Mad Max trailer introduces the Magnum Opus car, and a violent, skull-crushing open world

Mad Max trailer

After waiting a good long time, we’ve finally got our first extended look at Avalanche’s Mad Max game. If you had your fingers cross, feel free to relax a little; it looks like it could be good fun. A huge, sandy open world that looks exceptionally faithful to film director George Miller’s vision, it’s filled with insane gangs and absurd car chases. 

The game opens on Max having his clothes, shotgun, car, and his precious remaining photo of his family stolen. In the wasteland wheels are vital, so the first thing to do is bolt together a new car from scrap, which becomes known as Max’s Magnum Opus. The Magnum can be upgraded and adjusted over the course of the game, so expect to swap out parts to better suit new challenges.

The trailer shows off a lot of melee combat, which looks to take a lot of its cues from Sleeping Dogs’s violent context-sensitive moves, as well as the likes of Arkham and Shadow of Mordor’s fluid fight animations. Battles rage from hideouts to the openworld, and car combat looks a treat.

Whilst the trailer isn’t especially clear on everything, it mentions that the various gangs in the wasteland are out to get you, and appears to talk about this as if it were a system, as opposed to a narrative point. This is pure speculation, but perhaps this means that Mad Max has it’s own variation on the Nemesis System from Shadow of Mordor? We can only hope; randomised, hideous characters with piercings and scars would certainly suit the Mad Max universe perfectly.

Mad Max releases September 1st. Pre-orderers can grab the Ripper car as a bonus.