The Original Max Payne: 2001 Retro PC Time Capsule vs PlayStation 2

Max Payne may well be getting a full-on remake, but here's where it all began, way back in 2003. Join Alex Battaglia - playing on period appropriate PC hardware - along with John Linneman on PS2 to see why this game was such a big deal, and how troublesome it was to bring to consoles.
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[@Dreddtube]

I've completed that game during a snowy winter, mostly at night, when I was depressed. Some of the best memories of my gamer's life.

[@xmenyoyo]

Sounds like the perfect atmosphere to play video games 😉

[@sellingacoerwa8318]

I remember playing this game sooo much, part 2 as well, this and the first Farcry. was like magic man, magic.

[@peteparker22]

Waiting on a remaster for the first 2 games

[@TechRyze]

@@sellingacoerwa8318 At this time I remember having Max Payne, Return to Castle Wolfenstein and Medal of Honor Allied Assault on the go, and the PC versions of the GTA III era games were around as well. FarCry was a little later in my mind's eye, but that could have been me not having the hardware to run it for a year or two!

[@originalityisdead.9513]

​@@TechRyze Far Cry was later, 2004.

[@struckbydog8629]

Loved this game as a teen. This game also made me realize how distorted the game spaces are to accommodate the third person camera. Look at those 15 foot high ceilings!

[@kupokinzyt]

Holy wow I'm replaying Dark Souls at the moment and never have I understood this more lol.

[@SnakeShitNL]

OMG!! only because you point it out. Never noticed this and have played this game more than anyone should :D

[@gulanhem9495]

@@kupokinzyt How does it look in Dark Souls? The distortion?

[@ken131]

To be fair it's believable enough. some old buildings have high ceilings because they had no AC in those days and it gave hot air a place to rise up. That's the excuse I'm going with anyway.

[@Bailer86]

is that the reason why some rooms that should be smaller, but aren't like the bedrooms in Max's apartment? hes a Jersey cop, I doubt his apartment is that big.

[@MINI_91]

Still the best narration in any video game ever made. I adore the way Max describes what's happening and how he feels. What a classic.

[@BaronVonHaggis]

_As I finally closed the tab, I couldn't shake the feeling that I had just survived a brutal firefight in a war-torn city of words. The scars were invisible, but the impact was undeniable. The KZbin comments section was a no man's land, a digital wasteland where the boundaries of civility and coherence were shattered, leaving only the echoes of incoherent ramblings and the bitter taste of disillusionment._ - Max Payne reading the comments section of KZbin.

[@Egurius3]

​@@BaronVonHaggisPerfection

[@amilyester]

James McCaffrey as Max is a gem. Right up there alongside Michael Ironside as Sam Fisher. Iconic performances.

[@MrXreuf]

Alan Wake exist... The creator of max payne. ^^

[@MINI_91]

@@MrXreuf yeah, but it ain't Max Payne.

[@TSL73]

The Xbox port for this game is very good. If you play it backwards compatible it’s 4K 60 fps on Series X and it even has dead zone modifiers so you can make the game feel really good to play as well.

[@trobriandstorm]

Yeah, it easily the best one, even better than the PS4 port.

[@BeRadNotBadYo]

Are you sure it's 60fps?

[@BeRadNotBadYo]

Lol nvm I'm a dumbass it's max payne 3 with the 30 fps lock. Really wish that game got fps boost

[@2psah2]

True. Lots of games got a great treatment for the Series X. I just wish they also did SSX Tricky.... Can't even play it at all on Series X.

[@Mark-mu4pj]

Cool didn't know that going to play it on my Series X.

[@Smokinjoewhite]

I ran this on the first PC I bought and built for myself. 1.33Ghz Athlon (fastest consumer CPU at the time) 256MB RAM Geforce 2mx (upgraded a few months after initial build to a Geforce 3 Ti200, which I promptly overclocked to near Ti500 speeds, as you did back then) and a lovely 19" Sony Trinitron monitor This game freaking blew my mind at the time. and yes, even with what was at the time of purchase, the fastest cpu on the market here in AUS this game was really demanding on the CPU side.

[@aschilds]

Ah, brings back great memories. While I do love all the attention PC gaming gets these days I find it lacks the intimate charm of days past, either that or I'm just getting old and nostalgic.

[@hughJ]

Pretty close to the system I built for first year of college in summer of 2001. 1.4tbird, geforce3, 60GB ibm deskstar, 19 trinitron e400. Max Payne would have been the first single player game I bought to play on it. Still have the Lian Li PC68 case that it was inside. Also my first and last Remedy game, as after that they moved to console games.

[@bananachild1936]

I legit thought Max Payne was a famous movie IP back when it first released in 2001 because it really has that aura of an excellent noir narrative perfect for the big screen. Turns out it was a completely original video game made by a passionate team of devs and that blew my mind when I found out.

[@randybobandy9828]

Did the movie they made of max payne flop?

[@TehBurek]

Re: two points in the video: - It's absolutely no coincidence that there are similarities between this and 3DMark. As shown in the 3DMark credits, the Max Payne engine is used, Remedy and MadOnion (future FutureMark) share common ancestry and some personnel, there are close ties there, another fun fact is that the band Poets Of The Fall contributed music tracks to both Max Payne and 3DMark (and later Control). - I don't remember if the game required DirectX 8 to run, but even if it did, it was a mostly arbitrary software API targeting thing. Hardware capability wise, it's completely a DirectX 7 level game, all fixed function pipeline, no programmable shaders.

[@DenkyManner]

Poets of The Fall feature in Alan Wake as well

[@ezaike335]

I LOVE this game! The atmosphere is amazing in this game

[@Tx_zx]

The atmosphere in this game is the best in the series :)

[@jackjack121]

Still replay to this day.

[@brugalman1183]

literally all the max payne games are incredible, genuinely my favorite third person shooters of all time

[@bagggers9796]

@@Tx_zx Thought I was crazy when I played MP2 and thought it didn't have as strong an atmosphere as the first

[@RalfKraus]

REMEDY is Number1 in regards of atmospheric story telling 😍

[@philipcooper8297]

I finished this game on PC, PS2, GBA, Android phone, PS4 (the PS2 version) and even again on the PC. This game is really something.

[@MrXreuf]

Always the worst version, Woaw. Gg

[@athenian221]

Wow I'm impressed had no idea there were so many versions

[@randybobandy9828]

I did enjoy it when I got it on release for the PS2 but even thinking of playing this game makes me die of boredom. The game just doesn't seem fun. Idk.

[@CuppaKofe]

I’ve tried so many times to play through the gba conversion, but it’s so god damn difficult to control. I like how it took the same approach as the Tony Hawk gba games but like those it looks better than it plays.

[@thebaffman4898]

You missed the opportunity to get attacked by rats after throwing a granade in the hole in the brick wall (curious to know if that's also in the PS2 version) , also if you shoot at the alarm on the ceiling it will immediately stop and Max will break the 4th wall and thank the player. Man I love Remedy.

[@feedingfrenzy123]

Max Payne came with my secondhand PS2 as a kid and I'm really happy I gave it a chance and played it. Performance looking back is pretty dire but I didn't know any better and the gameplay was still very fun. Made me a fan of the series

[@spikepsych]

played the xbox version for the first time ever last year and got super hooked on it finished on all difficulties, thats very impressive to me for a 2001 game to hook me like that 20 years later

[@krono5el]

gameplay is king, when ever gameplay is fun its timeless and always a good time.

[@elone3997]

@@krono5el Very true. "Rise of the robots" taught me that looks alone do not make a game 😖

[@Danne-Danger]

Deus Ex has an interesting PS2-port with neat controls and map changes, worth a look in a future feature!

[@aschilds]

I actually agree, in their attempts to adapt key bindings from (basically) your entire keyboard to a controller they had to streamline some features (lockpicks, hacking tools, numpads) which in my option made the game much easier to play. I only wish they would add it to the PS2 Classics so I can play it on my PS4 with everything upscaled for my modern TV. There was once a port of System Shock 2 in the works for the Sega Dreamcast, it never saw the light of day but I always imagined Irrational taking a similar approach to what was done with DX on PS2.

[@Danne-Danger]

@aschilds as long as you play it stealthily it isn't too bad, but once you start alerting AI:s it's like single digit framerates. If you then take out the flamethrower... oh my!

[@Wobbothe3rd]

​@@Danne-Dangerto be fair it has pretty bad single thread performance on modern systems to this day lol. Unreal Engine was always single thread limited even then!

[@oscarzxn4067]

They did a long analysis of it a few years ago, but a side by side would be neat as well

[@TailsGuy72]

They've actually done this

[@kayeplaguedoc9054]

Considering the texture limitations of the PS2, I’m even more amazed by the texture work in Silent Hill 3

[@Dorraj]

Textures and lighting were both really impressive in SH3 for PS2, I'll never forget being impressed as a kid the first time I played it

[@Nintenboy01]

Did you see that Megatexture demo made for N64 recently? Imagine if similar techniques were used on PS2 back in the day

[@kayeplaguedoc9054]

@@Dorraj The game has aged beautifully, you look at it compared to Homecoming and its hard to believe they're a generation apart. Homecoming still has some good graphical elements but it looks like ass compared to SH3.

[@JustFun-ho6qy]

Homecoming is the king of hair helmets.

[@Vsevolod3788]

SH3 is the most underrated game graphics wise. Games with facial animation that believable started to appear only decade later. The game still looks phenomenal!

[@TwinOpinion]

🤩I remember reading the previews for Max Payne in PC Gamer magazine. The photo realistic graphics and bullet time blew my little mind🤯, but it was Sam Lake's writing and a stellar cast that touched my soul. Max's struggles and nightmares were so real... Made me a lifetime Remedy fan!

[@aschilds]

I remember reading the same spread in PC Gamer - they talked about how every texture in the game is made from a photograph (including the individual bullets) and having my mind blown. Remedy actually took a trip to NYC just to take photos for textures in the game.

[@TwinOpinion]

@@aschilds Oh yeah! I remember! That kind of insider info was wild back then... Thank you!

[@aschilds]

@@TwinOpinion I love it when developers deep dive into insider information about development. I've learned a lot of great things to do (and not to do) from Harvey Smith (Ion Storm, Arkane) who had performed a series of lectures about his history in game development for Warren Spector's college class. I absolutely recommend checking into them they are available here on KZbin.

[@TwinOpinion]

I'll have to check it out! I recently discovered Tim Cain's youtube channel. His stories have been utterly fascinating! Inspired me to finally play Fallout 1 & 2, as well as Arcanum. It's been amazing.@@aschilds

[@Loundsify]

​@@aschildsthe Getaway did something similar making a life sized London world. Man that game is so good.

[@bauer9101]

Max Payne was the first game I used mods for. It blew my mind what could be done. My AMD Athlon 1GHz got me through ok.

[@aschilds]

I knew quite a few people in the Max Payne mod community back in the day, I think the kung-fu mod may have been my favorite. Maddieman was a great developer.

[@Swisshost]

The night fever mod, when max was idle. The Saturday Night Fever music started and he was dancing 😆

[@Sabbalab92]

I remember playing a matrix mod that added kung fu. It was amazing what mods could do even back then.

[@thebham95]

love max Payne. still play it on the regular.

[@lordmaster2562]

Hahahhahahahhahaha

[@crzybrit8150]

Same here, I never played it on PC but going from ps2 to xbox series S was a huge difference... Especially the frame rate 😂 I swear it went less than 10fps on ps2 sometimes

[@club4ghz]

Should try "The Devil Inside" as well but man that game won't even start on windows 10 or windows 11. I think you need win 98 or XP to play it.

[@aschilds]

@@crzybrit8150 The original PC version is such a mess and pain to get working properly on modern operating systems (unless something has made a recent drastic change) I think you made a good choice going with the xbox version. When I get the itch I play the PS2 version on my PS4.

[@newyork1222]

​@@aschildsAgreed, its much easier playing some of these classics on a console than PC these days. Just hit install and play, the games are normally at least 1080p 60fps anyway and look great! Its better than spending an hour getting the same game going on a PC lol.

[@vikramjadhav3631]

Great video, guys! The title says 2003, but the game came out in 2001. Ran really well on my Athlon 650 and NVIDIA Riva TNT 2. Max Payne 2 came out in 2003, which had Havok Physics 2 a year before HL2.

[@vikramjadhav3631]

Thanks, DF, for correcting the title!

[@randybobandy9828]

​@@vikramjadhav3631 the description still says 2003 😂

[@vikramjadhav3631]

@@randybobandy9828 Good observation. I hope they correct that, too.

[@HatedJared]

I had MP on PS2. Its one of the few games I reminisce on often. Remedy's dark storytelling is unlike any other developers.

[@jamesoloughlin]

Max Payne was one of the few games I got on multiple platforms (PC, PS2, Xbox, even on iOS eventually) to compare the differences myself with I was a teenager. Glad DF cares about such things too years later. Splinter Cell was another title I did the same.

[@HunterTinsley]

I was a HUGE fan of Max Payne on PC. My cousin was console only so I bought him a copy for PS2 for Christmas. ...he hated it. :(

[@ark_knight]

He is not your cousin anymore! :)

[@SixSioux]

I bet, with that horrendous framerate! X))

[@KingSigy]

I don't remember what PC I had at the time, but I know I ran this on a Ti 4600. It was mindblowing how smoothly it ran.

[@TORQUENDB]

Huh, I didnt realize the first Max Payne was released on PS2. I played it on Xbox back in the day (and still today, I always have issues with the PC version crashing even with fan patches), I still remember the magazine ads with close-ups of Max's face and how it was real in-game graphics.

[@cunt5413]

This game doesn't like Ryzen. But the fan patches helped me.

[@WrathDrago]

2003? Didn't this come out in 2001.

[@oneandonlyjark]

Just want to dispel any notion here: REMEDY made the first two Max Payne games. Not Rockstar; they merely assisted with console ports (and published MP2). Yet, bc Rockstar fully took over for Max Payne 3, eleven years ago (thereabouts), there persists some notion on "Twitter" that Rockstar developed MP1.

[@norzma]

Replayed both Max Payne 1 and 2 just this spring/early summer, was great and after not having played either of them since my childhood it was fun to see it holds up very well.

[@Serpens6]

The final level has a cutscene if you die that barely plays on the PS2, it’s amazing!

[@mattlandry]

I originally played this on a meh PC in 2005 and it ran pretty good but then I played the PSN version on PS3 years later and i couldn't believe how rough it was.

[@aschilds]

This was one of the first games I upgraded my PC in advance due to anticipation, makes me miss 3DFX.

[@tHeWasTeDYouTh]

I want digital foundry to make a video like this for all the late 90s and early 2000s PC games that got ported to the PS2 like Quake 3 Arena, Unreal Tournament, Giant Citizen Kabuto, MDK2, Red Faction, Project Eden and others. DF has already done videos on NOLF and Max Payne.

[@thebaffman4898]

I still remember playing Max Payne on my poor TNT2 when it came out, the framerate was so low I had to look at the ground to make it playable. But man I didn't care...it looked so good and it was so fun that I just kept playing, I was completely captured by the story and atmosphere. Simpler times...

[@James-gj8rn]

Oh what a throwback this is! Remedy at the PEAK of their craft (James Mccaffrey was legendary)

[@aschilds]

I still prefer Sam Lake as the model for Max Payne, he nailed the character's vibe. When I first saw Max's model in the sequel I thought it was a prank. I get due to licensing and the sale of the IP it had to be changed but they swapped my 20 something hard edged gangster badass for a middle aged man having a mid life crisis. James McCaffrey was great as always, though.

[@Blaze92NL]

Sam Lake = Max Payne

[@aschilds]

@@Blaze92NL I really, really hope for the remake they try to create a new character design inspired by Sam Lake's Max Payne. The voice fortunately shouldn't be an issue.

[@aschilds]

If you play the PS2 version on a PS4 (PS2 Classics Edition) the emulator upscales the entire game's resolution, textures, effects, frame rate and makes a huge difference.

[@PunchKickBlog]

Bought it and couldnt even finish the first stage on console. Didnt feel right to me. Cant even put my finger on it. Was it a save anywhere game on pc back in the day? The checkpointing on ps2 felt bad, but maybe im just a way worse gamer now, haha

[@aschilds]

@@PunchKickBlog Considering the game is basically a first person shooter with a rotating third person camera it does play and "feel" a bit differently on console. The PC version did have the ability to save anywhere while the console versions use checkpoints. Besides the obvious difference in controls I can definitely understand your preference for PC, it's what the game was developed and targeted to run on anyway. The console versions aren't bad in my opinion, they just play a little different with some minor changes. However I'll totally admit that PC is what it was meant for.

[@krono5el]

but its still the crappy edited version and not even the full game, just play the original on your phone.

[@aschilds]

@@krono5el I was simply providing information for people who may not have known. While it may not be for everyone I personally find it entertaining.

[@SuperBearPoo]

@@aschilds Analog sticks are AWFUL for playing a game like Max Payne. You can always tell just from gameplay footage if someone is playing a shooter with a mouse and keyboard or a controller. Even motion controls on the Wii are infinitely better than aiming with an analog stick, regardless of the controller you're using.

[@SterkeYerke5555]

You could have a go at the PS2 port of the original Mafia game (the city of Lost Heaven). Worse textures (iirc the streets were just a single grey colour), bad framerate, loading screens in areas that didn't have them in the pc original, etc

[@SterkeYerke5555]

Just checked: the streets did get textures, they were just so low-res that they appeared to be a single colour over composite. Both console versions also missed out on manual transmissions, working odometers (obviously the worst part), widescreen support and all of the Freeride extreme mode, getting a racing mode instead. Consoles also got pre-rendered cutscenes rather than those rendered in real time on pc. I recall they looked rather bad even over composite, as all of the game still had to fit on a single dvd. All while being a somewhat late game for 6th gen consoles, as the console ports came out in 2004 - nearly two years after the pc original.

[@bombjack1984]

The long loads on John's PS2 version are easily offset by Alex's endless deaths 😄

[@CasepbX]

This game has such a massive amount of style and charm. I doubt the remake will be able to reproduce that.

[@numpy5135]

remedy makes games which keep standing out from its competition, hopefully they will knock it out of the park again

[@anchorlightforge]

Because Remedy is at the helm I have hope. Not to mention, I have a feeling we may see plot revisions that will help the first and second game fit together more smoothly.

[@richiegore1]

They can reuse the 3D mode from the detective in Alan wake 2.

[@aschilds]

Honestly I'd be perfectly happy with a remaster like the recent Quake II release. The game is one of the best ever made, no need to reinvent the wheel if they don't have to.

[@crazyjak56]

I think when you consider the games remedy have been making, they can definitely get the atmosphere of this game right, if not some of the goofiness from the jank.

[@seangalvin4582]

I just recently picked up a complete Big Box PC copy of Max Payne at Goodwill for 1.99. It was complete with a mouse pad. I was super pumped.

[@Housesider]

I knew the PS2 version was bonked, but had no idea it was to the extent of missing entire swaths of level geometry and gameplay! That's insane, and reminiscent of the PS2 versions of the Splinter Cell games.

[@Clay3613]

Those missing areas are superfluous and add nothing!

[@ShadowsThe1]

First map has missing paintings already and it also smallest map :)

[@rabid_si]

@@Clay3613 Was literally my first thought. It's a no-brainer removal for resource saving. They're pretty tough on the comparisons here. Are the console version (particularly PS2) "worse"? Absolutely, but I'd struggle to call them particularly bad or incompetent, But they work and are playable, and they're actually pretty impressive considering the hardware shortfalls. In terms of differences, it's pretty minor if you go back and look at the kinds of platform differences you'd see in earlier generations. Anyone familiar with platform variations from the 16bit, 8bit and Microcomputer era knows that the same title on a different platform could essentially be a completely different game (sometimes almost a completely different genre) from whatever the original were. Actual wild stuff!

[@Cinetyk]

I was 17 when I played this on PC back in the day. At the time, from a gameplay perspective, of course the "bullet time" stuff was awesomely cool! But as I was playing I found myself increasingly more and more engaged with the story and just the visual presentation of all of it. Then I recognized the writing and voice acting work, also the soundtrack. This is probably the first videogame I kept on my mind ever since I played it, I'm 39 now, even without me thinking about it. I cannot forget the Frankie the Bat Niagara moments like: Max Payne - "Niagara, as in you cry a lot?" [Payne as narrator] - I was tied to a chair and he had a baseball bat. Pissing him off was the smart thing to do. (Frank proceeds to smack Payne with the bat repeatedly) Years later Remedy keeps on in my mind, they have such unique and good taste in their work. Control was absolutely exquisite. It's good to revisit the original Max Payne and have Alan Wake 2 pretty close. Thanks DF for all your work and this revisit in particular.

[@amilyester]

One of my favourite games of all time. No one does it like Remedy!

[@schwartzy65]

Too bad they didnt do third :/ cant wait for the remasters!

[@Digimess88]

you see what they're doing with Alan Wake II? kinda how they blended comic-book style slides, now they are doing live-action cutscenes mixed in which is a huge creative risk and i love it. I wish there were more "individuals" in the gaming industry like Sam Lake, Hideo Kojima, Todd Howard, Michał Kiciński, John Carmack, GabeN and even Cliffy B lol. I feel like the bigger the studio, the more people, the less risks are taken...and also no one person is at fault or to credit. It's all just a pre-communistic environment where too many people are involved while trying to make games that appeal to everyone, but in doing that create something that noone connects with or relates to.

[@adriantrusca1245]

Hardware that's period appropriate? Sure, if you were rich during those times. Very few people had Pentium 4's in 2000. I played Max Payne in 2001 on a Pentium IIi 500mhz, 128 mb of ram, 4mb integrated graphics card, and a 10gb hard disk.

[@XDapologist]

Just finished 1 and 2 on pc last week perfect timing

[@LouisBee]

You guys mentioned Max Payne was demanding but I can recall running it, quite comfortably, with a TNT 2 Ultra 32MB. It did scale quite well for period appropriate hardware, all things considered.

[@Dicecreamvan]

I ran it pretty decent on my Riva Tnt2 m64 as well. I remember having loads of ram for the time though.

[@rannarharmaste9857]

I played it on voodoo 3 2000 with celeron 400mhz and also remember it running fine. Strange to see/hear pentium 4 1.5ghz has problems

[@Steak818]

@@rannarharmaste9857Played it on a Pentium III and it run flawlessly, so there was something wrong on their end.

[@TechRyze]

Yep, plus there was always the choice to drop down to 800x600 on a CRT back then. I remember this running great on my kit as well. Pentium 4 was weak as anything at launch, so moving away from WinME, plus changing that CPU to something that people were buying back then would probably achieve better results. WinME and a 1st gen P4 just weren't what the average gamer wanted at the time. RAMBUS memory was around at the time the P4 launched, and nobody wanted that overpriced crap either (apart from Sony with the PS3, years later).

[@leanlifter1]

​​​@@TechRyzeP4 was the most overhyped, overpriced, low performance "gaming chip" ever made. In fact it was a debacle and Intel was forced to pay out millions in rebates to all the people that got suckered into the sales and marketing propaganda. Fact was that at the time AMD Athlon 64 was the best performer and top dog gaming cpu and it cost allot less than Intel's propaganda tax they placed on their junk P4 chips that were the biggest flop ever. In fact Intel's P4 chips were so much garbage Intel lost millions of dollars and reputation in the process.

[@OfficialiGamer]

I absolutely love hearing ya'll rambling! Hope ya'll do more of these! It makes me feel like I'm right there next to ya'll!

[@michaelsantoro9864]

We love hearing you two commentate over games and do comparisons like this. MP is one of my favorite games so I was stoked when I saw you covered it. Thank you!

[@walter_the_wobot2349]

The Max Payne trilogy plays wonderfully on Steam Deck. 🙂

[@retro_ed746]

True. But jpeg error needs a fix on MP1...

[@stephensanders2104]

I LOVE Max Payne I CAN'T WAIT FOR Max Payne 1 AND 2 REMAKE

[@TapMyButtons]

Honestly can't wait for the remakes after seeing the engine powering Alan Wake 2

[@sandrinowitschM]

I played that game on an Athlon 600 with an Nvidia TNT card and it seemed to run just fine. Maybe because back then I considered everything above 20 fps to be playable. And I probably played it at 640x480.

[@timkasansky2528]

i used to run this game on a Celeron 500MHz, with 96mb coupled with a Geforce 2 MX400 on a PCI slot. Probably on 640x480 but the settings weren't too low, it still looked great and much better than this PS2 version.

[@gehtdinichtsan309]

the first max payne will always hold a special place in my heart. there were a lot of nay-sayers back then, "full price for just 8h of game? no!"; well i loved it! especially the graphic novel pages to tell the story, "is this the payne residence? - yes, someone broke into my house, please call 911!" - good, i'm afraid i cannot help you.."

[@eugeneko26]

Thanks for great video! Liked this series very much as a kid) And that music and atmosphere... just awesome!

[@timkasansky2528]

my PC for old games now is a Athlon 64 X2 4600+ with a Geforce 250GTS. I actually played both MP1 and 2 a few days ago. MP2 on max settings still looks great.

[@treiz01]

I played Max Payne on an AMD Duron 800Mhz (single core CPU) with 128mb ram and 128mb ATI 9800 Pro - it ran flawlessly at 1024x768.

[@kickazzdrummer666]

If you're a fan of The Matrix at that time, you'll absolutely love this game.

[@jlidean3541]

I think they came up with the idea first, but because of how game development works, The Matrix came out first. (they had the same influences)

[@191desperado]

I hope these videos perform well. I can lay back and watch these Alex and John Time Capsule videos all day long.

[@AfterBurnerTeirusu]

This game was made by Finnish demoscene people, so it was pretty obvious the outsourced console ports weren't going to be very good. We sadly only got this one in a dvd case in Finland, but it did come out a week before the international release! Bigboxes were disappearing at that time. We only really got games in dvd cases in the 00s. (and a lot of games that were released on cds in the States were only released on dvd in the nordic countries) EDIT: And yes, Futuremark started out as an another demogroup: Maturefurk. So yes, the benchmark demo is related to MP. Check out their old Amiga stuff... Lapsuus (amiga aga) is amazing.

[@mayen67]

The Android version is a nearly perfect PC port, you can even get a perfect 60fps on cheap $100 tablets and phones. Quite a good way to play it. plays well on a Xbox one pad via Bluetooth.

[@Filip10101]

Yes, Max Payne 2 would be even greater pick!

[@ItsameMatt]

The only version I played of Max Payne was the GBA, and I'm impressed watching this at how faithful that version was. I had no idea how well they nailed it on that little handheld.

[@theimpudentwanderer]

Loved this video. Please do make another one for Max Payne 2. Wasn't bored for a single second throughout the 1 hour length

[@SonDo91]

I am curious to see how the PS2 version performs in later stages, such as the Aesir HQ with lots of enemies on screen and a big lobby (like Matrix, if my memory serves correctly). I remember playing MP for the first time on a Celeron 900mhz and integrated graphic card with only 8mb vram, had those later stages made my old PC chugged so hard. Thanks for doing the episode, I really enjoy it! MP2 comparison for the next episode?

[@igorthelight]

I think, later stages are just even more cutted than the early ones ;-)

[@perlichtman1562]

It’s a trip hearing about running the game on that sort of hardware because I was running the demo at the time on a lowly AMD K6-3 450 MHz, alongside another app to playback WAV files of tracker music I’d composed to see how it went with the action (I can even remember my favorite one) and I was still happy with the framerate at the time. It’s a trip now to think of people on much more powerful systems having a frustrating time. :)

[@mbsfaridi]

Always enjoy these, nice relaxing gameplay with DF "ramblings" 👍

[@Harry101UK]

Max got in the train and John says "Max the conductor!" I was really expecting "MAX TRAYNE!" lol

[@vincentwarte4435]

I have been playing through that game for over 20 years for at least once a year, almost always during the Christmas season. I know every inch of every texture by now. And then it was a rhetorical question.

[@gmanuk1986]

awesome video, I love these pc time capsule vs ps2 and would love to see max payne 2

[@amitava1586]

Had been hoping for this for a long time! Thanks for bringing back fond memories

[@tommyaki]

I remember seeing trailers of this, reading articles in magazines, saving up all summer to buy it on cd. I was blown away with the gfx, i remember being facinated by the characters having individual fingers instead of one block being the hand. That was state of the art. Think i was 15, now im 37. Time goes by fast. And oh! The main theme "poets of the fall - late goodbye". Ah the memories!

[@metsallica]

Would you say the PS2 version elicits… maximum pain?

[@asad9414]

All you had to do was say was max instead of maximum c'mon man

[@Nitsua16]

It does to me. I played the Xbox version back in the day and this is horrendous. Hilarious too.

[@zezizezseze7544]

Love the two first Max Paynes games.Played them on my og xbox at the time and the ports were a lot better on it,not as good as pc versions better than ps2 versions.Also had quick saves during gameplay.Hope the remakes are done well.

[@alexkulik9607]

The red loading screen is so iconic. Loaded so slow on the pc when I was a kid

[@Extreme96PL]

This is my favorite game from trilogy and i think gameplay aged well its still fun to play, story and atmosphere is great and community is doing everything to keep this game alife with all fixes they made already to play this game fine on modern hardware.

[@Mike0193Azul]

One of the greatest written games every. So captivating and dark and moody. Film noire translated to video game form perfectly 👾

[@ScientificZoom]

Still played so many times, yet enjoyable

[@finraziel]

Oh man, I loved this game so much... Played it on a laptop with a 2.4 GHz P4 desktop CPU and a Radeon 9000 mobility... Ran really well as far as I remember. Worked a Helpdesk job at the time with lots of weekend and evening shifts where we'd just be sitting around in case someone called, me playing Max Payne on that laptop and a colleague watching over my shoulder... Good times :)

[@Kontekst]

what a timing. i've just replayed Max Payne 1 and 2 since I've never played it at 1080p highest settings and skipped most graphic novels and cut scenes as a young teen. what a wonderful experience, still one of my favorite games after all this time. during the time i didnt have a PC, i tried the PS2 version on PS4 and it was locked to 30 FPS and even dipped below many times, it ruined my nostalgic memories. i first played it on the original xbox and i dont remember it running so sluggish. PC version is the best version to play it BY FAR even though both 1 and 2 used to just run on Windows XP, i had to look for some mods for MP1 because the sound was messed up and it wouldnt run at 1080p, MP2 was a little bit easier to get running properly but it was stressing my GPU out because it would run at unlimited FPS no matter how i tried to restrict it until i installed the widescreen patch.

[@MichaelODonoghueMOD]

I played through this and MP2 recently on the Series X and it was a pretty smooth experience. It looks a lot more like the pc version. Back in the day I originally played it on an AMD Athlon and Geforce 4 ti 4200. I don't remember performance issues but I might not have noticed if it ran at 40 FPS, whereas I would if anything didn't run at 60 these days

[@Ghorun]

Played this on a Pentium II 400 Mhz with a Riva TNT 16 MB, back in the day. While the early game was ok, later on it struggled. I remember going up the staircase in the end building, and the framerate tanking as soon as the view was towards the outside.

[@ptrcrispy]

We need more Gun-Fu/John Woo style shooters like MAX PAYNE or FEAR. I know the remakes are in the works and John Wick is getting a AAA video game at some point but it would be great if it cemented itself as a proper subgenre like military or boomer shooters.

[@SomeRandomGuy369]

This is the best video you guys have ever done in the 10+ years I have been watching. I really like watching and listening to raw uncut footage while you guys play this game. I was just as lost where to go and am amazed how fast you figured it out. Im shocked by the changes made to the levels. I like watching Alex die all the time. That would be me. Im not even bad at video games. It happenes and it's all good because it showes the struggle with the pc. This is really good content. I would like to see you guys play the whole game. Even if you used cheat codes to do it and did it in defferent parts. Even if you dont do it now I think later you guys should for the fun of it. I would like to see Max Payne 2 on xbox, ps2, and pc at the same time. I played it on Xbox and it handled pretty good in the day. I really want them to remix Max Payne with RTX. It would be a great game to remix. I just had so much fun watching you guys play this game and I hope to see other games like this where you play together with raw uncut footage. I will try and look up some games you have not done yet and see if they would be good to play. This was cool.

[@davidjeffery3532]

One of my favourite games! Thank you!

[@Kenjitsuka]

Ahhhh, good old Max! I 'member being blown away by the demo on my PC!!!

[@birdman4birdlegs]

This video couldn't be more perfect for timing. I played Max Payne 2 at least 10 times and played through 3 a couple of times, but I never stuck it out to finish the original. I've been kicking back on a couch and playing it through pcsx2 :)

[@puma0085]

Max Payne is a great game. I have wanted to play it again for many years now but I never get the sound working of the Steam version on my modern-day pc. Soon I will be able to play it again. Got into building a retro gaming PC lately and as soon as my first rig Athlon T-Bird 1400 MHz, 512mb of RAM, and Geforce 4 42000 is finished Max Payne will be one of the first games I am going to play on that machine.

[@retro_ed746]

Not hardware issues at all ! Game runs on modern hardware with Proton just great....

[@Nocholas]

I still have the mouse pad that came in the box for PC. It has the appeal of old nostalgic running shoes.

[@v1kt0u5]

Nice comparison! You should have included the Xbox too 😮‍💨

[@LettuceJUMP]

Love these comparisons! Alex and John are great combo. Classic game!

[@candycabngfl]

I would rather see a straight comparison with no upscaling etc on the console side. The fun part of these videos are the way this stuff actually differed at the time especially with the different hardware quirks from one console to the next. That said still enjoyed the video and appreciate you guys taking the time.

[@4dxl]

I love your time capsule videos !

[@vedomedo]

Both this and the second one are amazing games

[@RaikenTB]

It was kind of mind blowing playing Max Payne years later on PC and noticing all the stuff I missed on PS2. Still had a lot of fun playing for the first time on console. I really wish they would update the game on steam so you could properly play it without mods.

[@greendude0420]

Loved the advertising you did for the gamer cube at the o2 arena, I'll be giving that 100 inch oled a try here at some point Tom lol.

[@nathane5287]

Thanks for another fun chaotic blind dual playthrough look of an absolute classic, loved MP1&2 growing up (do max payne 2 yes)

[@gamewizard5158]

Payne to the max.... settings!

[@jjforcebreaker]

Pretty rough in places, but still mostly fairly close. Can't wait to see MP2 comparison! That game holds up really well on PC, when playing in modern rez.

[@xaero212]

Loved this game when I was a kid & love it now. I have played it and completed it about 40 times, never gets boring, I play it every year. You cannot beat the atmosphere.

[@Cade_The_Squirrel]

I'd love to see you do this with Shadow Man on Dreamcast Vs a period accurate PC, would be super interesting to compare.

[@lukemclaughlin2184]

I loved this game, and the second one. I ran it on the GeForce 3 ti200, that was a great card!

[@Wogle]

14:40 Hehe, I appreciate the Silent Hill reference John (whether it was intentional or not)

[@ArzePoetic]

Read in Max's voice: "Somehow, I found more comfort with the PS2 visuals. Maybe it was Stockholm Syndrome, or drunken nostalgia viewed through blood tinted glasses. The cool color temperature felt like the cold hearted grasp of the New York winter. The shadows no longer eluded me; I wore the darkness like my bloodied leather jacket. The missing content mirrored the jacket's bullet holes. Somehow it all felt right. Surely I was in the wrong..."