Max Payne... 16 Years Later

[Music] Britain Japan America these were the nations that present to the concept of choice to game developers here you can make fantasy in a mystical past or scientific future and rapture players through narrative and puzzles and adventure or the intensity of first-person shooting engage with colorful wonder or deep dark despair but those outside of this Trinity you had to just take what you could get the amount of nations pushing for game development has grown since but for a small group of artisan Finland they weren't going to wait for the industry to come to them occupying their hands with lines of code for assisting others instead of fueling their own creativity wouldn't satisfy they were going to bring gaming to their home on their terms no matter the pain remedy entertainment has a fascinating history one that both had them progressing an alarming rate and taking their time with each release their growth took them from working with companies many envied in their prime from 3d realms in the 90s to Rockstar in the early 2000s and Microsoft with their sophomore success the Xbox 360 but their first collaboration was the most impactful in the 90s demos were audio-visual compilations that pushed pcs to their limits at a time when new hardware such as dedicated 3d graphics cards were surfacing this was very important as new technology made it a challenge to create a stable game across all systems luckily for remedy one of the most notable talents future crew was also located in Finland the opportunity to make video games that show off the group's technology was too big for most of them to pass up and join remedy soon after the game developer was just coming off of their first product death rally remedies first success albeit on a small scale he was this game that put them in contact with Scott Miller and George Broussard of Apogee in 3d realms who liked it so much they gave them the license to make Duke Nukem a racer but remedies first breakout hit wasn't a game a tool not originally planned to be released the public a benchmark program called final reality whereas death rally sold approximately 90,000 units the final reality benchmark sold more than 5 million the studio was in a place many never saw and that's what allowed them to take the time required to achieve their overwhelming ambition [Music] remedy inform their producer apogee of three concepts another racer following up death rally a space combat simulator and the last one that was called dark justice an isometric action game taking place in a near-future drug war 3d realms had just come off of their massive success with Duke Nukem 3d and advised the finish developer to focus on one project instead of three and put all hands on deck for dark justice with the success of titles like tomb raider who also was making headlines with its part agonist remedies producer believed heavily and having a notable lead character in a 3d game as a result it was decided early on that dark justice would be a 3d action title and as they did with duke avenue recommended that the game's title be spruced up and named after its protagonist many names were tossed around such as dick justice and max heat Apogee started with Max and unable to come up with anything else remedy added heat as the character's last name thousands of dollars was spent trademarking max heat until the developer came up with a surname payne max payne is a perfect name on its own one that fans like myself envy but it was even more appropriate for the game remedy had in the works while the project was originally pitched as a near future drug war the team quickly altered it to a contemporary in new york Max Payne's unique style was the result of the team smashing their biggest inspirations together Sam Lake loved the darkness echoes black and white Humphrey Bogart a city that never sees daylight and the team couldn't stop thinking about John Lewis cult films like the killer and hard-boiled stylized pictures that had cops do wielding pistols while leaping in the air bullets flying as images were slowed down to heighten the spectacle combining Hong Kong action with film noir was a killer combo and a technical nightmare slow motion or as remedy called it bullet time had only been featured in a handful of games up to this point and not nearly to the extent Max Payne was aiming for as a result the five long years in development were spent struggling with the challenges of paving the way for this new mechanic when the game was shown at e3 in 1998 and impressed with unique particle effects but the gameplay was practically non-existent here and it's easy to see why with a camera system is inaccurate as Max is easy that's because behind the scenes remedy were simultaneously building their tools and experimenting which led to multiple changes during development that will be mentioned but the growth of Max Payne over five years is very evident remedy had their artists traveled to New York or Leon not to visit tourist destinations but the seedy underbelly with bodyguards to protect them as they captured photos some of them which ended up as comic panels for the games cutscenes sam lake pushed for graphic novel visuals over in-game cinematics for multiple reasons creative and practical creatively it fit with the game's moody atmosphere illustrating the stylized New York that Max Payne had perpetually bathed in snow and night skies practically it delivered the story in a more elegant and emotional way that in-game cinematics could 3d graphics were very recent technology and while a great progression in the 90s and early 2000s they were better in motion than up close at the time 3d games for just starting to finally get rid of clubbed fists and half-life blew people's minds by having the characters mouths move the idea of accurately synching with their speech or conveying any believable expressions was science fiction max pains visuals were top-notch in 2001 but the faces are hardly its most beautiful quality and using the game's limited animations expressions and characters would have distracted from the story instead of enhance it comic panels also had the added benefit of allowing remedy to alter the story immediately rather than spending days on creating new cinematics in engine panels could be rearranged replaced or edited at a much faster rate there was tons of love and effort put into Max Payne with much of its development cycle demonstrating remedies tenacity creativity and attitude the game used photographs from multiple aspects such as a comic panels and characters faces yet members of the team had to be convinced this was the way to go due to feeling like using photos instead of creating textures from scratch was cheating remedy couldn't afford professional actors so far in-game character models and comic panels they had to use themselves their relatives cousins parents girlfriends and even everyday locals most famously Max Payne is Sam Lake the lead writer and Nicole Horne the game's main villain is Sam's mother similar to other breakout hits of 2001 it was the last of an era where a relatively small team of people could push the cutting edge in the triple-a gaming scene max Payne's development was akin to a garage band filled with stories of innocence naivety and raw talent thankfully remedy following Apogee 's motto of when it's done didn't put them under Max Payne released on July 23rd 2001 and they were already in conversations with Rockstar to port the game at consoles and fall for even more exposure and unknown at the time something else it's easy to see why what eventually became Max Payne was originally pitched as an isometric game in 1996 the genre we know today as third-person shooters wasn't established there were titles such as fade to black die hard trilogy and most notably Tomb Raider but to call these shooters is a stretch due to technology control the restrictions on consoles and lack of a blueprint the genre was to make its real debut in the new millennium not to diminish the importance of 1999 with wind back Syphon Filter and jet force Gemini 2001 was one of gaming's most significant years and Max Payne deserves to stand alongside innovators such as halo and Grand Theft Auto 3 there's no awkward lock-on targeting no stiff movements and animations and supporting levels of detail that brought the action to life just like halo it's remarkable how effortless max Payne's core gameplay is to pick up and engage with on an immersive level over a decade after its release while remedy strive for the cinematic spectacle of its inspiration the goal wasn't to just show off bullet time it was to give the player a feature that opened up new possibilities in the gameplay sandbox and letting them create the spectacle themselves instead of a game setting itself up while its control was the most helpful element Max Payne provided for third-person shooters all the time is what was imitated today what made Max Payne immediately notable is typically a powerup in anything from call of duty to Mass Effect but at the time it proved to be a real challenge the developer to overcome originally bullet time was something that triggered when entering certain rooms remedy had done their homework and particle effects bullet projectiles and motion but this system quickly overstayed its welcome all the time has its greatest impact when use sparingly and with contrast rather than from minutes without pause whom not only was being in slow motion without the players consent infuriating it didn't mesh with the rest of its gameplay for instance of an enemy decided to retreat the player would have to pursue them at a snail's pace until they were finally dealt with according to remedy it wasn't until bullet-time became a resource to player activated that the game began to assemble pressing a button to leap in the air and manually aim on target successfully creates that John Woo spectacle when in bullet time max Payne's gameplay even resembles that of a projectile based shmup or its software shooters dodging shotgun pellets as you navigate the environment predicting where the enemy is going to be next leaping to avoid the incoming burst from a submachine gun it's great fun and with the promise of this being the last time halos mentioned Max Payne shares another element with bungees breakout in the empowerment and vulnerability of its hero Master Chief is a super soldier until those shields go down and he's an exposed human being on the brink of death it both creates tension during gameplay and forms a connection with the player Max Payne accomplishes the same feat in a different way his arsenal of powerful weapons bullet time and dodges is what makes him capable of contesting against multiple goons but outside of that max is weaker than his enemies one burst of a machine gun or close enough shotgun blast is enough to put you in the grave and it's what makes a gameplay so exciting when you chart into a room in bullet time in an age where a single enemy couldn't hope to knock ten points off our health bar this element manages to keep Max Payne unique after all these years but unique is never without its flaws and while many things such as its visuals and physics can be fairly blamed on the limitations in 2001 there are missteps in design and execution as to be expected with a game that pushed so many boundaries this game welcome to back my inputs with a hit to the job Max Payne has been known to give people a challenge even on its normal difficulty and I was being met with a min music and Sam Lakes look a disappointment at my lack of skill constantly that is until I looked a little deeper and realized just how damn cheap this game is now in Max Payne there's not really any concern for accuracy you don't so much aim at targets as you point in there vague direction the spread each of your weapons have is quite vast and often even greater than an enemy's body this is not a fault with a game in fact it's something I've come to like in the best levels it turns Max Payne into a really exciting puzzle or rhythm game similar to how hotline Miami was you reload an experiment with which enemies to kill first and register what they're carrying if it's a pump-action shotgun Desert Eagle or do wield engrams the problem is Max Payne has a really bad habit of hiding enemies and spots a player can't possibly anticipate unless they've played the level before and in the worst scenarios severely limit the gameplay sandbox into a grueling monotonous slog the most appalling instances of this are sections where enemies foresee and imitate Call of Duty's campers and when grenades are lobbed at you in the exact same path no matter what the former is severely overused in the finale but appears in some form or another throughout the entire game am unsure as to whether it's done to heighten tension and later battles or always keep the player on edge but if you found yourself struggling through Max Payne in the past it's likely because of these guys I recently played the game twice to prepare for this video and despite increasing the difficulty on my second run he became significantly easier after dealing with these campers first with them gone stocking up the maximum amount of painkillers and a level became routine and predictably he's much of the tension in gunfights though for a brief moment I'd like to praise the painkiller system fear would go on to feature something similar allowing the player to gain back health with a finite resource but Max Payne had it slowly recover rather than instantly this makes it so that when a painkiller is used during gun battles there's a cheeky but unnerving dance on The Devil's door with the slow regeneration protecting you from a lethal shot the occasional wait for your health to recover before a battle is ultimately worth the excitement it brings in battle but using two painkillers because of one thug in a corner no one in their right mind would ever ever be in makes the game's title a bit too literal look at this in order for someone to come from there he has to place himself behind a lobby chair hugging a wall that is gameplay worthy of some serious profanity which you'll also be screaming when these tedious sections are paired with the bad accuracy of your weapons you can do everything right and still lose but you can also do everything wrong and leave without a scratch after 20 plus hours shotguns and this game still don't add up for me they're either Barrett 50 cals or a BB gun as a result you'll mostly be relying on the Colt commando during the endgame but sadly the game's finale is the cheapest and strictest level of all from the second encounter where you execute people sniping at you with grenade launchers to the constant ambushing enemies that remind me of Resident Evil more than an action game and while the controls were ahead of their time they can get you killed firstly leaping in bullet time are attached to the same key and depend on whether or not your character's standing still as expected when your character is as vulnerable as Max you need to always be on your feet so to initiate bullet time without leaping requires you to stop for a brief moment except if your character has a nanometre of momentum in a direction you'll be in the air what's worse is after you've landed max automatically gets up and prevents you from shooting it may be brief but when in games this frantic that exposure is all that's needed to end you however these problems aren't meant to give the impression that they overrule the whole experience max mains gameplay features more positives and negatives it's simply the polish that it was known for in 2001 hasn't translated to the modern day but its core gameplay has and while it's been roughened up the diamond still shines it's also easy to see a per G's influence and why Rockstar were interested in picking up the Max Payne brand similar to Duke Nukem 3d everything in Max Payne can be interacted with on some level TVs turn on and off toilets can be flushed lockers or open cabinets or scavenge and this goes for the action too boxes are reduced to dust and fire extinguishers leak it all goes a long way to making the game's underworld believable and the game's usage of drugs sex and language grabbed rockstars attention but it wasn't juvenile and that's down to the excellent levity in its writing and storytelling despite its abundance of explosive battles that has the player leaping through the air with bullets flying in an epic fashion Max Payne is often held as a vanguard at videogames storytelling and this seems rather odd when you look at the plot in its simplicity this isn't SpecOps Bioshock or metal gear with an abundance of twists turns and even hidden storylines that the player must solve and interpret themselves it's about a man who has everything he could want tragically loses it all and kills those he believes are responsible but the unique presentation makes that simple premise engaging and the layers in depth this story has raised Max Payne above and beyond your basic shoot-'em-up sadly the presentation is the most dated aspect of this game graphics are going to age no matter what in Remedies depiction of a dark ingredient New York that set it apart in 2001 has deteriorated from the seven generations flood of this gritty art style the handful of in-game cinematics are the most apparent and only confirmed that remedy made the right call in using graphic novel panels for cutscenes they're a combination of real-life photographs with overlays and filters for the most part employees and locals play their characters and occasionally these scenes use Max's in-game model likely due to adding panels and making adjustments later in development the comics storytelling does have issues related to executions such as only having one piece of music that endlessly plays on a loop which makes switching from in-game to cutscenes feel rather jarring in tone at times not having professional actors the expressions can often be silly and some characters look more like people in Halloween costumes and gangsters but that carries with it a ton of charm and personality that may sound like a cop-out but with the way Max Payne presents its world and delivers levity and contrasts it fits Max's personal stories is unflinching as it is unnerving beginning the game with you overhearing your wife being slaughtered and opened the door to see blood surrounding your infant daughter but max uses dry sarcasm in tense situations that make you grin like his default expression enemies are intentionally stupid and there's even references to cartoon violence coupled with TV parodies and the parodies are not just for humor the pink flamingo is at first cheesy with its voices until noises start to ramp up followed by a chilling scream that scream is Max's baby from the drugged up dream sequences not only that but the show is a parallel to Max's dreams with a similar narrative of someone trying to stop their double foreshadowing Max's struggle this subtlety is the true maturity of Max Payne it scenes don't come across as forced melodramatic or stupid as in so many other games because when something happens in the story there are a slew of motivations and reasons as to why the closest Max Payne gets the padding is the shipping yard and restaurant meet up max only gets one new weapon from the cargo and it does seem silly that the Punchinello crime family would blow up one of their businesses just to kill you though considering they're in a gang war under the thumb of a sir corporation and you're their biggest threat it could be argued that the stakes warranted it even the meet up with BB has plenty of subtlety and build-up it's not a twist and no he's the one that killed Max's partner and set him up but it goes deeper BB potentially orchestrated far more than that as it's said to have taken three years for the police to get a single break in the case related to Max's family it's not a stretch to imagine BB having a hand in that setback it's things like these that only strengthen Max Payne as a character by making the world operate beyond his presence characters like Mona sax and vladimir lem don't just exist for the sake of max's development they are individuals with their own motivations and desires and these actions ripple throughout the game with purpose or indirectly for instance alfred wooden seems like the archetypal illuminati know-it-all that comes in to point max in the right direction and save his ass at the end that can be the way to look at him that's how i did when i first played this game years ago but there's more to this guy in the game's final level there's an easter egg in wilden's private office that reveals his dungeon of kink it confirms a detail that's mentioned in act 1 in three early on there's the mention of someone fitting Alfred's description found not known at the time being filmed with a prostitute at first it's thought that the sex worker was just making extra money on the side but in reality they're ordered by the main villain Nicole Horne to blackmail Alfred into remaining silent out of the desperation in his predicament he tries to slip the evidence that incriminated Horne to the district's Attorney office where it was seen by Michelle Payne it's a tragic detail to learn that Alfred's actions are what ultimately made Horne target Max's family and have them killed and makes one think that if Horne wasn't a megalomaniac she could potentially convince max that Alfred is as responsible for his family's death as she is it even hints that there may be some guilt on Alfred's end he doesn't need to free max in the end there's no benefit for him to do so max has the tapes that incriminates him but that's unknown by the mysterious figure he just does it out a feeling that it's owed and speaking of guilt no where is Max's more emphasized than in his dreams I've read online about a theory that Max Payne is the one who murdered his family and that he's actually a Valkyr drug addict that's making up for his sins however I said earlier that this isn't SpecOps or bioshock and I stand by it this theory is interesting and probably could work in a story but it's not what happens the key points of evidence for the theory are Max's dreams of him murdering his wife and that he survives a lethal dosage of Valkyr but these pieces of evidence are only compatible with the theory when ignoring others the dreams premise hinges on a primary source that being the papers Michelle Payne had received anonymously by Woden they were what got her killed and on the day Michelle tried to inform max about its oddity he pushed the conversation for later and went to work the dreams show Max's double killing his wife because he feels that's what effectively happened when he brushed aside that conversation with her not because he domestically abused and eventually killed his wife and child in reality as shown this game has copious amounts of detail in its plot and characters but there's no extra connection to Valkyr max has at least that I could find as for max surviving the lethal dosage okay yeah it just happens because if not the story would be over but in defense of the scene max doesn't just overcome some nasty drugs he's left in the frozen snow soaking in his own sweat and puke Max is never having an easy time and that's part of what makes him such a relatable character his personality is used primarily for seriousness but also for comedic value that second dream sequence with your screaming child and wife being murdered is preceded one of the best fourth wall breaks in gaming history you're in a computer game max the truth was a burning green crack through my brain weapon statistics hanging in the air glimpsed out of the corner of my eye endless repetition of the act of shooting time slowing down to show off my moves the paranoid feel of someone controlling my every step I was in a computer game funny as hell it was the most horrible thing I could think of and you can't talk about max without mentioning the voice actor James McCaffrey whose distinct deep tone is his pitch perfect as Steven Russell for Garrett or David Bateson as agent 47 due to the circumstances it's not his best performance in the franchise but the film the war narration equips make him one of the most timeless characters out there while max Payne's presentation might have aged its character hasn't the story is great not because it's dark and serious but because it's a journey a rollercoaster of emotions that have you laughs tense up grin like salmon everything in between it's an experience and one that doesn't overrule the gameplay but enhances it [Music] Max Payne isn't a feature-rich experience it canceled its multiplayer portion early in development the games campaign only takes six or eight hours to finish an outside of difficulties and seeing what you missed on the first run it's not an experience that many would be soaking copious amounts of hours into over years but it doesn't need to be I never forgot the eight hours I spent with this game seven years ago and playing it twice more only confirmed why similar to other franchise debuts I've covered in this series they're not without fault nor should they be labeled as such Max Payne can be frustrating and cheap but that's not enough to diminish its accomplishments it was one of the best games of its generation and also like the debuts I've covered it still is [Music] what do you think of suda51 s games I've only played the opening chapters of killer7 and on an emulator and I have killers dead installed on Steam though I haven't played it yet but the dudes style is certainly insane and unique and while some may write it off as pretentious or all spectacle and no substance there were only a handful of people like suda51 in the industry and whatever you may say about him and other people like david cage or kojima I'm glad they ultimately exists because for all of their egos the industry would be a lot less interesting without them around what game could have been improved if its story was told in a nonlinear fashion a lot dunkirk pulp fiction adaptation etc rise of the Tomb Raider now granted I'm also thinking of plenty of story changes but considering rise of the tomb Raider's ultimately mediocre action movie narrative I think it would have been much more interesting to have Lara in conversation with her psychiatrist like we saw in the trailer they'd have each level be her rating a different tomb in each tomb ends up telling its own little mini story that develops her character more like a collection of short stories that inform us about the character and her struggles and complexities rather than this completely ridiculous overarching narrative about finding the ancient thing that ends up being for bad so you destroyed in the end outside of gaming content on YouTube do you watch other kind of content and if so what nothing to the same extent as gaming content so I'll just pick one of my favorites that I follow off-camera with Sam Jones just seemed like a typical celebrity talk show but in reality it's actually a really fascinating show mainly because all the actors and directors and writers up here don't seem to be playing a character or persona and the main reason for that is that on this show they're not plugging anything they're not trying to sell a book or a movie or play it's just them talking about life their struggles and about how they got to where they are where do you think the person interviewed is arrogant heartfelt or nervous I always feel that I gain some piece of valuable advice from watching the show are you afraid to be branded that halo guy not really because I haven't covered halo in quite some time and in fact there are quite a few conversations on Twitter between people in the halo community that I'm not really engaged in because I don't think I'm really considered a halo guy in the community halo is just what got my start but I'm grateful for all the awesome people I've gotten to talk to in due to making that content do you ever get a keen sense of cognitive dissonance from accepting ice cream from a small child you just ran over with your car jaysus if a man cannot ask stupid pointless nihilistic questions then is he truly a man Touche how does it feel when randoms recognize you in a match you're playing it's really surreal for me but on the few occasions it has happened it's always been a lot of fun who is the best girl from any anime is this even a question Ravi [Music]

Channel: Raycevick

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Keywords: Raycevick, CuHnadian, COG, connected, COGconnected, review, analysis, years, later, Max, Payne, Alan, Wake, Quantum, Break, Remedy, Entertainment, Apogee, 3D Realms, Rockstar, Microsoft, Xbox, PC, James, McCaffrey, Vancouver, Finland, Espoo, Sam, Lake, Gameplay, Story, Easter, Egg, Behind, the, Scenes, retrospective, breakdown, bullet, time, hong, kong, film, noir, noire, hard, boiled, killer, dark, justice, death, rally, fall, of, shoot, dodge, leap, action, game, fade, to, black, die, tomb, raider, lara, croft, duke, nukem, E3, Future, Mark, Crew, Reality

Id: fK5PRRITJu8

Length: 28min 6sec (1686 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 17 2017