Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne [PS2]

Graphics Max Payne 2, like the first, offers a unique brand of visuals. Payne is an ordinary guy, so he looks pretty normal in dress, facial structure and stature. Remedy has done an excellent job of updating the characters' visuals, and you'll instantly see the better textured facial visuals on Payne, who looks a whole lot different; and you'll quickly recognize his creased leather jacket too.

The game's other textures aren't so much drastically enhanced as they are just very well used. For instance, while Mona and Max are far better looking than the other characters, which is a little weird, the levels prove to be fascinating because of their structure. Mona hides out in a fun house on Coney Island and the layout of this particular level is mind-altering without being painful to play through. The dozens of 2D characters, moving cars, spinning rooms, and funhouse theme objects create a surprisingly wild sense of exploration.

Technically, the PS2 version doesn't hold a candle to its PC or Xbox brethren in resolution, framerates, or aliasing, which is heavy here, but the Max Payne series was never a graphics demo piece. It gets its beauty from other places. Gamers with widescreen TVs are given the widescreen option, as well as some fun options for their reticules.

Sound The dialogue, like I said before, is comic brilliance. The TV shows, especially, Lords and Ladies and Dick Justice are these strangely calm breaks between intense gun-toting scenes of grisly violence and death, and they point out the absurdity of Max's situation with even stronger clarify that his often lengthy monologues.

As music goes, the theme song here will stay with you a long time. The heavy emphasis on classic strings is thick and melodramatic, but it perfectly sets the stage for Max's seemingly unending set of failures and stubborn returns. I love the classic touch in Max Payne. More game companies should take a lesson from Max Payne's original soundtrack, which deftly avoids techno and licensed rock. Wow!

Another set of technical problems appear in the sound department. I found is that characters often repeat words. They'll stutter. Also, while playing as Mona, Max Payne's voice is injected in several areas. He says "Careful." And in these cases, he was not talking to her over the headset. This is the exact same line he says to himself when encountering an interesting or dangerous situation.

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