Both behind the wheel and on foot, there’s an exciting flourish to the familiar feel that comes with murdering the roaming war parties of the Roadkill, Buzzard, and Scrotus’ War Boy factions. The Road WarriorBut Mad Max’s combat is the great promise at each of these destinations. All of these activities are great, and engaging in their own right, but they begin to suffer from diminishing returns as their rinse/repeat nature sinks in down the stretch. In the lengthy process of wrestling control of the wasteland from its brutal, established warlords, you’ll destroy their refineries, kill their Top Dogs, burn their fuel depots, and topple their gruesome intimidation totems. And fortunately, for us, the players who visit this violent husk of a world, leaving our treadmarks on its scorched earth and igniting all we touch, there are many, many things to do. You are always earning something that directly changes your experience, and it’s incredibly rewarding. The same attention is offered to the Magnum Opus - where you’ll literally build the car from scrap and purchase things like nitro boosters, a harpoon, explosive javelins, spikes, armor, tires, and even side-mounted flame cannons. But you’ll also collect Scrap – the wasteland’s currency – to upgrade individual pieces of armor, weapons, tools, combat moves, and even Max’s look. Its progression mechanisms urge you to complete an exhaustive list of challenges to increase your Legend, which you cash in with Griffa – a sort of wasteland therapist – to increase base attributes.
If not the wasteland, then the excellent layers of systems that drive Mad Max’s gameplay are the real draw. And it may be the true star of Mad Max, despite the unsteady frame rate, texture popping, and physics quirkiness. Nearly everything and everyone you’ll meet fits the purpose and lore of the wasteland it’s alive with personality and indifference. Yet in the space between the premise and climax, Max is about your progression and domination of a world full of striking, ugly beauty, and incredible atmosphere.
By the closing credits, I had a genuine reaction to Avalanche’s tale of Max, but I wish more of it had been peppered throughout my 30-40 hours of play time. Wasteland WaresFor all this engaging premise, most of the traditional storytelling disappears until the near-end, when it ultimately, surprisingly succeeds.
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