An absolutely amazing experience from start to finish, a game that honestly gets overshadowed for being developed by Rockstar and not Remedy and the fact that it strays from the classic noir aesthetic of the first two, but as someone who played all three games one-by-one back to back, I found the transition great and the game being a masterpiece both in story and gameplay.
The gunplay in this game is fantastic, probably genuinely the greatest third person shooter I've ever played, the guns feel and sound amazing to handle and shoot, every kill feels satisfying, bullet time is back and only even better with a modern spin, Max Payne as a character is older and in his middle ages now, but that hasn't slowed him down one bit (Possible MGS reference haha) He's still brooding, lonely and depressed, maybe even at his lowest but his sarcastic wit is still there in every sense, the story plays out greatly and only gets deeper and more miserable, James Mcaffrey gives what I think is his greatest performance as Max Payne, showcasing a far more angry and tired Max than we've ever seen, a Max who's tired of losing people, and by the end, after an unbelievable struggle, after over ten years of pushing himself deeper into hell, he pulls himself back up, he finally finds peace within his solitude and moves on, though still alone, not wanting to form connections with anyone as he doesn't want to lose anyone else.
Max Payne 3 was an absolutely perfect end to an amazing trilogy, and I urge anyone to play through all three games in 2023.

Randomly decided to give a quick replay cause of all the "Cat zoning out" memes with the remix of Aquatic Ambience playing in the background, and man, the sudden wave of imminent nostalgia that hit me while playing was something else. Despite the weird and janky level design at times, it still holds up and is more than stellar if you're looking for a challenging but still fun time. It doesn't hand-hold you ever through any moment, but rather expects you to learn and get used to its mechanics. And trust me, when you're exhausting lives at the speed of light in the ice stages, you'll more than get used to it. Also, I friggin' love Diddy. Artistically I love this game, I find the visuals stunning, and they kinda represent a majority of the visuals of the SNES era for me and why I love them so much. Never could beat this game as a kid, now feels absolutely great doing so as an adult :)

Honestly? For a first handheld Tekken and on the Game Boy Advance, this game is an absolute treat and I can't imagine how awesome it felt back in 2001 to play Tekken portably, until we got Dark Resurrection and 6 on the PSP later on.
There's quite a lot of inputs you can do including of course electrics for Mishimas and there's a lot of cute Game Boyified details here and there, like King's throws being slideshows, the little 8-bit crushed sprites used in the gameplay, the Tekken 3 soundtrack but also 8-bitified, and so much more. It's honestly absolutely impressive how the game is still 3D and has full sidesteps, it has more movement than the first console Tekken, and that's a fact. Doesn't take a lot to get the hang of either, give it a try :)

Max Payne, to this day, is one of the greatest and most revolutionary games ever made. Not just from a gameplay and storytelling perspective for video games, from voice acting and aesthetics as well. The amazing gunplay that still holds up today mixed with the slow-down mechanic, aka Bullet Time, makes for such a fantastic gameplay loop that seldom gets stale. Although some segments of the game are very difficult, they feel super rewarding to get through once you do beat them, and the overall experience makes for such a heart-wrenching and satisfying time.
The story while somewhat simple, is awesome and hooks you from the start, and immediately makes you feel sympathy for Max, and speaking of Max, easily one of the greatest and most fantastically written video game protagonists of all time. A happy man whose everything is ripped away from him, and from that moment, he spends the rest of his time dwelling on the past and trying, and failing to bring himself back up from drowning. The story, along with the wonderful voice acting from James Mcaffrey and others, make for a storytelling experience we hadn't quite seen in that caliber since Metal Gear Solid back in 1998 on the PS1. The Noir aesthetic adds to the amazing atmosphere of the game, and puts together an experience that is nothing short of amazing to get through even today. Please play the Max Payne trilogy, you won't regret it :)

I initially played the 3D remake after playing Ocarina Of Time and wondered what is it that people didn't like about it, then I played and beat the original and it hit me just how magical it truly is. Ocarina Of Time is one of my favorite games of all time and yet Majora's Mask just comes in as an absolutely perfect sequel that may even surpass it, I loved it more as a sequel than I did Tears Of The Kingdom to Breath Of The Wild, the sheer atmosphere along with how simultaneously stressful and relaxing the entire game is, the soundtrack, and how genuinely scary and messed up it can be for a Zelda game, even now as an adult. There aren't many more words I can use to describe how amazing of an experience this game is, play it.
When Nintendo really gets out of their comfort zone, they truly end up making a bizarre yet nearly perfect adventure.

Okay so, this is gonna be more of an updated bunch of thoughts I’m sharing about Payday 3 as of February 2024 than a review. And yes, obviously most of these things that I will say are gonna be negative, but from someone who’s a passionate fan and only wants the best for the game.

The truth is I’ve been playing Payday 2 since before release, that’s over ten years now. I’ve accumulated thousands of hours across several platforms and went back and played Payday: The Heist as well. I was unbelievably excited about Payday 3, but… The game should not have come out so fast. If they said September 2024, hell, I would not be mad. We could have easily, and damn well merrily handled another year of Payday 2.

There are many issues to address with the game, I’ll start by saying it has the groundwork to truly be an amazing, fun, and complete package. The shooting and gunplay is very grounded and fun, the heists are very well designed and replayable, the new stealth system is greatly improved and challenging, but there’s a number of problems that stop all of that,

With the main one for me being, how the hell are you gonna sell this game as an all-in-all multiplayer/co-op experience to be enjoyed by friends and randoms alike across different platforms… But then, the game tries its absolute HARDEST, to prevent you from almost all of that.

When you finish a heist whether it’s with your friends or randoms, the game automatically kicks all of you out of the lobby and you’re back to being alone, having to look for them and invite them all again, the lobby system itself is so bad and doesn’t allow you to properly change anything, doesn’t allow you to unready if you accidentally ready up, doesn’t have a text chat, doesn’t allow you to kick players when the game has started, and much more.

In Payday 2 it was the simplest but most perfect system: If you join a random and finish a heist with them, the game automatically puts you into a lobby together, where you could chat and decide which heist to do next, change your weapons and loadouts, and so much more. I don’t understand what made them unable to simply carry this system over to Payday 3.

And the sad part is, this has been killing the game’s player base to the point where now, when you (for some reason) wait for minutes and minutes for a damn match, you just end up entering a lobby all alone, and have to wait for someone to join, and more often than not, nobody will.

This is my current main gripe with the game other than the obvious one: The lack of an offline mode, but that’s been discussed a lot already and I’d like to believe that it’s not exactly the devs fault but the notoriously money hungry publishers, Deep Silver.

But that’s sadly not all. There’s still a lot about the game that is missing or needs changing. The menus are… boring, bland, colorless and uninspired, they’re wonky to navigate and are annoying, customization is so lacking, weapon and mask customization is not nearly as good or detailed as Payday 2, and in general there’s barely any preset masks, not many goofy outfits, there’s no incentive to keep grinding.

And there’s so many other features and things that are beloved in this franchise that are missing for some unknown reason. Like… there's no melee weapons. You just hit enemies with your gun’s ass and that’s it. How the hell are you gonna take away melee weapons after Payday 2 was well-known for its wide and wacky selection of dumbass melee weapons ranging from comically large spoons to money stacks and katanas? W H Y ?

And of course many other things, like the lack of a jukebox/music selector before a heist, in a franchise with unbelievably beloved and popular music that even people who are not part of the game’s tight community have heard one or two tracks from it before. I don’t get it.

Overall, I say all of this as a passionate fan and player of over ten years who does not want to see the game/franchise crash and burn, and wants the devs to get it together and work to make the game become the best version of itself it can be, and that is still possible.

Once all of those issues are fixed, we can look forward to new content and DLC, and with all of that: We finally have a damn good Payday game. I really hope we can reach that. The game definitely needed a lot more time in the oven, but it’s okay, let’s try and be hopeful.