Katana
released on Nov 13, 2006
A mod for Max Payne
Heavily influenced by popular Japanese Anime and recent movies such as Kill Bill; Katana combines Max Payne's stylish Bullet-Time with stunning, yet brutal, bladed-weapon combat. Developed by Maddieman and StratonAce, with help and support from Kenneth Yeung, Katana lifts the Max Payne engine to new heights and takes the player to new levels of pain.
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Originally posted here: https://cultclassiccornervideogames.wordpress.com/2018/04/16/mod-corner-katana-max-payne-review/
Katana is an ambitious mod for the first Max Payne, introducing a world and characters that are surprisingly fleshed out. Obviously inspired by the likes of The Matrix, Ghost In The Shell, Blade Runner, and Akira, so much so that the mod uses the soundtrack from Akira directly, as well as audio from several other sources, Despite that, the mod manages to feel like it’s own world.
The story is pretty thorough, so much so that the mod comes with a PDF explaining the story and characters in depth. The mod feels like it takes place in the middle of a story already in progress, so even though the PDF isn’t necessary to enjoy the mod, it gives the mod a lot of context.
But to summarize it the best i can, you play as an unnamed character who was raised as nobility, and is a trained soldier who became an assassin. His real memories were replaced by false ones by a shady organization called “The Order”. Our main character is now on the run from “The Order”, who has it’s eyes everywhere, and is now being hunted by them. As he makes his escapes, he comes across characters who seem to know a lot more than they’re letting on. All of this story was way more than was either necessary or expected for a small project like this, but is gladly appreciated.
Since the mod is called Katana, it’s pretty obvious that one of the new weapons for this mod is a Katana. To show it off, the mod implements another mod, which is Kung Fu 3.0. This means that hand-to-hand combat features a lot of acrobatic moves, such as running up walls and leaps. The only time hand-to-hand combat is a problem is with boss battles. The first boss requires melee combat, and takes away your guns during it. I’m pretty sure it does that to show off the combat.
And when the boss hits you, he takes off huge chunks of your health. You’ll be using up your pills pretty quickly, and will probably have to reload quite a bit. Thankfully, the rest of the boss battles let you use your guns. While this does make the bosses bullet sponges and easier to defeat, I’d rather that then having to reload a thousand times, wasting hours of my life.
Graphically, the whole mod is pretty impressive for a tiny team of modders. Most of the levels have lots of smaller details scattered around them, along with the odd easter egg. Some of the set pieces in the mod stand out and are fun to experience.
For some reason, cutscenes are unskippable, which means if you have to reload, you have to re-watch it over. And if you’re having difficulty with an enemy or forgot to save in a while, it’s going to get incredibly tedious. The base game lets you skip the cutscenes, so i don’t know why this mod doesn’t give you the ability to do it.
Katana surprisingly comes with voice acting, and it’s pretty amateurish and clearly recorded on several microphones of varying quality by several people who aren’t professional voice actors. But for a mod that came out around 2003, there wasn’t much to compete with, and it makes for a nice addition, especially when other mods at the time didn’t have it.
With a mix of unique ambition and a surprisingly high quality execution, Katana is definitely worth checking out. If this mod had been picked up and was done by a professional team, it could have been something interesting. But since it remains a relatively unknown mod for Max Payne that has a “To Be Continued…” ending, it’s probably going to fade off into obscurity. Considering that Max Payne is relatively cheap on Steam and pretty easy to get working on modern systems, this mod is definitely worth checking out.
Katana is an ambitious mod for the first Max Payne, introducing a world and characters that are surprisingly fleshed out. Obviously inspired by the likes of The Matrix, Ghost In The Shell, Blade Runner, and Akira, so much so that the mod uses the soundtrack from Akira directly, as well as audio from several other sources, Despite that, the mod manages to feel like it’s own world.
The story is pretty thorough, so much so that the mod comes with a PDF explaining the story and characters in depth. The mod feels like it takes place in the middle of a story already in progress, so even though the PDF isn’t necessary to enjoy the mod, it gives the mod a lot of context.
But to summarize it the best i can, you play as an unnamed character who was raised as nobility, and is a trained soldier who became an assassin. His real memories were replaced by false ones by a shady organization called “The Order”. Our main character is now on the run from “The Order”, who has it’s eyes everywhere, and is now being hunted by them. As he makes his escapes, he comes across characters who seem to know a lot more than they’re letting on. All of this story was way more than was either necessary or expected for a small project like this, but is gladly appreciated.
Since the mod is called Katana, it’s pretty obvious that one of the new weapons for this mod is a Katana. To show it off, the mod implements another mod, which is Kung Fu 3.0. This means that hand-to-hand combat features a lot of acrobatic moves, such as running up walls and leaps. The only time hand-to-hand combat is a problem is with boss battles. The first boss requires melee combat, and takes away your guns during it. I’m pretty sure it does that to show off the combat.
And when the boss hits you, he takes off huge chunks of your health. You’ll be using up your pills pretty quickly, and will probably have to reload quite a bit. Thankfully, the rest of the boss battles let you use your guns. While this does make the bosses bullet sponges and easier to defeat, I’d rather that then having to reload a thousand times, wasting hours of my life.
Graphically, the whole mod is pretty impressive for a tiny team of modders. Most of the levels have lots of smaller details scattered around them, along with the odd easter egg. Some of the set pieces in the mod stand out and are fun to experience.
For some reason, cutscenes are unskippable, which means if you have to reload, you have to re-watch it over. And if you’re having difficulty with an enemy or forgot to save in a while, it’s going to get incredibly tedious. The base game lets you skip the cutscenes, so i don’t know why this mod doesn’t give you the ability to do it.
Katana surprisingly comes with voice acting, and it’s pretty amateurish and clearly recorded on several microphones of varying quality by several people who aren’t professional voice actors. But for a mod that came out around 2003, there wasn’t much to compete with, and it makes for a nice addition, especially when other mods at the time didn’t have it.
With a mix of unique ambition and a surprisingly high quality execution, Katana is definitely worth checking out. If this mod had been picked up and was done by a professional team, it could have been something interesting. But since it remains a relatively unknown mod for Max Payne that has a “To Be Continued…” ending, it’s probably going to fade off into obscurity. Considering that Max Payne is relatively cheap on Steam and pretty easy to get working on modern systems, this mod is definitely worth checking out.