Max Payne

Max Payne is a man with nothing left to lose in a violent, freezing urban night. A fugitive undercover cop framed for murder and hunted by both the police and the mob, Max fights with his back against the wall in a battle he can’t hope to win. This relentless, story-driven action game follows a man on the edge as he tries to clear his name and uncover the truth behind his slain family, navigating plot twists and twisted thugs in the gritty depths of New York during the century’s worst blizzard. A groundbreaking cinematic action shooter, Max Payne introduced Bullet Time to videogames. Its stylish slow-motion gunplay and dark, twisted narrative helped redefine the action-shooter genre.

In December 2001, as New York City endures the final stretch of the worst blizzard in its history, Max Payne—a renegade DEA agent and former NYPD detective—stands atop a skyscraper with a sniper rifle, smiling as police arrive to arrest him. From there, he relives the past in flashbacks spanning three years and the last two days. Three years earlier, on August 22, 1998, Max is an NYPD detective finishing a normal workday. His longtime friend Alex Balder, now a DEA agent, urges him to transfer, but Max turns him down, focused on life with his wife Michelle and their newborn daughter Rose. Returning to his New Jersey home, Max discovers three junkies have broken in—addicted to a new designer drug called Valkyr. A mysterious woman calls Max, sounding pleased by the situation and refusing to summon help. Max rushes to protect his family and kills the intruders, but arrives too late: Michelle has been shot dead and Rose has been slaughtered. After the funeral, Max accepts Alex’s offer and transfers to the DEA at his own request, determined to stop the drug’s spread.