A man. A woman. A bullet, lodged in each of their brains.
Max Payne 2 picks up 2 years after the end of Max Payne, with Max reassigned to the NYPD and tasked with picking up on a new case involving a series of killers known only as "The Cleaners." This brings him back into the fold with known killer for hire Mona Sax, who we last encountered in the finale of Max's wild ride. Together they fight the cleaners back to their source, leaving a trail of bodies behind them so thick that no number of mops could clean it up.
Writing up Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne is easy - its like someone took a wrench and tightened up every loose screw Max Payne burst onto the scene with.
The guns have better weight. The level design is tighter and more arcade oriented. The bullet time and dodge mechanics are a little more useful and fun. The structure has more variety by introducing escort missions where you have to defend other characters and a new character to play as and interact with in Mona Sax.
It's all flavor, no filler. A perfectly acceptable improvement over its predecessor that doesn't blow the wheels completely off, but makes for a decent hang, especially for how short it is at around six hours.
Performance on the Xbox is further refined in this entry - the game runs at a solid 60fps in most sequences, only dropping in certain cases where large amounts of explosives are going off or enemy count increases beyond 3 or 4 at once. Aim assist doesn't feel nearly as magnetic in this entry, making controller feel much, much better than it did in Max Payne. All in all an excellent console port.
Sure do wish each line of dialogue wasn't trying to outsmart the last one though. Cool heckin game.
Max Payne 2 picks up 2 years after the end of Max Payne, with Max reassigned to the NYPD and tasked with picking up on a new case involving a series of killers known only as "The Cleaners." This brings him back into the fold with known killer for hire Mona Sax, who we last encountered in the finale of Max's wild ride. Together they fight the cleaners back to their source, leaving a trail of bodies behind them so thick that no number of mops could clean it up.
Writing up Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne is easy - its like someone took a wrench and tightened up every loose screw Max Payne burst onto the scene with.
The guns have better weight. The level design is tighter and more arcade oriented. The bullet time and dodge mechanics are a little more useful and fun. The structure has more variety by introducing escort missions where you have to defend other characters and a new character to play as and interact with in Mona Sax.
It's all flavor, no filler. A perfectly acceptable improvement over its predecessor that doesn't blow the wheels completely off, but makes for a decent hang, especially for how short it is at around six hours.
Performance on the Xbox is further refined in this entry - the game runs at a solid 60fps in most sequences, only dropping in certain cases where large amounts of explosives are going off or enemy count increases beyond 3 or 4 at once. Aim assist doesn't feel nearly as magnetic in this entry, making controller feel much, much better than it did in Max Payne. All in all an excellent console port.
Sure do wish each line of dialogue wasn't trying to outsmart the last one though. Cool heckin game.