If you're a video game fan, then you know that the purchase of a new game often delivers a rush similar to that induced by high grade heroin. Hopefully, actually playing the game is as much fun as the anticipation of it; unfortunately, that's often not true. A few months back I purchased a game entitled "Stuntman;" if you haven't played it, then you are living a fuller, happier life than I. That game, um, SUH--UCKED. The basic idea: you drive cars in stunt scenes for movies, flipping the car through the air and doing power turns and stuff. Here's the short list of things that pissed me off about that damn game:

• Too hard! This probably sounds whiny, but I'm used to games where you get a few easy levels before the game gets really difficult. This game just started out hard; it took me something like 21 tries to complete the first level. This brings me to:
• The game doesn't save often enough. I was going insane, because completing the first level required me to drive for like 3 minutes, go through 20+ checkpoints, and not screw up. So I'd be doing fine, get about 15 check points in, and then accidentally spin out and lose so much time that I'd fail. I would then fling my controller across the room and kick one of the cats in the head. Important note to all game makers: if the game precipitates animal cruelty, it is probably not a good game. This is why "Mary Kay's Interactive Cosmetic Testing Lab (featuring Baldy the Bunny)" didn't take off.

I played for about an hour, probably and turned it off. I have no intention of playing it again. I guess I probably should've been warned off from the game, considering I got it used for like $8.

Anyway, I bring this all up because I have purchased a new game. I picked up Max Payne on sale at the mall for $20. I know, I know, that game is SO last year. Which is why it was only $20. What, you think I'm gonna shell out $50 for a NEW game? Remember, I'm cheap. Before I go into detail about how cool this game is, I'll just quote one line from it:

He had a baseball bat and I was tied a chair. Pissing him off was the smart thing to do.

Okay, in retrospect, it's probably funnier if you've been playing the game for 3 straight hours. And are drunk. Nevertheless, the game is one of the best shoot-'em-ups I've played in a long time, mainly because it includes the one thing I've always missed from regular games: the ability to dive while blasting away at your enemies. Max Payne does it one better, throwing you into slow motion when you do it; they call it "bullet time." Bullet time is the greatest invention to hit 3D shooters since B.J. Blazkowicz broke out of Castle Wolfenstein. (Note: I have just downloaded Castle Wolfenstein 3D so I can play it. I'm such an easily distracted dork.)

My only complaints about Max Payne are that there's no multiplayer mode, and loading is slow. What's the point of a shooter if you can't shoot your friends? Admittedly, having Bullet Time in 2 player mode would be kinda hard to work out, but just figure something out, dammit. As to loading: every time you die, the game has to take 30-45 seconds to completely reload from the most recent save point. This is annoying, particularly since as the game gets harder, I'm having to take 10-15 attempts to complete a level. (Max Payne also doesn't save often enough, but that doesn't trouble me too much in this game for some reason.)

All I know is, you just can't beat flinging yourself around a corner in slowmotion with an Ingrams in each hand and spray a few hundred rounds into the poor mafia goons standing there. It's like sex, I'm telling you. If you like sex with guns and Italians, that is.

And who doesn't?