8 Popular Video Game Mechanics That Suddenly Disappeared
1. Multiplayer Bullet Time
When it was first announced that Max Payne 3 would feature an online multiplayer mode, most fans were simply left wondering, "How the hell will that work?"
Given that the ability to slow down time and gun down your enemies is integral to the very gameplay fabric of the franchise, it was tough to consider quite how Rockstar would implement such a feature in multiplayer.
But dammit, they pulled it off.
Cleverly, Max Payne 3's multiplayer bullet time operates on line-of-sight activation, meaning that if someone turns on bullet time, anyone they see and anyone who sees them will similarly enter slow-mo.
And beyond that, if anyone sees another slowed-down person, they too will slow down, ensuring that players away from the bullet time action aren't forced to encounter sudden slowdown out of nowhere.
Though the potential for clunkiness speaks for itself, it actually worked shockingly well, and yet received virtually no uptake in the wider action game sphere.
Granted, bullet time's popularity began to fade in the years following Max Payne 3's release, but the game found a devilishly clever solution to a tricky technical head-scratcher and should've received more credit for it.