Jolt Country

Read it and weep: http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/020522/222459_1.html

My initial reaction: frigging day-um. That, more than anything else, is a KICK IN THE BALLS that just possibly I am wasting my time and my youth in my current endeavors. Don't get me wrong, although Max Payne had three of the worst levels in the history of computer gaming (that'd be the two baby-crying, jump-on-umbilical-cord ones and the burning restaurant one) and although it took me three evenings to finish, it was a pretty good game. But the writing was dreck. I get that it was "supposed" to be cliched and hackneyed, but I still believe that you could make a much better crime noir / first person shooter by adding some quality original dialogue and whatnot to it. I don't see that it was critical that it HAD to be that cheesy.

The thing has really sold well on the X-box (and on the PC) and I guess that's the most important thing. I will, however, take this recent acquisition as proof positive that the days of decadence are back in the entertainment software industry. I've been wondering whether or not I should attempt to grab some Take Two stock. They have access to Payne and the Grand Theft Auto line. I would suspect that both sequels (Max Payne II and GTA4) will sell rather well, especially since both are coming to consoles, but I don't know. Take Two was just so bad at publishing -- hell, everything they did -- pre-GTA3.... dunno.

I'd stay clear of purchasing Take Two stock - of course, I stear clear of their games as well.

Their purchase of Max Payne shows that they are still incapable of producing a solid title, with the exception of GTA. That's hardly indicative of a good company.

For the record: Max Payne SUCKS. It's boring, trite, with some eye candy - kinda like Return to Castle Wolfenstein.

Regretably, no one seems to be able to pull Nihilistic Software out of the dog house. All the wanna-be's and baby Bats ruined their Redemption title, even with Activision publishing it, and now company that made great a technology (their engine ROCKS), and an even better game, is going down the tubes...

Moral: Give money to Nihilistic not Take Two.

J.

My objections towards Payne would appear to be along different veins. I'd criticize it for being short, cliched (in terms of how its plot/story was presented) and the subject of a few almost-crippling bad design decisions in its latter third section. Shooting people in the face with rocket launchers has always and probably always will appeal to me, so I can't fault it along those lines.

I was also okay with how they got a "pencil neck"-type guy to play Max. The roided-out beefy goon thing had been done to death. I think PC Gamer gave it the middle finger for not featuring a bigger guy. He did look like he was taking a grunt throughout the entire game, though.