31st March 2020 Retrospective: Agents of Storm Remedy's First Step In Becoming A Multi-Project Studio

Released in 2014, Agents of Storm was a reverse tower-defence strategy game designed for mobile devices. It challenged the player to build a fleet and to rise up against a growing international paramilitary threat known as the Chimera Corporation, led by the ruthless Selena Meredith. At the start of the game, the organisation had recently set up base on a series of paradise islands in the far east, where they have been busy harvesting a rare mineral known as "Blue Jade" for unknown by nefarious reasons. The title is also one of the most mysterious titles in Remedy's catalogue, with details of the game having been announced at VGX in 2013, then launching in 2014, and community updates fading out in 2015. The game is no longer available for download, and those who have downloaded the game before it was removed from the App Store can no longer play it.

Promotional Image for Agents of Storm / Source: Official Facebook Page

When my friend upgraded their iPhone to a later model, they gave their old one. It was the first Apple product that I had owned and with Agents of Storm launching a few months prior, I immediately downloaded the game. I never got to finish it, the sudden closure of the servers just over two years after the game launched took the active players by surprise, but I enjoyed it and was fascinated by just how different it was to the studio's previous work.

When most people think of Remedy's titles they tend to think of story-driven adventures with a film-noir vibe or a certain darkness. They're often set off the beaten path; in disused buildings, forests, abandoned swimming pools or kaleidoscopic rooms; they make a point to be different. But you also go into the experience not quite expecting a happy ending and following a not-quite-hero as they stagger towards their goal. With Agents of Storm, the team cuts through those expectations you may have about the studio, delivering something quite unexpected. Instead, for the developers' first mobile IP, the game washes you ashore on the fine, white sandy beaches of an island with blue skies and seas for miles around.



Shift In Industry

Between the launch of Alan Wake and Quantum Break, Remedy had divided itself into two teams; one group would continue to work on AAA titles, with a second smaller team focused on delivering mobile experiences. Expanding into a multi-project studio had been the intention for a while; Remedy were still dedicated to delivering larger gaming experiences, but with its lengthy development times, they looked to creating in-house mobile games to keep the company financially secure.

The change in direction at the studio was also in part kindled by a greater change in the Finnish games industry.

Cover image of Neogames' The Game Industry of Finland booklet from 2013 / Source: Neogames

Originally founded in 2003, Rovio is now one of the biggest names in the gaming industry but started off with much humbler beginnings, creating mobile titles for the N-Gage and Java ME, frequently as work-for-hire or as contractors. After six years, they developed over fifty mobile titles, but in December 2009 they released a new mobile game which would completely change the company, Angry Birds. In the game, players are given a set of birds, a slingshot, and the straight-forward target of defeating a tiny army of green pigs. Eleven years after it's debut, Angry Birds remains an internationally beloved brand, with eighteen games under its name, two tie-in CGI movies, a wealth of merchandise, and theme parks in Finland, UK, US, Spain, China, and Malaysia. Over the years, they've teamed up with musicians such as Slash, and other major franchises such as Star Wars to add an interesting new twist to an enduring formula. And it seems to have worked; to date, the Angry Birds games have been downloaded over four billion times!

Five months after Angry Birds launched, Supercell opened its doors. Between 2011 and 2012, the team published four titles; Gunshine.net (Zombies Online), Pets Vs Orcs, Battle Buddies, and Hay Day but it was Clash of Clans that secured Supercell's position in the industry. Supercell is one of Finland's biggest studios and gaming success stories and, since 2012, has expanded internationally, setting up additional offices in Tokyo, Shanghai, San Francisco, and Seoul.

Those weren't the only two success stories in the country either, with developers like Seriously (2013), PlayRaven (2013), Next Games (2013), and so many more starting up around the same time, Finland was becoming what felt to be the centralised hub of mobile gaming.

With major successes so close to home, it was no surprise that Remedy wanted to see if they can expand into mobile gaming. 

Building The Mobile Team

While Remedy refers to 2016 as being the start of their journey in becoming a multi-project studio, it actually began a lot earlier and with a familiar friend.

Screenshot from the DOS edition of Death Rally. Taken by B.L Stryker, posted on MobyGames.

While still years away from forming the mobile team, the start of the transition can be traced back to before the launch of Alan Wake. In 2009, Jari Komppa got in contact with Remedy with the proposal of making Death Rally 1996 open-source, but while the initial idea was rejected by the studio, a freeware version of the game was later agreed upon. While Jari had to sign an NDA to work on the project, the strictness of it slightly relaxed in early October when news that Remedy had filed a new Death Rally trademark was picked up by media outlets, prompting Oskari "Ozz" Häkkinen (then-Head of Franchise) to release a statement on behalf of the studio. "There are quite a few fans of Death Rally out there and over the years Remedy has been hit by various requests time and again to do something around it," Oskari said. "With Death Rally we're looking at getting something neat out to the community by having a version that is playable on modern PCs out there. This is more of a sweet small thing for people, rather than a full-scale commercial project at this point. We've really enjoyed playing some of the classic games that we have grown up with, and having the opportunity to revisit Death Rally and to share those memories with the fans and community would simply just be cool."

The launch of the freeware version would come only a few days later on October 20th, allowing a brand new group of fans to get behind the wheel in the title that established the studio. The feedback was overwhelmingly positive in the community and media, a possible catalyst for what came next.

A few months later, Remedy made their first steps into mobile games with the same title; teaming up with international talent to help develop their concept, as they began to form their own internal mobile department. While the mobile industry could be a profitable, with 30,000 new apps being submitted to Apple each week, as reported in 2012 by BGR, doing something exceptional to get notice was tough. To bring reimagine the classic, Remedy teamed up with Mountain Sheep and Cornfox & Brothers who helped build their vision. Similar to its successor, Alan Wake's American Nightmare, Death Rally was built in just eight months. It launched for iOS and Android on March 31st 2011.

Concept artwork for Death Rally on mobile / Source: Death Rally Developer Blog

Speaking to IndustryGamers.com, Aki Järvilehto talked about returning to the developer's first IP and how the studio had planned to bring the game to a more modern audience. "We started to toy around with different concepts and the iOS platform as a starting point immediately felt right." The term "toy" feels appropriate, as it felt like a passion project to play, a feeling which was reinforced with its rich cast of cameos including Barry Wheeler (Alan Wake), John Gore (Minigore), Mighty Eagle (Angry Birds) and Duke Nukem (Duke Nukem). With a slick new interface, a stronger narrative focus, mobile-friendly controls, and new graphics, Death Rally was a success for the studios, so much so that the game had since been downloaded over 16 million times, reached No.1 in 84 countries, and generated enough profit to easily recoup its eight-month development cost in just three days. Things were looking promising for the new multi-project studio format!

With Death Rally's success, Remedy began to form a full, internal mobile team. "After the success of the iOS and Android versions of Death Rally, we have been excited about the opportunities on mobile games, and wanted to jump in," Markus Mäki (then-Project Lead) later revealed in an interview with iMore. "It's a great opportunity to learn and develop as a game studio, but also a fun space to make games in, one where we can more and more apply our high-end console and PC development experience. Agents of Storm is Remedy's first internally developed mobile game, and we wanted to step outside of our comfort zone." 

Development of Agents of Storm

Stepping outside of their comfort zone was exactly what the studio did; Agents of Storm was very different to anything that Remedy has developed before. But a tower-defence strategy game taking place on a series of paradise islands set in the Far East? That was a bold step! In this latest adventure, players are given the goal of expanding and developing a task force, which operates where governments can't, known as Storm; Special Tactical Organization of Remote Missions. Linking those missions was a story written by Alan Wake writer, Mikko Rautalahti, which introduced the various agents at the heart of the operation; Oliver Quan (Asian Affairs Expert), Cassius Jones (Mission Pilot and Mechanic), Li Pei (Mission Scientist and Engineer), and Evan Phoenix (Field Agent). Dialogue would primarily be reserved for between missions, either to cool down the action or to build it up. During these times advice would also be shared between characters about how the player can approach the next challenge/mission, allowing them insight into how best to tailor their fleet to the situation.

Promotional Image for Agents of Storm / Source: Official Facebook Page

Details on the game's development process are still vague, but an interview with then-CEO, Matias Myllyrinne, added some clarity to the team's experiences. While Death Rally took eight months to build, Agents of Storm was a different matter, speaking to VentureBeat, Myllyrinne revealed “this game has been in the making for a while, almost two years to date actually. Honestly, trying to balance our culture of quality and attention to detail with a ‘minimum viable product’ mobile culture has had its challenges. It’s been a learning process but I think we have found our way now." The main difference between Agents of Storm and Death Rally was in the setup; Remedy was now building the game independently, with a newly formed team that was still in the process of growing.

After a year in development, the team announced the game in December 2013, on the VGX stage. 

VGX 2013 was a reimagined take on Spike's Video Game Awards, the latest version of which would see developers sit down with the presenters to talk about their latest projects. The mobile game accompanied a special pre-recorded teaser for Quantum Break and followed by the studio's introduction to Agents of Storm. Taking to the stage was Oskari Häkkinen (then-Head of Franchise Development) who introduced the genre and Johannes Paloheimo (then-Head of Digital Partnerships) who spoke a little bit about the challenges that players can expect to find. Johannes explains, "for the medium, it's a big project. We really wanted to push the envelope [on] what you can do on these devices." Early footage of an in-process built was also shown on the live stream during the interview, giving viewers a taste of the gameplay. While a fixed launch date wasn't announced on the show, they did reveal a release window of "early 2014", just a few weeks after the reveal.

The schedule didn't quite go as smoothly as previously expected. The game didn't reach its initial release window of "early 2014" and, for several months after its reveal, things were quiet on the marketing side of things. Behind closed doors though, the game was getting ready to soft launch, with New Zealand in their sights as their test audience. At this point, Remedy hadn't signed with a partner; having previously self-published Death Rally on mobile, it was possible that it was originally intended to be another addition to their publishing portfolio. With little information to go on though, that's all speculation.

Promotional Image for Agents of Storm / Source: Official Facebook Page

According to archived marketplaces, the game was soft-launched in a number of limited areas on January 14th, including New Zealand. The process would be vital for the team, allowing them to address player feedback ahead of its international launch. “It’s awesomely powerful to get real-world information about how often people play your game and how long and how often they come back," Myllyrinne describes in his interview with VentureBeat. "For us, a large part of the learning has been areas that Remedy is not known for, like backend servers, analytics and such. We have been building all that for Agents of Storm but also for the future. I hope gamers will see the love of the craft that shines through in Agents of Storm... We’ve been constantly pushing what we can do on mobile in terms of content. It feels like a golden age is upon us. The new devices are powerful and allow for much richer graphics and gameplay than one could only have imagined, Agents of Storm opens the door and takes a step or two in that direction.”

The Publishing Deal & Launch

Around the same time that the game was getting ready to launch, Germany-based developer and publisher, Flaregames, was seeking out new partnerships to build up its publishing portfolio. As part of this goal, they had already signed agreements with US developers; Subatomic Studios, Superweapon and Fuzzycube. In late 2013, Myllyrinne met up with Flaregames' CEO and founder, Klaas Kersting in a pub in London to discuss about Remedy's latest venture. 

Celebration cake at the Remedy offices / Source: Remedy's Twitter page

"This was the fastest deal ever." Kersting reveals later in a press release, "Matias and I met over a beer in a London pub, talked shop and agreed the terms right there. We both love and understand games - that makes for a great common ground. " In a later interview with VentureBeat, he further explained the draw of working with the Finnish studio; it's free-to-play (F2P) nature of the upcoming game, "we know our way around mobile games, but we cannot add value to everything. If you have an adventure game, to be sold for $2.99 in the store, for instance, we cannot help you much. But if you have an RPG or strategy game operating under the free-to-play model, we can leverage all our marketing experience, all our design expertise, everything that Flaregames has learned in the last years. Agents of Storm is a beautiful, cleverly designed “action strategy“ much like Royal Revolt, it fits our portfolio very well.” Part of the deal also included some additional support in the final stage of Agents of Storm's development.

After two years in the making, Agents of Storm launched on October 23rd exclusively on iOS in Western Europe and the Americas, and would be available in English, French, Spanish, German and Italian. With the launch of the title, the studio held a celebration at the offices with champagne and Agents of Storm branded cake for the developers involved in bringing the project to life.

Coinciding with the launch, Flaresgames published a blog post with a contribution from, Remedy's then-Lead Programmer, Olli Tervo, who spoke about his experience while working in the team, “we set out to create one of the best 3D games available for mobile in terms of visual quality and technical achievement, and of course it had to feature some of Remedy’s signature special effects and cinematic cameras. It’s been ambitious and not without challenges, but we are really excited to finally get it out there into the hands of gamers."

Celebration champagne at the Remedy offices / Source: Remedy's Twitter page

While the community were only just getting their hands on the title, both studios had plans for players moving forward, with Flaregames revealing that Android and Windows Phone versions were underway. Additionally, in his own interview with iMore, Saku Lehtinen further revealed: "we have a strong live team on the game that's busy at work creating new content."

New updates for the game would continue to roll out for another year at least, but the Android and Windows Phone editions would never be launched.

Wrapping Up Agents of Storm

For a year after Agents of Storm launched, the official Facebook page became the centralised hub for all community engagement. For fans of the game, they would be able to see new character profiles and compete in global challenges for additional diamonds. While the social media channel was receiving weekly updates, behind the scenes things were already changing. 

In early November 2014, the studios posted their final update to the Facebook page; "Agent, we have received new information on our enemy!" accompanied by a character profile of the Chimera Corporation. Unknown at the time, the message would end up being the studio's final published post about their mobile title. Behind the scenes, the focus was shifting to a new IP.

In late 2014, Remedy's Media Unit tweeted a teaser for their next mobile title; a cosplay photo taken at MCM London Expo which showed a fantasy element, with the promise of hearing more soon. Soon after, on November 11th, Remedy filed a new trademark for a game called Legends of Shadow America, eighteen months after Microsoft had separately trademarked Quantum Break. 

Trademark registration for Legends of Shadow America / Source: EUIPO

Legends of Shadow America was never officially announced beyond the trademark being listed on the EUIPO (European Union Intellectual Property Office), and after November 2014, news about Remedy's mobile department died down. 

The shift happened around 2015. By the time that Quantum Break launched the following year, the mobile team was disbanded and the studio's focus had shifted to new larger adventures. Some developers moved back to creating AAA projects with the studio, whereas others were hired by other mobile studios such as Next Games, Supercell, Seriously, and later Redhill Games. By 2015, work had just begun on early concepts for Control, and Smilegate was getting set to announce their new partnership with the developer. Remedy had closed down mobile development, but the multi-project setup was an aspect they were eager to explore. 

Unfortunately, details about Remedy moving away from mobile and disbanding the team are fairly sparse. In fact, the only interview that we've managed to find which addresses Remedy's shift from mobile took place in August 2016, a week after Tero Virtala was announced as the studio's CEO. In his interview with GamesIndustry.biz he revealed "we learned it wasn't in the main Remedy DNA--at least at that time--to make those types of mobile games. So at the moment, we don't have a focus in mobile. And most of all, we're focusing on where we're strong, and that's definitely in the core games, basically. We know the PC and console side. For the moment, that's the area where our people are passionate about and the most experienced."  Talking about the constantly changing environment of the industry he goes on to add, "but of course, we always follow where the different markets go. It seems like the market's changing so fast and there are new platforms coming, so no one can say how the market will be in two or three years' time and what opportunities that might give us."

Screenshot from Agents of Storm / Source: The Sudden Stop

On November 2017, exactly three years to the date of the last social media post, Flaregames announced that they would be shutting down the Agents of Storm servers effective immediately, and existing players would no longer be able to play or log onto the game. Any existing pre-paid in-game currency could be redeemed on other titles by the publisher. For Agents of Storm players looking to claim the currency elsewhere, they would need to set up a ticket with the publisher's customer service within two months of the servers closing. 

Three years after the closure of the servers, the mobile unit is not an aspect of Remedy's history that they often talk about, but it played an important part of what the studio is today!

Since the Agents of Storm servers closed, the company has gone on to develop and release Control, in partnership with 505Games, and co-developed CrossFire X, in partnership with Smilgate. They are currently now working two titles in the same franchise, funded and published by Epic Games. Moving away from mobile in 2015, they took a different Junction Point, and formed several AAA development teams under the Remedy name.

Interestingly, in press releases and interviews over the past couple of years, spokespeople for the company have talked about 2016 as being the turning point in becoming a multi-project developer, citing Quantum Break as a major turning point, and that's for a different retrospective. But in truth, it happened years earlier, just with different teams and a different focus. 

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22nd February 2019 Retrospective: Alan Wake's American Nightmare [How Remedy Developed a Game in Eight Months and Marketed it in 74 Days]

On Wednesday, 22nd February 2012, Alan Wake's American Nightmare, developed by Remedy Entertainment Oy and published by Microsoft Studios, was launched exclusively on XBOX Live Arcade.

While Remedy was fairly open about the development of American Nightmare through their community events and interactions, a lot of the studio's activities and plans during the years following Alan Wake's launch were hidden from public view. Unknown to fans at the time, the team were working on American Nightmare, knowing that Alan Wake 2 wouldn't be developed for a few years. At the time, AWAN was described as a project that emerged from experimentation with a Horde mode and developed into a stand-alone title. Following the announcement of Quantum Break, Remedy expanded further on American Nightmare's origins, with the developers focusing on a smaller digital title to bridge the gap between AAA projects and to have the chance to work again on the Alan Wake series before it went into hiatus.

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14th October 2018 Retrospective Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne Celebrating the 15th Anniversary of the Game's Launch

In October 2003, just eighteen months after the release of Max Payne, Remedy launched their highly-anticipated sequel, Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne.

Described as a "film-noir love story", in this new adventure, Max's is reinstated as a NYPD detective but a warehouse bust leads to a startling realisation as a ghost from his past comes back to haunt him, Mona Sax, an assassin previously presumed dead and with answers to the questions Max is seeking. As prior connections turn into enemies, Max must retrace his past to learn the truth of the events that led him here.

Building Upon Success

Building on top of the original game was a challenge in itself. The first Max Payne was massively successful, gaining positive review scores and a hefty 89 Metacritic rating. The original has sold over 5 million units to date worldwide and achieved recognition by Microsoft and Sony, who respectively awarded it "Greatest Hit" and "Platinum Hit" statuses. The game was also awarded a BAFTA, calling it the "Best PC Game of 2001, as well as a Golden Joystick Award, among many others. To complete a sequel living up to expectations and within the time constraints was going to be a tough demand.

One major thing which made the development of Max Payne 2 different to its predecessor was that Remedy went into the project knowing that it would be their last Max Payne title. In May 2002, Take Two released a press release announcing two things; that a sequel was underway and that the publisher had purchased the Max Payne IP from Remedy and Apogee. The MP franchise had brought them $10 Million, 969,932 shares of restricted common stock (stock with conditions) and "certain future development incentives" according to the release. The acquisition would allow Remedy to move onto other IPs, later revealed to be Alan Wake, and give financial backing into getting the project off the ground.

Working On The Sequel

"Making a sequel is obviously different from making the first game," Sam Lake stated at his Jeux Vidéo Masterclass in 2015. "The first game of a franchise always requires a lot of prototyping and a lot of figuring out, and once you’re done with that, building on that foundation, it’s much faster, much easier. Making Max Payne, we didn’t plan for a sequel at all, once again, no real experience. We were just aiming for the end of the project, to get it done, there was no absolutely no thought about doing more Max Paynes at that point." Soon after the launch of the original title though, the sequel was on the books.

For Max's second adventure, Remedy brought additional realism by integrated the Havok engine, creating ragdoll physics. Speaking to Beyond3D in 2003, Remedy's Project Lead on Max Payne 2, Markus Mäki described that besides the graphic novel, the story, character creation, and the environment taking the greatest amount of time to develop, that "maybe the biggest programming efforts went into integrating Havok physics and making a new version of our level editor, MaxED. Both were crucial in getting the level of detail we wanted to have in the game." Originally due to make it's debut with Half-Life 2, Max Payne 2 incorporated the new Havok 2.0 physics engine more than a year ahead of Value's upcoming title.

In addition to the physics engine, major rewrites where underway across the board. Speaking to Shacknews that same year, Petri Järvilehto (Lead Game Design) summed up the technical improvements saying that the team "basically started out by taking the game engine apart and then rewriting big chunks of it. The radiosity lighting has been completely re-written, we got rid of all of the old AI code and took the AI to a new level of sophistication, and the texture resolutions and polycounts have been boosted to lot higher levels. All of the skins are now using DX shaders (so yes, light reflects properly on the eyes) which makes a world of difference on the lighting if you have the hardware that can take advantage of it. Also, we've taken the particle systems much further." All of this went through a rewrite within the eighteen months of development.

New Faces For Familiar Names

With a tighter schedule for the sequel and an expanded budget, the team could now afford to bring in actors instead of returning to the developers to fill out character roles. The most notable of which came with Max Payne whose previous "face", Sam Lake, now had the tough job of writing the script for the sequel in a fifth of the development time that the original title allowed, a challenge that Sam expanded on in an IGN interview back in September 2003. "Max Payne 2 is a lot deeper game than the first one was. The screenplay for the sequel ended up being three times longer than the script of Max Payne 1, in the number of pages that adds up to five movie scripts."

The new demands, in addition to more freedom with hiring actors, led to Lake being replaced by actor, Timothy Gibbs. Although for fans hoping to see some familiar faces in the game, the original faces of Max Payne (Sam Lake) and Vladimir Lem (Marko Saaresto) also appeared across a number of in-game television shows including Address Unknown and Lords & Ladies, mirroring the two character's storylines, and acting as a nice call back to the original title. While the face may have changed, the voice of Max Payne, James McCaffrey stayed on to the role, once again giving Payne his gravely tone players know and love.

Unedited photographs, images from Max Payne Wiki.

Another return was Mona Sax who became the central character in the sequel. Fans got their last look of Mona in Max Payne, protecting the detective from a shower of bullets before falling back into a nearby elevator and leaving a substantial pool of blood in her wake. Speaking to Gamespot in 2011, Remedy's CEO, Matias Myllyrinne admitted that the team received an emotional response from fans over her possible death. Mona’s death was ambiguous in the first game, but in an earlier draft she did die; in the same interview with Gamespot Sam revealed that, “Mona was one of them who was killed very clearly and conclusively on screen. And it was our graphic novel artist, Kiia Kallio, back then who felt so sad about the fact that Mona would be killed that I decided to change it so that the elevator doors closed and her body disappears so there is an open possibility that she survived. Well, it’s thanks to that, that Mona ends up in such a big role in Max Payne 2.”

Rockstar Games held the casting at Donna DeSetta's casting agency in New York City for the two lead roles. For the live action element, model Kathy Tong gave Mona Sax life, and in our interview four years ago delved into the process of becoming the character. "I had read a copy of the script before we started shooting and I knew Mona was a contract killer but I felt there was a softness underneath her rock hard exterior that she a never able to explore because she was led down a dark path. I had my own idea of this woman struggling with conflicting emotions and the challenges it presented in her everyday existence".

Mona Sax as she appears in Max Payne.

Getting the right Mona for the job was important as the game was to feature the assassin as a second playable character. It was the first time in Remedy's eight years that players would control two characters, a feature which wouldn't be returned to again for another thirteen years, until the release of Quantum Break.

In addition to character model-likeness, Timothy Gibbs and Kathy Tong recreated scenes from the game to be used in level title-cards, graphic novels cutscenes, promotional material and more. Like its predecessor, actors were provided  reference photographs, later edited and used in place of the game's cutscenes. Originally used as a way to stay within budget and to convey deeper emotion, with the progression of technology, the graphic novels were now intertwined with traditional cinematics but were still the main and preferred method to show drama and suspense.

A Fifteen Year Partnership

While it was a continuation of the Max Payne series, the game also marked the start of something new, Poets of the Fall, the band behind the game's theme song, Late Goodbye. While the idea and group had already begun assembling, the deal to make a song for Max Payne 2 gave the band an established international audience.

Speaking to Kotaku in their article, The Story Behind Late Goodbye, The Song That Defined Max Payne 2, Poets of the Fall's vocalist, Marko Saaresto stated, “Sam and I have been friends since childhood, so the connection was already in place. Then one night while driving we started talking about the possibility of the band writing a song for his new game, Max Payne 2." At first the vocalist considered that nothing would come out of the suggestion, but later received a phone call. The group created three early demos, based on Sam's poem, for the studio who selected Late Goodbye to be the theme.

Behind the scenes of Late Goodbye's music video. Photo from the Poet County Jail fansite.

The band members were no stranger to Remedy's titles, and especially the Max Payne series. Their producer and keyboardist, Markus "Captain" Kaarlonen in addition to Pauli Saastamoinen mastered the sequel's music at Finnvox Studios. And as a long-time friend of Lake's, Saaresto had also helped with the original Max Payne game, portraying Russian Mob Boss, Vladimir Lem, as well as creating the Captain Baseball Bat Boy comic strips.

In an early version of the script, Late Goodbye would be used to awaken memories of a traumatic experience previously forgotten. In the final version, the song is used to reflect the game's themes, frequently repeated by characters that Max faces in his journey.

Launch and Critical Reception

Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne was released on 14th October 2003, eight days after the game reached gold status. Reviews for the game were positive almost across the board, claiming an impressive 86 Metacritic score, almost identical to that of its predecessor. GameZone called it "a cinematic, action packed swarm of near perfection with a tragically twisting plot worthy of the big screen", whereas Gamer's Hell referred to it as "one of the most intense and best played games ever." IGN expressed the desire to be longer, with the title taking approximately seven hours to complete, but compliments it for being an adventure "thick with drama and action."

Praise was not only given to the gameplay, but to the adventure's brilliant soundtrack. In April 2004, both the Max Payne theme and Late Goodbye won in two categories, of the G.A.N.G ("Game Audio Network Guild") Awards, claiming "Best Original Instrumental Song" and "Best Original Vocal Song (Pop)" respectively.

Photograph sent by Remedy and posted on the 3DRealms news channel.

According to a YouGamer interview with Scott Miller, Max Payne and Max Payne 2 sold a combined seven million units worldwide. While the original title sold the majority of that amount, the sequel made a sizeable contribution with an estimated two or three million, although the official numbers have never been officially announced. Despite the numbers, TakeTwo's predicted sales fell into the same trap faced by Square Enix for Tomb Raider (2013), as the publisher demanded higher unit sales than what could be delivered despite a highly praised game and with a quality described by the President of Rockstar Games of exceeding "even our high expectations". As a result of sales, TakeTwo's financial report 2004 stated "in May 2003, we agreed to make payments of up to $6,000 in cash upon the achievement of certain sales targets for Max Payne 2. We do not expect that these sales targets will be achieved."

Despite not meeting TakeTwo's sales targets, Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne is still considered, even fifteen years later, to be a solid and beloved adventure, and the perfect way to sign off the end of Remedy's Max Payne era.

What's Next?

Following the release of Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, the IP transferred hands becoming solely TakeTwo's property.

It wasn't long before fans heard more Max Payne news; two months after the launch of the sequel, the original title launched on GameBoy, a project led by Mobius, which marked the first in a series of ports to mobile platforms. In an interview with IGN, David Box, Lead Programmer at Mobius talks about getting the green light from the publisher. "Rockstar contacted us after seeing some of our previous work. We built them a thorough prototype of how the game would look and feel and from there we dived straight into full production." After five months, the port was launch just days before Christmas.

For Max, his story went in a completely different direction for Max Payne 3 with Rockstar taking up the developmental reigns. Similar to Remedy's direction for their new title, Rockstar traded the New York streets for the São Paulo's party scene, bringing the protagonist new challenges as a bodyguard. The game was launched on Playstation 3, XBOX 360 and PC on May 15th 2012 and equalled it's predecessor's already-impressive Metacritic score. A year after its release, it was announced that Max Payne 3 had shipped an incredible four million units.

It was in 2008 that the Max Payne movie came out, leading to mixed reviews. While the film was aesthetically beautiful, it was a departure from the original material, full of loose ends and contradictions. The game's protagonist and story was inspired by the Film Noir genre, and drew inspiration on the films of Humphrey Bogart, known for the intelligent suave and sophistication he gave to his characters. Instead the movie portrayed Max more as a desperate animal, constantly running away from his past, but in no certain direction. Although critically unsuccessful the movie made a profit, with an estimated budget (according to IMDB) of $35 million, the Max Payne movie grossed $85,416,905 by 2013.

Following the release of Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, Remedy went into a new direction replacing the busy streets of New York with the serene Pacific Northwest. The developer's new game, Alan Wake, was announced at E3 2005 for PC and XBOX 360, in partnership with Microsoft Studios who continued to work directly with them for eleven years throughout Alan Wake, Alan Wake's American Nightmare and Quantum Break.

For Remedy, Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne was the bridge between finding success and entering the industry as a standalone, independent studio. The developers entered the project knowing it would be their last Max Payne title, and with new ideas on the back-burner. It proved that they could make a bigger, more polished game with a shorter development cycle.

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6th September 2016 Retrospective: The Twentieth Anniversary of Death Rally The Origins of Remedy Entertainment

Remedy began with a quick success story. Formed in Espoo (Finland), in summer 1995, the team celebrated their first game launch, Death Rally, in autumn 1996. While the studio is best known for Max Payne, Alan Wake and Quantum Break, their beginning focused on a much smaller scale project, taking just a few months to do with a handful of developers. The success of the top-down racer which proved to the team that they had a successful company to move onto bigger things.

This is how Remedy and Death Rally began.


The Team & Concept

Remedy has its origins in the Demoscene, an international subculture where groups strive to push computers to their technical and artistic boundaries. Despite the shared goal, there was a sense of competition with multiple factions working on multiple systems, eager to prove their strengths. Yet, it was from this desire to push expectations which kindled the interest to move onto games, creating a communication between groups. Remedy began to take form when members of Future Crew (focusing primarily on PC) contacted The Aggression (focusing primarily on Atari ST), with a proposal to start a games studio. The combined interest led to a third group being formed, Remedy.

The original Remedy logo as seen in the Death Rally opening. This was later changed in April 1999.

While prototypes existed before Remedy's formation, the real work on their debut title began after. In the games industry today, it's not uncommon for development studios to spend a year or two exploring potential ideas for their next title, but for Death Rally it's conception was almost instantaneous. "We were just making it up as we went," says Sam Lake (Creative Director at Remedy) in the interview with Complex, stating that the team had a very fast work pace as there were no long debates over decisions. "It was the first idea, and we went ahead with that."

Originally titled "HiSpeed", the group began development on their first title, a non-lethal racing game. At the time, Remedy consisted of a core team of six people. Despite familiarity with the technology and prior experience, Death Rally brought a different set of challenges. “Obviously during the Future Crew times, we had done a few game-like things," begins Markus Mäki (Executive Chairman at Remedy) in the same interview, "but just doing a full blown game is a completely different ballgame." Expanding on some of the challenges, Mäki says, "there were no third party engines out there, back then. You had to actually do everything on your own. And we had the guys who had the passion and talent to do that.”

In the Complex retrospective, Lake spoke about the company atmosphere soon after its formation, "Most of us didn’t really think that it was a company. It was this, kind of, loose group of people in one of the founding members’ basement - the founding member’s parents’ basement.” Despite the basement being a place of work, it often became a second home for many of members, with mattresses being stored under desks for tired employees. Expansion came quickly to the company throughout Death Rally's development. In the same interview, Henri Blåfield, now Senior Technical Animator, recalls how the group had changed, “we started in the basement and we slowly took over all the floors in the house.”



Remedy & 3DRealms

Through their background in the Demoscene, Remedy had entered the games industry with a number of contacts at fellow studios, including 3D Realms. It was with them that a publishing deal was struck. Remedy visited the offices on Thanksgiving Day Eve (22nd of November 1995) with an early demo. Following a positive reception, a contract was signed just a few weeks later.

The team at 3DRealms in 1995, when development on Death Rally began. Photo from the company's web archives.

The partnership was beyond a typical developer-publisher relationship, with 3DRealms providing support to encourage the studio to grow, as well as providing constant feedback on the game. In fact, it was at 3DRealms' request that guns should be added to the game. It was also due to their partnership that sparked the creative decision to incorporate 3DRealms' leading man, Duke Nukem, as one of the player's competitors. For the original 1996 version, Duke was the only character who spoke in the game and during the development stage there were talks about adding even more dialogue in for his cameo.



Release and Reception

The final version of Death Rally took players on the dangerous career path. More wins meant more money which could be put towards armour upgrades or new weapons, sometimes that meant doing business with shady individuals. Races could descend into chaos easily with sabotage being in the minds of all the drivers. The game featured six customisable vehicles which could be driven around nineteen different tracks, and also allowed up to four player multiplayer.

Promotional render for the 1996 version of Death Rally.

The launch of Death Rally soon put Remedy on the map. According to Hugi, a magazine which focuses on the Demoscene, the title sold over 120,000 copies, a massive hit for the start-up company in 1996.  "Death Rally, back then, was a hit," Lake describes in The Story of Remedy documentary. "And we were definitely going to other games, we knew that."

Still working from a basement, the project's success encouraged the team go further with their ideas. The team expanded and embraced a stronger focus on storytelling, something which became an iconic element of Remedy's identity's in the following years. In 2001, Remedy released Max Payne, followed by its sequel in 2003. In 2010, they released Alan Wake, and it's spin-off title, Alan Wake's American Nightmare, in 2012. Their latest project was Quantum Break, released April 2016. Despite going onto new projects, the team often returned to their original IP.



Freeware

In May 2009, Jari Komppa, known for his success in Assembly demo competitions, contacted Remedy about creating an open source version of Death Rally. Initially a "maybe," an investigation soon followed, looking into the legal and practical side of the project. The first proposal focused on making Death Rally open source, allowing its source code to be available to study, change or distribution. That wasn't possible. But the project didn't die then. Despite open source not being an option, there was interest in making a freeware version of the game, allowing for a new audience to download and play the game for free. By mid-July of that same year, work began on the project.

Rumours about a new Death Rally title began circulating in early October 2009 following a trademark filed by Remedy, but concrete news was soon to follow, with the freeware version of the game released just three weeks later. The program was available to download via gaming website, Joystiq, until its closure in February 2015.

Official screenshot from the original game.

Yet, the trademark could have also been seen as a hint of things to come. Indications that Remedy were looking to return to the Death Rally IP followed the reveal of the freeware version. From their official FAQ at the time: "Death Rally is not "abandonware" and Remedy has only made the Windows re-release free according to the license agreement included in the installation package. Distributing the full DOS version is illegal." Less than a year later, they were in talks for officially returning to the franchise.



Reimagining a Classic

Remedy returned to the Death Rally series, publishing the game in 2011 on iOS, Android, and later Kindle Fire. Moving into the mobile gaming space was a new experience for Remedy, with the team having to adjust to new competition and challenges to get their game noticed. The effort is profitable but with 30,000 new apps being submitted to Apple each week, as reported in 2012 by BGR, doing something exceptional was tough. To bring reimagine the classic, Remedy teamed up with newly established developer, Mountain Sheep.

Comparison by Mountain Sheep, posted on their Death Rally dev blog.

Development on Death Rally began in 2010 with the initial prototype coded in Java using Eclipse by lead programmers Antti and Jukka Viljamaa (Mountain Sheep) with placeholder graphics by Heikki Repo. Later tests moved away from Eclipse in favour of using Minigore's 3D engine. Using the engine provided familiarity with the software, but it also came with some weird effects, as it had been developed for Mountain Sheep's other title. As a result, in very early iterations, little hands were automatically added to the side of the cars by the game engine. (See above)

Speaking to IndustryGamers.com, Aki Järvilehto talked about returning to the developer's first IP. "The reception was astounding, which brought us to realize the potential of this little game that we always thought was brilliant in many ways." The next stage was to decide how to bring the game to a more modern audience. "We started to toy around with different concepts and the iOS platform as a starting point immediately felt right."

Screenshot from the 2011 remastered version of the game.

Not all ideas could be implemented into the game, leaving several interesting pursuits on the cutting room floor. According to VentureBeat, one of these early ideas including bringing a level designer option to Death Rally, and allowing the community to create and play user generated content.



Bringing it to Mobile & PC

Marketing for a tablet game was a new experience for Remedy, who mainly relied on promotional material produced in-house and at Mountain Sheep. Originally marketed at $4.99, Death Rally was reduced to $2.99 after a short amount of time on the store to make it more accessible to a new audience. Fierce competition on the App Store soon saw the price further reduced to $0.99. At the time the game didn't have micro-transactions, which meant that for the first few months after the game's launch, the developers relied solely on sales of the game.

Promotional render by Heikki Repo (Mountain Sheep) showcasing Eureka, a new level available in one of the updates.

Following the launch on iOS and Android, the Death Rally Facebook page asked followers to help shape the game by suggesting upgrades or additions they would like to see. Updates for the title saw the introduction of new guns, cars, and multiplayer on October 2011. For the Facebook page, fans could not only submit their own suggestion but vote for the suggestions they liked best. Winning participants were awarded prizes ranging from iOS codes to a Death Rally themed iPad. Suggestions included adding a school bus a playable vehicle, "Spiked Monster Truck of Doom" and a Dune Buggy with a fibreglass rollcage.



In 2012, sixteen years after it's original launch, Death Rally returned to PC. The game launched on Steam on 3rd August, with attendees of Assembly getting an exclusive first look the previous day. The remastered version included a series of new changes from its mobile edition to better suit it's new platform. While the heart of the mobile version remained, the title's menu system and multiplayer feature were overhauled, allowing up to six drivers to compete in the same race.



The Remastered's Reception

Bringing the IP to mobile proved to be a success for Remedy. By December 2012, nine months after it's release, the developers reported 1.5 million downloads for the game. The number skyrocketed to 10 million downloads and 100 million play sessions by June 2012; eight million on iOS devices and two million on Android, reported by gamesindustry.biz. By August of the following year, the total number of units shipped rose by a million with the total number of playsessions increasing to 150 million. The game generated an income of $50,000 per day while on the top five game chart, with reported average monthly income of between $50,000 - $350,000. For four years, revenue brought in from the title had a 40/60 split between game downloads and in-game purchases. That split was obviously altered in June 2015, when the title became a free-to-play game.

Promotional image from Remedy's Twitter page.

Following's launch in 2011, Death Rally collected a number of nominations: Excellence in Gameplay (International Mobile Gaming Awards West), Best Nordic Handheld Game (Nordic Game Awards), Best Handheld Audio (Game Audio Network Guild). By December 2011, Death Rally hit the US Apple Store's Hall of Fame. Critically the game was a success too with review scores of 5/5 stars by TouchArcade, 4/5 stars by AppSpy and 8/10 by Destructoid.


Despite celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, Death Rally has frequently proved that it has all of the elements of being a timeless classic. In 1996, the game gave Remedy enough confidence and momentum to move into new and more ambitious projects. Thirteen years later, the freeware version proved that there was still active interest in the franchise, prompting the developer to return once again to it's first franchise. Two later after, the remastered version was introduced to a brand new audience with enormous success, recouping the entire development costs in just three days. While Remedy is now recognised for its AAA titles, without a doubt Death Rally played the most important part of the company's history - it made Remedy happen.


If you liked this article and want to read more about Remedy's history, I recently posted a piece on the original Max Payne game. Click HERE to read it.

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23rd July 2016 Retrospective: The Story of Max Payne How The Series Impacted The World of Video Games

Today the Remedy community is celebrating the fifteenth anniversary of Max Payne; the developer's first step into AAA territory and a game which not only shaped the company but the industry too.

To celebrate to occasion, I wanted explore how one of my favourite games came together and the impact that it's had over the years.

Moving From Death Rally to Max Payne

For Remedy, huge changes were happening within a very short amount of time.

The company was formed in Espoo in late 1995, originally stationed in a basement belonging to one of founding member's parents. Not long after, in September 1996, the team celebrated a successful release of their first game, Death Rally for the MS-DOS. The title was a top down racer which demanded an aggressive play style and quick reflexes. The launch of Death Rally proved to the company that they had a successful team, combination and ambition, a realisation which led to them reaching for more daring projects.

Initial prototypes bridged the gap between Death Rally and the final concept of Max Payne. At first, Remedy looked creating at a truck war game called Dark Justice which, according to Markus Mäki's Seven Years of Max Payne* GDC talk in 2004, had a concept demo by November 1996. There had also been talks about diving into the action RPG genre, similar to Zelda, and a space simulator. Speaking on the transition between projects in the retrospective documentary The Story of Remedy, Sam Lake (now Creative Director at Remedy) stated, "There were a lot of different ideas and concepts for different games floating around and one of those was a very early draft of what then became Max Payne." With the sudden jump in project size, concept and goals needed to be nailed down before work could begin, and throughout 1997-1998 the team of just a dozen did exactly that.

Max Payne might not have felt like a natural next step, demanding upgrades and overhauls to every aspect of game design that they had experimented with for Death Rally. In an retrospective interview with GameSpot in October 2011, Lake described the team as being hungry to prove themselves, "a talented team but inexperienced in many ways, but very, very enthusiastic." The studio now had to suddenly deal with 3D graphics, animations, voice acting and interactive narrative. Their first title had gained them connections and support, and shipping the product gave the team experience in the stages of finalising and working with publishers. But still, Max Payne was beyond anything that had been attempted. "It really was a blessing back then," he continues in the interview, "we really didn't know what we were getting into." In his Jeux Video Masterclass in 2015, Lake also added that at the start "it was just a group of young guys, no one had any real experience in these things. We were just making it up as we went along, and dreaming big and having ambitious ideas. "


Inspirations

The original concept for Max Payne was inspired by Film Noir protagonists, both in how the character expresses himself and how he behaves. But inspiration was also taken from legends to illustrate the fracturing reality their protagonist feels and how, for him, "real life completely loses all meaning" as Lake describes it in the Gamespot interview.

For combat, Remedy looked at Hong Kong action films. The ability to slow down time and shoot gave the series extra intrigue, allowing the player to feel badass as they leap at bad guys, both guns blazing. Admittedly after a while things could get pretty comical, and it wasn't too long before players intentionally started crashing into paper shredders, door frames and walls and slowly sliding downwards, Max's face still in his strained look of concentration.

How the Company Changed

In an interview with GameSpot, former Managing Director Matias Myllyrinne describes the Max Payne development process as being the formation of two entities: "We not only built the game itself, but we built the studio in the process." With the need for expansion, the studio relocated to an office building in Espoo to accommodate a larger team which grew to the lofty heights of 20 whole people by the end of development. By modern standards the new team size was pretty small, but for a recently formed independent studio in the late 1990s, it was substantial and the rate of growth was a positive reflection of the company.

During the development, there were also some internal conflicts between two teams on the direction of the company. Many members at Remedy had a background in the Demoscene, an international subculture which strived to push computers to their technical and artistic boundaries, and that background was useful in several ventures. Some wanted to continue creating video games, others wanted to pursue 3D benchmark software development. After negotiations, a sister company called Futuremark was formed in December 1997. The company now has offices in both Espoo (HQ) and California (sales office). Futuremark was acquired in 2014 by UL, a safety consulting and certification company. Remedy still remains an independent studio.

The Old Remedy Logo. I see both an eye and a very surprised Pac Man.

The developer's logo at the time had also caused some hiccups, with similarities being drawn Remedy's and LucasArts'. The company was already in the process of creating a new logo for their brand, so no action was taken. The bullet logo was unveiled in April 1999 with a press release which read "The idea of changing the company's look had been on the agenda since early last year. The final push to go ahead with the plan came when LucasArts, a U.S. game company, contacted Remedy and said that Remedy's logo too closely resembled that of LucasArts'. Not seeing any point in modifying the old logo, Remedy removed it from its web sites, and replaced it with a question mark." Max Payne was the first Remedy title to ship with the bullet logo.



Technical Challenges

Over the years the demands and exceptions of video games have changed, and the industry with it. In The Story of Remedy, Lake describes how game development for start up companies have changed. "This was the mid-nineties and it was still, at that time, possible for a handful of individuals to actually make a video game or a computer game by themselves, and a top notch game at that. So it was an ambitious dream even then, but something that was within the reach."

For Max Payne, Remedy had a budget of three million dollars, spread over a four and a half year development period. While the team was small, the project was not, and it often required the developers to look elsewhere to save costs. One of the ways this was achieved was by using the graphic novel format as a storytelling technique compared to using cinematics which were often expensive to make and clunky. Using sequential still images also eased the pressure of narrative constraints, as Remedy entered the project with a heavier focus on storytelling and a 150 page script.

To get the aesthetic and atmosphere for their levels and art just right, a group of six developers (aided by former NYPD officers) travelled from the outskirts of Helsinki to the centre of New York on an early morning flight. Their journey and adventures, both glamorous and at times terrifying, were recorded on a special article entitled Remedy Designers Visit New York. "We wanted every level in the game to spell New York in big, bold neon letters." Begins the article, "We had all the levels planned out, from the deepest crime-ridden slums to the glittering skyscraper heights, we knew exactly what we needed. There was only one way to get it. We had to go and do it ourselves." The team classed the expedition as a success, returning to Espoo with 5000 reference photographs and approximately 10 hours of video to be used for textures, atmosphere, audio and locations.

Saku Lehtinen in New York. Screenshot from the Jeux Video Masterclass. Click HERE for the interview.

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With a small studio, developers often had to take on multiple roles, branching out their skills. For many people that required them to be in charge of several elements of game design, but it also sometimes had them step in front of a camera to be incorporated into the game, or recruit others to do the same. Lake, who had portrayed the protagonist in the game, also involved his parents as villains, with his mother approached to play the main antagonist Nicole Horne - which must have made Christmas dinner a tad awkward affair.

Like with Death Rally, Remedy built a custom game engine. Called MAX-FX which was designed to carry the story and technological weight that the team had targeted for. In addition to releasing the game, the developers had ambitions to include an editor to allow the community to create their own adventures. "It will be possible for end-users to do modifications to the game," describes Markus Stein (Lead Programmer on Max Payne) in an interview with GameReactor. "Naturally, some of the extensions and changes will require more work than others. Integrating for example new maps into the game will be comparatively easy, using our custom level editor MaxEd. We are planning on posting examples on how to do certain modifications to the game after the release. We are looking forward to seeing all kinds of modifications made to the game!"

The Impact of Delays

In an industry which demands quick development but heavily criticises rush, Remedy's focus was always on making games they could be proud of; a studio philosophy that gave birth to the tongue-in-cheek phrase "when it's done" in response to release date queries.  So how did the game change between 1998 and 2001? One way was through the game's asethetics. In early footage, many of the textures and graphic novels panels were hand drawn by Kiia Kallio with some photographs used as reference. But later, the team embraced, with some initial resistance, using photographs and manipulating them to bring increased realism and speed to the graphic novel production.

Graphic Novel from The Story of Remedy Documentary.

The world got its first glimpse of Max Payne at E3 1998, just a year after the formation of Futuremark and at the end of what Remedy later refers to as the concept period for the series. The beta footage revealed the game's graphic novel cutscenes. It also featured  lots of shooting, admirable shoulder pads and tasers as an optional weapon for the protagonist. Remedy also teased the release date as being Summer 1999. Yet it would be an additional two years after that before players would be able to get their hands on the game.

While Remedy was secretive during their work on the game, E3 demos allowed audiences to see how the game evolved over the years as upgrades made along the way. At E3 1999, Max Payne returned again with an updated trailer featuring Remedy's brand new bullet logo. The trailer was similar to what Remedy had shown previously, with a focus put on the game's combat elements. New additions to the game could be seen in the video, such as Max using a sniper rifle on an unsuspecting goon. While the game already generated interest, it was at the following year's show where it really shone. With new textures, realistic physics, upgraded character models and more, the trailer showed a more detailed and solid game, closer to the final product.

Max Payne was both a large project and a large undertaking for a small hopeful team based just outside Helsinki.  "It might have been that if everybody had known how many years this kind of a project will take and how hard it will be, y'know, it might have been that quite a few would have said "yeah, no thanks" but we didn't. We didn't know," Lake admits, reflecting on the development days during his Masterclass. He continues later in his conference, addressing the elements which led to the longer development cycle: "part of it was creating the tools and creating the technology, it evolved."

Press Reception During Development

"Demoing the game, the queues were just getting longer and longer. Everyone wanted to get in and see the demo, and we were getting a lot of really raved reviews on the game," Lake describes to Gamespot, reflecting on trade shows. One of those reviews appeared in the May 2001 issue of PC Gamer, who published their exclusive hands-on preview of the title, describing the game as "simultaneously an absorbing crime drama, a stunning visual achievement of cinematic ambition, and a relentlessly rewarding shoot-'em-up." Yet it was the violent "shoot-'em-up" element which also attracted concern from some, especially with marketing focusing on the game's Bullet Time element. "I think of Max very much along the same lines as a good action movie. If you want to start banning things like the Die Hard movie trilogy or John Woo movies, then you are starting to cut a lot of the fun entertainment away from a lot of people," explains Project Lead, Petri Järvilehto in an interview with Voodoo Extreme. "I think what we are doing, regardless, is a crime thriller. We are telling a storyline. The violence itself is not an end."

June 1999 Issue of Computer Gaming World featuring a very early Max Payne.

One thing which became synonymous with the series for fans and the press, is the "Payne Face" or "The Grimace," which became the protagonist's most recognised expression. Because of technical limitations, facial animation consisted of a series of images which would change depending on the character's actions. There would be an expression to show hurt, pride and determination. When Max is shooting, his facial expression reflects the latter, his eyes squinting in response to the muzzle flash whenever the shoot button would be pressed. "The Grimace" would only ever appear when the gun was being fired, which meant that most of the time it would be hidden. But leading up to the game's launch, the Grimace was everywhere. "We wanted those muzzle flashes in the screenshots; capturing screenshots for marketing purposes," Lake explains in his Masterclass conference. "There always had to be a muzzle flash, which means the gun has been fired, so there is always that expression."

On 15th July 2001, the game reached gold status. Eight days later, on 23rd July, the game was released.

The Launch and Critical Reception

Originally planned to be a PC exclusive title, in April 2001, 3DRealms announced that a PlayStation 2 version of the game was currently in the works by Rockstar Canada and set for release later that year. "The line between special effects in movies and videogames is narrowing," explains Sam Houser, President of Rockstar. "The technology behind PlayStation 2 allows us to take action to a level not yet achieved in videogames. With Max Payne, you will see the evolution of gameplay." The PS2 and XBOX ports were released in December 2001, just a few months after the PC version.

The ESRB certificate for Max Payne. Posted by 3DRealms

Max Payne has sold over 5 million units to date worldwide and achieved recognition by Microsoft and Sony, who respectively awarded it "Greatest Hit" and "Platinum Hit" statuses. The game was also awarded a BAFTA, calling it the best PC game of 2001, and a Golden Joystick Award, among many others.

Although Max Payne had been a success, there were some concerns at Remedy. Described in the Seven Years of Max Payne GDC talk, the studio was eager to prove that the title wasn't just a "one hit wonder" and that the developers were capable of delivering further hits. After the successful release of their first AAA game, the team began developing the sequel, Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, which came as a surprise to some. "I probably wouldn't have killed off all of the characters in the first game if I had known a sequel was coming," jokes Sam during the Masterclass talk.

15 Years Later

Over the past fifteen years, a lot has changed with the Max Payne series. After the release of the original title on 23rd June 2001, Take Two purchased the Max Payne IP from Remedy and Apogee, announcing the transfer in May of the following year. The MP franchise had brought them $10 Million,  969,932 shares of restricted common stock (stock with conditions) and "certain future development incentives" according to the Take-Two press release. In the same press release, the company announced that Remedy were developing the next instalment in the Max Payne franchise, for release in 2003.

With 2.75 million units of Max Payne sold, it was clear that Remedy had a commercial success in their hands. Following critic and community feedback, Remedy began work on a sequel. With a higher budget and a solid foundation to build the next adventure on, development was much quicker. The sequel, titled Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, was released in October 2003.

Later, and with the IP in new hands, Remedy turned their attention to new adventures and moved from the overwhelming complexity of New York for the unsettling quietness of Bright Falls. Trees replaced skylines and a life of tragedy was replaced with a life of privilege.** The Alan Wake series, whilst not an immediate commercial success, has gained popularity and a loyal fan following over the years and in May 2015, Remedy announced that the game has shipped more than 4.5 million units.

Despite Remedy moving onto new projects, the Max Payne series, now under new management, continued. In 2008, the Max Payne movie came out, with a reception of mixed reviews. While the film was aesthetically beautiful, it was a departure from the original material, full of loose ends and contradictions. The game's protagonist was inspired by the Film Noir genre, and drawing on the films of Humphrey Bogart, known for the intelligent suave and sophistication he gave to his characters. The movie portrayed Max more as a desperate animal, constantly running away from his past, but in no certain direction. With an estimated budget (according to IMDB) of $35 million, the Max Payne movie grossed $85,416,905 by 2013.

On 15th May 2012, Rockstar celebrated the release of the third instalment of the franchise, simply titled Max Payne 3. In the game's events, Max travels to São Paulo, accepting a job offer as a bodyguard after accidentally murdering the son of New York mob boss DeMarco, and then DeMarco's gang, and then DeMarco. Max Payne is very clumsy. In the hopes of making a new life for himself and putting the past behind him, Max throws away his leather jacket and grows a beard, but his past soon catches up to him when his clients are aggressively kidnapped. Don't send a Christmas Card to this guy, it's just going to end in tears. (And not of the Health variety.)

The third instalment was awarded with a 87% review on Metacritic from critics, who praised the game for dark continuation of Max's story and development of the Bullet Time mechanics the series has become best known for. While the game was being developed by Rockstar, Remedy was brought in from time to time in a consultant role, and also contributed to the published graphic novel which detailed Max's life before his family's death.

Max Payne has greatly impacted the way video games are developed and played. It established Bullet Time as a cool combat mechanic, still frequently used in games today. Games such as Red Dead Redemption, Tomb Raider, F.E.A.R, as well as many others, features the ability to slow down time during fight scenes to create cinematic gameplay. Yet what made the game stand out was the presence of a strong story and memorable protagonist.  For many titles at the time, the narrative was often an overlooked element or something that was added near the end. It proved that you could create a game in which the narrative drove the levels while simultaneously delivering on engaging combat without one element taking anything away from the other.

Footnotes:
*D'awww, seven years. :')

** While Alan Wake is caught in a downwards spiral, he lives a life that many writers dream about having.  At the start of the story, he's already a successful writer; he's respected, and he has a thriving fanbase. He's doing very well, surrounded by supportive friends and family; the kind that go above and beyond to help him. It's only in the DLC packs and Alan Wake's American Nightmare that Wake realises and acknowledges how secure his life had been. Especially compared to Max Payne who can't think of someone as "okay" without death suddenly happening to them, Wake's life isn't too bad.

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