The closest gaming experience to a movie. This is immersion at it's peak.
The sequel packs in that, and plenty more. Max Payne: The Fall Of Max Payne combines some furious action with an excellent story, bringing back old favourite characters, and introducing new ones too.
The story begins in the normal Max Payne way - In the future. We find Max running for his life through a hospital, relaying memories of his experiences with key characters. This sets the scene nicely. The game then takes a turn, and heads back a night, and shows us the events of Max's haunting adventures. This in itself shows that already the game has some movie influences, and you know that you're in for a ride of twists and turns.
Max's character is a bit different this time round, both physically and mentally. For starters, he no longer has that sly, crazed look he sported in the original Max Payne, and instead looks like a stark, emotionally frustrated man. He is no longer a "hero looking for vengeance." Instead he has a "glass half empty" look on life at the start of the game. He also has terrible difficulty choosing sides to play with. One side to his job, a simple NYPD cop, tracking down a fake cleaning agency, and the other to the Femme Fatale Mona Sax, who is being tracked down by another officer on the force. It is Mona's seducing skills, and Max's weakness to seducing skills, that causes Max to fall in love with Mona. At first, you'll be thinking, Max is a bit of a jerk. I don't like his attitude. Why isn't he happier? Let me tell you, by the end of the game, you'll love Max Payne, and you'll be praising him with every bullet he fires.
This time round however, the cops don't turn on Max. Not entirely anyway. It's not all black and white this time round. Without ruining too much of the story, let me just say there is double crossing, and sometimes you find yourself helping or fighting those you least suspected.
As you can see the story is a crucial part of the game. Even with all the excellent action, the game wouldn't be half as good without it's brilliant cinematic feel.
The graphics themselves are brilliant, giving a nice stellar feel to the game. It's dark, yet colourful at the same time. The models are excellent - with greats like the beautiful Mona Sax, the sly, sneaky, and angry Vinnie Gognitti, and the calm and clever Vladmir Lem, all of which make an appearance in the original Max Payne, so they had a lot to live up to.
The sounds are great. From the crack of a Berreta, to the loud pump of a shotgun, the games sounds are amazing. But that's just the start. With the added element of the excellent and fitting voice acting, the game works great. The music finishes the sound off with a bang though. This is truly some of the best music you'll ever hear. Think the original Max Payne music with a violin, slower theme, and darker pitch, with some great drums, and you've got this excellent piece of music, that gives the game it's awesome feel.
And finally I've reached the point where I can actually talk about the gameplay. Like I said before, that without the story, the gameplay would be nothing, likewise, without the gameplay, the story would be nothing. With the added ragdolling effects, you can have some seriously awesome fights. Bullet Time makes a return, obviously, this time with a small change. As you kill more people, you will become faster, and you're enemies slower in bullet time. So if you wrack up enough kills, you can eventually be moving at a normal rate in bullet time, while your enemies will be blasted into yesterday, literally.
But it's not just about running and gunning. There are many different styles of play. The first of which, is a level in which you play as Mona (that's right, it happends now. Only a few, but they're there) when you're on the rooftop of a warehouse, with you're heavy sniper rifle, creating cover for Max, as he runs across a huge open cavern. It's times like these that make you go, wow!
The game is over far too quickly however, just like it's predecessor. You'll be wanting much more after you finish, but when you think about it, it's not that crazy. If it were longer, it'd feel dragged on, as though, they're stretching the near perfect story and just going on tangents. The only other way around it is to make the game harder. But it is. It's incredibly hard. And that's another reason why you'll love it so much.
This game is an easy recommend to anyone looking to have some great action, or simply a great, movie quality story. This game is better than it's predecessor in almost every single way. The developers have left nothing off that was in the original. Overall, Max Payne 2: The Fall Of Max Payne creates very memorable scenery, great graphics, excellent gameplay, and the best damn story in a game, I've every seen.