The gameplay of Stranglehold does pack a decent variety.  To be quite honest though for those who have ever played Max Payne in the past, you should know what you are getting yourself into as the game is basically Max Payne on steroids. 

You play as Inspector Tequila, and this man has some skill to him.  The basic run-and-gun action is here.  It is also mixed up with a slow-motion featured called Tequila Time.  When you combine Tequila Time with a sniper rifle you actually get to watch the bullet fly out of the gun and follow it into your enemy, a la Max Payne.

There is also a bit of a mini-game when you are in a stand-off with many enemies.  The series will kick in and you will have to use the analog sticks to dodge bullets, while aiming your guns and taking them out.  This is all done in zoomed in, close up and personal action.  It looks like a great action sequence and takes a great deal of timing.  You cannot move your feet, you control your guns and your upper body and have limited time to get your bullets off while dodging enemy bullets.  A very nice set of sequences which add variety to the experience.

Tequila also gains access to different Tequila Bombs or powers throughout the seven chapters of the game.  The special powers are attached to the D-Pad, four in total, one for each direction.  When you fill up your Tequila meter, which is used for slow-motion and these attacks, you will be able to pull off some fancy and absolutely sick-looking kills.

One aspect of Stranglehold which bugged me a tad was the camera.  Upon playing around with it more I found though that it can be worked with if you give it a little practice.  The camera is all manual which makes it difficult to control.  You can go into the settings and make it so it swings around you at all times which may help many.  I found that controlling the camera myself gave me more freedom though.

The only issue with Stranglehold is that you continuously do the same thing over and over.  Run into a room, clear out the enemies, move on and do it over again.  There is lacking variety.  The strange thing about it though is that the game is so much fun that you really do not notice it.  The short length of the game helps keep you from getting bored as well.  The only drawback is that the repetitiveness of it may keep you from playing through it multiple times.

The highlight of the gameplay of Stranglehold is that of the interactive environments.  When you jump into an area you can pretty much interact with everything around you.  You can slide down a railing, jump off of it and jump on top of a rolling cart, all while continuing to blow your enemies away one by one.  You can slide across tables, use objects, fire away and destroy gas tanks and other things as well.  All of this works extremely well and is very intuitive, and quite easy.  You will pick up on the controls almost instantly and be able to pull off some really cool-looking kills.