Max Payne Series

Max Payne
Max Payne is a third-person shooter video game developed by Finnish developers Remedy Entertainment and published by Gathering of Developers in July 2001 for Microsoft Windows. Ports created later in the year for the PlayStation 2, Xbox and the Game Boy Advance were published by Rockstar Games. A Macintosh port was published in July 2002 by MacSoft in North America[1] and by Feral Interactive in the rest of the world. There were plans for a Dreamcast version of Max Payne, but they were canceled due to the discontinuation of the console.[2] The game was re-released on April 29, 2009 as a downloadable game in the Xbox Originals program for the Xbox 360.[3] The game was also re-released in the spring of 2012 as a downloadable game in the PlayStation Store for the PlayStation 3, and on iOS.

The game features a gritty neo-noir style and uses graphic novel panels (with voice-overs) in place of animated cutscenes to narrate the game, as it draws inspiration from hard-boiled detective novels by authors like Mickey Spillane.[4] The game contains many allusions to Norse mythology, particularly the myth of Ragnarök, and several of the names used in the game are those of the Norse gods and mythos. The gameplay is heavily influenced by the Hong Kong action cinema genre, particularly the work of director John Woo,[5] [6] [7] and it was the first game to feature the bullet time effect popularized by The Matrix.

Max Payne received very positive reviews and was praised for its exciting gunplay and use of noir storytelling devices. Critically acclaimed, the game won a large number of accolades,[8] including theBAFTA Award.[9] As of 2011, the Max Payne game franchise has sold over 7.5 million copies.[10] It also inspired a feature film under the same title.

Plot
Back on August 22, 1998, Max returned home to find that a trio of apparent junkies had broken into his house while high on a new designer drug called Valkyr. Max rushed to aid his family, but was too late and his wife and their newborn daughter had already been brutally murdered. After his family's funeral, Payne transferred to the DEA.The story consists of three volumes: "The American Dream", "A Cold Day in Hell", and "A Bit Closer to Heaven". The game begins in medias res in December 2001, as New York City finishes experiencing the worst blizzard in the history of the city. The intro sequence shows Max Payne, a renegade DEA agent and former NYPD officer, standing at the top of a skyscraper building as police units arrive. He then experiences a flashback from three years ago.

Three years later, Max Payne is employed as an undercover operative inside the Punchinello Mafia family responsible for the trafficking of Valkyr. His DEA colleague B.B. gives Max a message asking him to meet another DEA agent, who is also Max's best friend, Alex Balder, in the NYC Subway station. Max's arrival at the subway results in a shoot-out after he encounters mobsters working for Jack Lupino, a Mafia underboss in the Punchinello crime family, attempting a bank robbery by breaking through from the station. Working his way back to the surface, Max encounters Alex, who is then killed by an unknown assassin. Payne becomes the prime suspect in the murder because he is still undercover and the fact that he fled the crime scene, while the Mafia find out that he is a cop and now want him dead.

While searching for Lupino in "businesses" owned by him, Max busts a Valkyr drug deal and discovers that the Russian mobster Vladimir Lem is engaged in a fierce turf war against Punchinello's men. Max eventually finds Vinnie Gognitti, Lupino's right-hand man. He wounds and chases Gognitti, while also shooting mobsters that accompanied him. Chasing Gognitti through the city, Max learns about the location of Lupino's hideout, a nightclub named Ragna Rock. After gunning down the insane Lupino, Payne meets Mona Sax, a female contract killer, who pours him a drink which turns out to be laced with a sedative. In this state Max is found by the Mafia and is dragged away to be tortured.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Max manages to escape from the Mafia-owned slaughterhouse and enters a brief alliance with Vladimir Lem. He agrees to kill one of Vladimir's traitors, Boris Dime, and his men aboard the cargo shipCharon at the Brooklyn riverfront, which contains a shipment of high-powered firearms belonging to the Russian mob, which Max keeps in exchange for the favor. After surviving a bomb ambush at the Mafia restaurant Casa di Angelo, Max uses the new-found Russian mob's weapons to storm the residence of Don Angelo Punchinello. There he finds the body of Lisa Punchinello, Mona's sister, and discovers that the Don is only a puppet in the Valkyr market when the mafioso is killed in front of Payne by agents of Nicole Horne, the CEO of the mysterious Aesir Corporation. Horne then injects Max with an overdose of Valkyr and leaves him for dead, as he experiences a drug-induced nightmare and suffers his internal torment and guilt for not being able to save his family (as well as strange letters allegedly written by his deceased wife telling him that he is a character in a video game).<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-11" style="line-height:1em;">[12]

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">After surviving the overdose and awakening, Payne pursues his only lead to a steel foundry located over a hidden underground military research complex. Inside he discovers that Valkyr is the result of Valhalla Project, an early 1990s U.S. military attempt to improve soldiers' stamina and morale following earlier The Ladder experiments; the project that was sharply halted due to poor results, but was later restarted by Horne and Aesir. He also discovers that his wife accidentally found out about the project, and Horne let loose the crazed Valkyr test subjects into his house. Aesir initiates "Operation Dead Eyes" to get rid of evidence and witnesses, including their own scientists. Max escapes the bunker at the last moment just as it self-destructs.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Max then gets a call from B.B., who arranges a meeting at an underground parking lot and reveals he shot Alex and framed Max for his murder. A running gunfight then commences as Max chases him through the garage. After killing the traitor, Max gets a phone call from a man named Alfred Woden asking him to come to the Asgard Building. Alfred reveals himself to be part of a powerful secret society called the Inner Circle, which has strong ties to the U.S. government. The Inner Circle members inform Max about Nicole Horne's identity but cannot pursue her themselves because "their hands are tied". They ask Max to kill Horne in exchange for dropping any criminal charges against him. Suddenly, Asgard is overrun by Aesir gunmen who kill everyone in the meeting room except for Max, who escapes, and Woden, who pretends to be shot. Max has to fight his way out of the building.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Max arrives at the main office of Aesir Corporation and makes his way through this high-tech security building while avoiding strafing runs by a minigun-armed helicopter. Along the way he runs into Mona Sax again in an elevator, but she is shot in the head by Horne's men after she refuses to shoot Max (her body vanishes when Max goes back to the elevator). At the top Max finally confronts Nicole, who escapes to the roof and boards the helicopter. Max shoots the guy wires of the building's antenna, which snaps off and crashes into the helicopter, killing Horne.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">The game's storyline returns at the very point where it had first started, as Payne's three-night rampage is over. The NYPD ESU arrives at the scene, arresting Max and leading him out of the Aesir building, where he sees Alfred Woden. Knowing that Woden will ensure his safe passage through the judicial system, Max smiles genuinely.

Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne
<p style="line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne is a third-person shooter video game developed by Remedy Entertainment for Microsoft Windows and Rockstar Vienna for the Xbox and PlayStation 2 and published by Rockstar Games. The game is a sequel to Max Payne and is followed by Max Payne 3. It was released for Microsoft Windows on October 15, 2003, for Xbox on November 25, 2003, and for the PlayStation 2 on December 2, 2003.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">In Max Payne 2, the player controls Max Payne, a detective for the New York City Police Department (NYPD) and a fugitive framed for murder in New York City at the end of Max Payne. Two years after the events of the first game, Max has cleared his name and is now an NYPD detective. He reunites with Mona Sax, whom he met in the previous game, as they set out to resolve a conspiracy of death and betrayal, finding the Inner Circle in the center of it all.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Video game critics gave Max Payne 2 highly acclaimed reviews. Praise focused on its action and story, while criticism targeted its short length. Despite the positive reception, the game sold poorly, leading Rockstar Games' parent company Take-Two Interactive to cite Max Payne 2 ' s sales as a cause for the company's reforecast finances of 2004. Max Payne 2 received several industry awards, including Outstanding Art Direction at the Golden Satellite Awards 2004, and Editors' Choice Awards from GamePro, IGN, and GameSpy.

Plot
<p style="line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">After Max leaves the hospital, he begins looking for answers. When Max is kidnapped by Vladimir Lem, head of the local Russian Mafia, he learns that the Cleaners work for Lem, who uses them to eliminate the competition to his businesses. Max then learns that Lem is part of the secretive Inner Circle, led by Senator Alfred Woden, who had ensured that the charges against Max were dropped at the end of the previous game. Lem plans to kill Woden and gain control of the Inner Circle. Max also learns that Mona is a hired gun for Woden, with orders to kill Lem and Max. After Lem reveals that Detective Winterson was his mistress, he shoots Max and leaves him for dead in a burning building. Mona rescues Max, and together they go to Woden's mansion to save him from Lem.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-guide_4-1" style="line-height:1em;">[5] Two years after the events of the first game, Max Payne has quit his job at the DEA and returned to his former job as an NYPD detective. While investigating a series of murders by a group of contract killers called the Cleaners, Max encounters Mona Sax, who was assumed dead at the end of the previous game. Wanted for the murder of Senator Gates, Mona is arrested despite Max's protests, and taken to the police station. While at the station, Max overhears his new partner, Detective Valerie Winterson, talking on the phone about Mona. Suddenly, the station is attacked by the Cleaners, who are looking for Mona. Before they reach her, Mona breaks out of her cell and vanishes into the night. After Max meets her again at her residence, where they fight off the Cleaners who followed Max to her place, they begin hunting down the people responsible for the attack. Their search leads them to a construction site, where Max and Mona defend themselves against the Cleaners. After their foes flee, Detective Winterson arrives and holds Mona at gunpoint. Mona claims that Winterson is there to kill her while Winterson claims that she is simply trying to arrest a fleeing fugitive. After several moments of consideration, Max shoots Winterson, allowing Mona to escape. Before she dies, Winterson shoots Max, leading to his hospitalization.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-guide_4-0" style="line-height:1em;">[5]

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">At the mansion, Mona knocks Max to the ground in an attempt to follow her orders to kill him, but discovers that her feelings for him keep her from doing so. Lem shoots Mona after realizing that she will not kill Max. Woden then appears in a wheelchair, and lunges at Lem; Woden is killed during the ensuing struggle. Max and Lem then begin to fight, until Lem triggers a bomb that he planted in the mansion. After they both drop to the floor below, Max pursues Lem through the mansion. Max faces Lem in a firefight, and eventually destabilizes the platform below Lem, causing it to fall to the floor below, killing Lem. Max returns to Mona's side as the police arrive, and she dies in his arms. If the game is completed at its highest difficulty level, Mona survives.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-guide_4-2" style="line-height:1em;">[5] However, this is not canon, as she is dead in the next installment. The story ends with Max telling us that he had a dream of his wife. "She was dead but it was all right." Then the credits roll as Late Goodbye by Poets of the Fall plays.

Max Payne 3
Max Payne 3<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> is a third-person shooter<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> video game<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> developed by Rockstar Studios<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> and published by Rockstar Games<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;">. It is the third title in the Max Payne franchise<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> and was released for PlayStation 3<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;">and Xbox 360<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> in May 2012 and for Microsoft Windows<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> in June. Development is led by Rockstar Vancouver<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> in collaboration with the New England<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;">, London<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> and Toronto<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> studios. <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-RSStudios_5-0" style="line-height:1em;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">[6] <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-EDGEMay2011_6-0" style="line-height:1em;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">[7] <span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> This is the first game in the series that was not developed by Finnish game developer Remedy Entertainment<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> and not written by series creator Sam Lake<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;">. <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-ref.234_7-0" style="line-height:1em;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">[8] <span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> The lead writer of Max Payne 3<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> was Dan Houser<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;">, who was also the writer of Red Dead Redemption<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;"> and most games in the Grand Theft Auto series<span style="color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;line-height:19px;text-align:-webkit-auto;">. <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-variety_houser_8-0" style="line-height:1em;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">[9]

[edit] Setting
<p style="line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">According to Rockstar's Sam Houser, it was their intention on starting a new chapter of Max Payne's life with the game. "This is Max as we've never seen him before, a few years older, more world-weary and cynical than ever." Since the last game, the press release states Max has left New York City behind and has "drifted from bad to worse." The press release then goes on to say Max has been double-crossed in this new city and he is searching for the truth and a way out.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-rsw1_14-0" style="line-height:1em;">[15] The game is set in São Paulo, Brazil, where Payne is working in the private security sector for a wealthy local family, set eight years after the events of the second game.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-pcworld_15-0" style="line-height:1em;">[16] <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-ref.237_16-0" style="line-height:1em;">[17] Max Payne now works in executive protection for the wealthy Rodrigo Branco in the hopes of escaping the memories of his troubled past. When a street gang kidnaps Rodrigo's wife, Max is pulled into a conspiracy of shadowy, warring factions threading every aspect of São Paulo society in a deadly web that threatens to engulf everyone and everything around him.

[edit] Plot
<p style="line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Nine years after killing Vladimir Lem and the death of Mona Sax, Max Payne has retired from his job in the NYPD, moved to Hoboken, New Jersey and has developed an addiction to alcohol and painkillers. Max gets into a confrontation at a bar with Anthony DeMarco Jr., the son of a local mob boss, and Raul Passos interjects, hoping to recruit Max for a private security job in South America. Max initially resists, but when he becomes a target for mob hitmen after he kills Anthony Jr. in a bar fight, he agrees to accompany Passos to Brazil.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Max and Passos work for the wealthy Branco family in São Paulo, made up of three brothers: the businessman Rodrigo, the politician Victor, and the partying Marcelo. During a party held in Rodrigo's penthouse, Rodrigo and his wife Fabiana are kidnapped by a street gang called the Comando Sombra, but Max saves them. Fabiana, her sister (and Passos' lover) Giovanna, and Marcelo are later again targeted at a nightclub by the same gang, who successfully kidnap Fabiana. Max and Passos bring ransom money to the gang at a soccer stadium, but the deal is ambushed by an outlaw right-wing paramilitary group known as Crachá Preto, who steal the money. Max and Passos decide to raid a Comando Sombra base to save Fabiana, but the gang escapes with her.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">As Max and Passos discuss the situation with Rodrigo, Victor and Armando Becker, the local battalion commander of a special police unit Unidade de Forças Especiais (UFE), Crachá Preto raid the Branco offices. An unknown assassin breaks into Rodrigo's secured office and assassinates him. A bomb then explodes in the building, but Max escapes, learning that Fabiana is in one of São Paulo'sfavelas and that Max was the true target of the raid.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Blaming himself for everything that happened to the Brancos, Max chooses to abstain from alcohol and shave his head to disguise himself for another rescue attempt of Fabiana. Local detective Wilson Da Silva informs him that Crachá Preto had nefarious links with Rodrigo, who hired them to clear out villages on a piece of land he wished to turn into a retail development. Da Silva explains he thinks the UFE and Victor are all connected to Max's predicament.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Max finds Fabiana with Marcelo and Giovanna, who were also kidnapped when trying to pay the ransom for Fabiana themselves. Comando Sombra's leader Serrano executes Fabiana and escapes with Giovanna and Marcelo. As Max gives chase, the UFE raid the favela; he witnesses the Crachá Preto and the UFE exchanging money for those who were arrested in the raids for an unknown reason. Max finds Marcelo and Giovanna in the hands of the Crachá Preto's second-in-command Milo Rego. Marcelo is burned to death in a gang-like ritual manner so the UFE can have an excuse to raid. Max kills Milo and saves Giovanna. Passos later arrives to pick them up by helicopter, but flees with Giovanna and leaves Max behind, who is saved by Da Silva.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">A flashback shows Max and Passos in the Panama Canal protecting Marcelo at a yacht party that is raided by guerrilla pirates. Max finds them trying to gain access to a hidden stash within the boat. Max is unsure what the contents were, but it is clear that it is no longer there; Max later found Marcelo and Passos trying to drive away with the unknown cargo. It hits Max that he was recruited by Passos to be the "fall guy" for whatever illicit activity the Brancos were involved in.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Da Silva informs Max about a rundown hotel where the Crachá Preto and the UFE are seen entering with prisoners, yet very few leave. Max discovers it is the base for a black market organ theft ring and corrupt UFE officers were being paid to transport arrested individuals for organ harvesting. Max finds Serrano as one of the victims and spares him, allowing him to take revenge on the surgeon performing the harvesting. Max sets explosives to destroy the entire complex, and Passos manages to kill the Crachá Preto leader Álvaro Neves before he shoots Max. Max discovers Passos was unaware of the plan to set up Max. He forgives Passos, who leaves Brazil with a pregnant Giovanna, asking Max to get over his past and move on.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Da Silva concludes that Becker and Victor are behind everything and asks Max to handle it, as there is too much corruption for Da Silva to stop them legally. Max battles his way through the UFE building, discovering that Becker's UFE unit are the perpetrators for Rodrigo's assassination. Victor explains to Max that he wanted more money from his brother for his political campaign: he told the Crachá Preto to ambush the money exchange at the stadium, which went toward funding the organ harvesting ring, the profits of which helped fund his campaign.

<p style="margin-top:0.4em;margin-bottom:0.5em;line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Victor and Becker escape to the airport with Max in pursuit. After an intense shootout, Max arrives at the hangar where Becker and Victor are preparing to board a jet. Becker tries to use a grenade launcher to kill Max, but ends up burning himself with his left arm severed when Max shoots at one of the fired grenades. Eventually, the player can choose to kill Becker or let him die from his wounds. Max then grabs the grenade launcher and, with Da Silva's help, uses it to disable Victor's plane. Da Silva persuades Max to spare Victor so he can live in shame. Victor taunts Max, who responds with breaking Victor's leg. A week later, Max watches the news on a beach in Bahia. It reports that Becker's UFE battalion have been disbanded indefinitely due to their ties to the organ harvesting ring, while Victor is found hanged in his cell. The last shot of the game is Max walking along the beach, enjoying his vacation and ready to move on with his life.

[edit] Characters
<p style="line-height:19px;color:rgb(0,0,0);font-family:sans-serif;text-align:-webkit-auto;">Rockstar initially claimed that series staple James McCaffrey would not return to the role of Max Payne, instead opting for an older actor.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-ref.238_17-0" style="line-height:1em;">[18] However, in Edge it was confirmed that McCaffrey will not only return to voice Max, but will also return in a full acting role through motion capture.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-EDGEMay2011_6-1" style="line-height:1em;">[7]

Credits
Max Payne Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Payne

Max Payne 2 Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Payne_2:_The_Fall_of_Max_Payne

Max Payne 3 Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Payne_3

Max Payne (series) Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Payne_(series)

Max Payne Wikia: http://maxpayne.wikia.com/wiki/Max_Payne_Wiki