Mad Max

A solid core of driving mechanics and top-tier environmental design struggle to stay afloat in a sea of repetitive, low-reward filler activities and strangely forgiving survival mechanics

In terms of lasting influence and predictive ability, George Miller's Mad Max series has cast an enormous shadow over the media landscape after it was unleashed in 1979 with it's iconoclastic characters and signature vehicle-mounted gangs circling the refinery. A quick licensed cash-in to ride the waves created by Fury Road seems a fate far too corporate to befall Max, but just like the ruins of the old world occasionally encountered in the films, Avalanche studios constructed the bones of a game that may have had a real shot at capturing the tenuous desperation of Miller's bizarro outback, then seemed to crush it under the weight of triple AAA gaming's smiling reaper -- "content".

That map shows about 60% of the total area of the map 30 hours in, with a suspicious number of icons sprinkled around, almost as if to scream at players "Don't worry! Even though it's a big wasteland there's still plenty of stuff here! Please be assured that you will be constantly stimulated with activities and errands in case you were afraid of not getting your money's worth". (Also, why have this awful, giant map crawling with little blips? If any game seemed to welcome the resurrection of Far Cry 2's immersive physical map idea, than this was it). The constant bombardment of reminders and indicators is relentless, and inexcusably so for Mad Max. Your minimap isn't toggleable, so you can't really ever fully submerge yourself into the world and so it's difficult to feel any attachment to it since the game doesn't seem to want you to just drive around and drink it in.

At the center of this checklist-clearing inanity is Chumbucket, your faithful companion and sidekick. The very existence of this character begs many questions that are best left unpondered, but needless to say you'll be forced to tag team with Chum for the vast majority of the game, despite also encountering and befriending a dog a la The Road Warrior that is subsequently gated from actual use in a the most aggravating and idiotic way possible. He wouldn't even be that bad if he was just another character you could visit every so often, say, to upgrade your car (I assume this was how he was originally conceived because I assume anyone suggesting a forced buddy character in a Mad Max game was immediately fired). He does actually fix and upgrade your car, at no cost, in another strange concession to the "casual" crowd, making your "Magnum Opus" feel more like an overpowered cheat item than an indispensable resource. Chum also does the whole "buddy character exposition source" thing like Ellie from The Last of Us does, blessing you with the same fifteen lines of dialogue ad nauseam, which rubs up against the game's halfhearted interest in environmental storytelling awkwardly, like Avalanche needed a failsafe to constantly remind players of what to do or something -- trust me, ask anyone who's seen a Mad Max movie and they'll tell you exactly what you should be doing in a Mad Max game.

Besides the false-start pacing (why do open world games after Far Cry 3 even bother doing campaigns?) of the story itself, the game's mechanics and systems are similarly frustrating, because (to me at least) most of what could make a good Mad Max game are already found here, just... buried:

• Fuel is implemented as both a resource and a weapon - sweet! Luckily, cars in this game are apparently all based off Prius engines and get approximately 400 miles to the gallon, so you'll never ever have to worry about actually running out of juice. Try not to think too hard about the irony there.
• The currency of the world is "scrap". Ok, so why does one character talk about people "dropping bills"? Also, where do I store all this magical scrap as I collect it? I assume in my car, because its only able to store a single spare gas can and nothing else.
• Enemy cars give you practically no scrap at all. What better source for scrap car parts would there be than fully functional cars? Also, if scrap is the currency in this place, why do trucks with upwards of 500 scrap in the back drive around unprotected, while large groups of armored cars protect convoys of already-abundant gasoline that drive around in circles?
• Why can't I lure enemy cars to their doom by making them drive off cliffs or into walls like Max does in the movies? Also, why is Chumbucket the only person who thought of using a harpoon gun?
• Shotgun shells are supposedly scarce even though there are guys with sniper rifles(!) all over the place. You also find shells in ammo boxes everywhere but you never see anyone using any other guns.
• Remember outposts from Far Cry? Yeah, there in here.

I could go on, but you get the picture. For a franchise that basically wrote the book on scavenging there's precious little of it that you'll be doing in Mad Max. Despite the weighty animations of combat and the throaty roar of the Magnum Opus' engine there's a lack of consequence that just feels... wrong.

Happily, it wasn't all for nothing. The few moments of emergent gameplay that manage to slip through the blockade really shine, as Max offers unprompted comments on landmarks and locations that immediately breathe life into the wasteland, as do the environment's frankly jaw-dropping skybox and lighting effects. The larger issues with the game will never really be fixed, but much of the damage can be repaired with some kind of hardcore mod -- and if Mad Max: The Wasteland is as successful as it's predecessor was, Max may be given another shot at redemption.