Mad Max Review

Only the Maddest:

Since its reveal – long before the awesome Fury Road hit theatres – I’ve been quietly excited about Warner Bros.’ “Mad Max” video game. Developers Avalanche Studios seemed to understand a lot about what made the iconic Mad Max film franchise truly special, and now that it’s out in the wilds and fending for itself I’m pleased to announce Mad Max is just as good as I’d hoped.

Story:

Mad Max mercifully avoids trying to be a tie-in game to this year’s movie – or any of the movies from the franchise. Instead Avalanche have carved out their own place in the Mad Max universe and tell an original tale of the Road Warrior. As a series explicitly about revenge, you might not be surprised to hear that Max begins the game getting the sand kicked out of him and his iconic V8 Interceptor stolen, birthing an all new grudge against the game’s big bad – Scabrous Scrotus – and his party of war boys.

Left to die in the Wasteland, Max eventually comes across Chumbucket, a curious hunchback who has pioneered his own religion for gearheads. Needless to say he’s a fantastic mechanic – a self-proclaimed ‘blackfinger’, whose exemplary skills with a wrench promise to deliver Max to his enemies in a monstrous ride, and offer him yet another chance at revenge.

Whilst the story initially revolves around Max and Chumbucket building the perfect car – the Magnum Opus – it changes gear half way through and a lot of new interesting elements come into play. It’s a great story peopled with really interesting and twisted characters, with Avalanche evidently cribbing copiously from series’ creator George Miller’s unique eye for the strange and fascinating.

Gameplay:

The world of Mad Max is massive. The initial stretch of wasteland Max is dumped into is just a small chunk of the huge world Avalanche have designed here, and that first time you open up the world map and zoom out you realize just how much you’re going to rely on the Magnum Opus. It’s then that you truly appreciate the value of Max and Chumbucket’s mission: to build the best, biggest and most badass car in the wasteland.

Fittingly, a lot of Mad Max takes place behind the wheel. As the titular anti-hero, it’s up to you to drive around the wasteland to put a stop to Scrotus’ reign of terror. In fact, most of your progress is measured in the fear level of the territories you tear through in your ever-changing car. As you lay waste to convoys, scarecrows and sniper posts from the relative safety of the Magnum Opus you build your legend and earn the right to even cooler car parts and skills for Max.

Upgrading the Magnum Opus is an instantly satisfying endeavour, and one that drove me to continue picking up every bit of scrap I could lay my grubby hands on. As you add wheel spikes, beefier engines and even harpoons to the car your view of the world and the way you consume it evolves. Ripping the defences from other cars before destroying them with a well placed shotgun blast was grin-inducing, and smashing a stronghold from the outside before working my way in on foot became standard practise.

Outside of the car Max can infiltrate these bases, beat up parties of War Boys and find thousands of collectibles. The amount of stuff there is to do and find in Mad Max is insane – and whilst I’ll never scoff at a content rich game, some of what’s here does feel repetitive after you’ve done it a few hundred times. Still, the core gameplay of Mad Max – aggressive driving and Batman-styled hand-to-hand combat – is engaging and enjoyable throughout.