high quality of the production extends into location design and the meticulous detail that has gone into every inch of Max Payne’s world. There are also no load times, so gameplay flows and seamlessly blurs with scripted sequences and cut-scenes, and is topped off by an audio and visual experience that would rival any movie. Using stylish story-telling techniques, such as static-panels, which give the game a motion-comic feel, and the flashing up of text on-screen from in-game conversations, Rockstar has created a unique way to showcase the story, the likes of which I’ve never seen before. It helps, of course, that the character model, facial animations, dialogue and voice is so believable, but Rockstar has also created a world and storyline that stays true to the original games, wrapping around it production values that give it a truly cinematic feel. This raw personality gives him a real edge that consequently makes him one of the hardest videogame characters of all time. They’ve taken his back-story and personality and have created a character that’s exactly how you’d imagine Max would be at this point of his life having witnessed such violence over the years. Rockstar has magnificently built upon Max’s character from the previous games. ![]()
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