Part one: What is the best game to come out of the 80s?

Part two: What is the best game to come out of the 90s

This is the third part of the series. This is eventually all going to get compiled into one megathread for people who want gaming recommendations from Chapos specifically. Other decades (10s and 70s) and consoles will come in sporadic subsequent threads.

Expanding on your choice is definitely a plus. I don't think we're gonna get Doom the post this time around.

  • OhWell [he/him]
    ·
    4 years ago

    Max Payne and it's sequel.

    Slow motion shooting is now a power up in most shooting games now, both third and first person. It all started here.

    Before that game came out, we had never had a real proper third person shooter. Max Payne revolutionized the entire genre. I believe it was also the first shooting game to move away from hitscan style bullets and every weapon had full bullets and tracers. The "bullet time" slow motion effect had you actually dodging bullets and you could see the full buckshot of a shotgun blast with all the bullets firing directly at you.

    Max Payne 1 is notable for it's relentless difficulty and can be brutalizing to first time players. Even a veteran player can have a hard time on the lowest difficulty. They don't make games like this where your every move counts and all it takes is one mistake to get killed.

    The arsenal of weapons in that game is similar to Doom/Doom II where every weapon has a purpose (even the crappy pistol you start with) and the combat is kinda like a puzzle where it comes down to micromanaging ammo and using the right weapon for certain situations. The Colt Commando however, is the equivalent of Doom's plasma gun and you'll be using it for most of part 3.

    I might do a long post on it one day. Been replaying the first game lately and it truly aged well. Max Payne 2 took everything from the first game and expanded upon it, truly polishing up the bullet time combat. The only down side is how easy that game is. Even on Dead On Arrival difficulty, MP2 is such a breeze and the only hard spot is the silly escort mission.

    I think Max Payne also was one of the first games that had a fun story to it and proved video games could have story and it work. They mixed Film Noir with Kung Fu action movies. Max himself is just an interesting and fun character. He cracks jokes , he makes funny faces that are memorable (thanks to Sam Lake and the graphic novel panels) and he had a great voice actor who delivered on lines that made it all work. This is everything that Rockstar got wrong with Max Payne 3 and why I will never accept that game as a proper sequel, cause it's not. The 3D Realms Max Payne is the real one.