Hello, this is AnarhySonik, this time I will talk about the game Max Payne 3. Yes, specifically about the third, and not about the first two parts. Since the first and second ones will forever remain on the list of gaming industry legends, they are definitely good and have been analyzed by everyone possible. What can’t be said about the third one?.
Some fans were put off by the first trailers, when Max suddenly grew a beard and began to sparkle with his bald head, having moved to sunny Brazil. More precisely, in its abode of financial flows and social stratification – Sao Paulo.
Someone started playing and was finished off by the glitches that are constantly present in cutscenes and more. For some, the cutscenes themselves take up a good third of the game’s time, if not more. Well, someone ran through the entire game, skipping cutscenes, without delving into the plot at all. At the time of the release of the third part, I was already a fan of the first parts and even gave it a three, but at some point I just gave it up, I don’t know for what reason. And I didn’t even remember those crumbs of the plot.
But now I finally played it, after a relatively recent replay of the first and second parts. I responsibly declare that I liked the three. Even if you skip the cutscenes, shooting here is very pleasant, the sound of the weapon, impact, bullet time, everything is at the highest level. So for anyone who likes third-person shooters and for some reason hasn’t played Max, I advise you to go through all three in sequence. But this is not a review, but an essay/conversation/analysis/composition on a topic (underline as appropriate), so let’s talk more about the plot, narrative and ideas that are explored in the game.
Naturally, the first thing that catches your eye is Max Payne’s psychological problems amid the loss of all his loved ones and the severance of former ties. His wife and child were killed by drug addicts. His hope for a new love relationship died with Mona Sachs. His friend Vlad betrayed him and naturally died. His colleagues with whom he had any interaction died. Moreover, those hundreds of killed bandits also did not lead to anything positive. Instead of the previous organized crime group led by Punchinello, another organized crime group led by DeMarco took over the palm. There is no fundamental difference between them.
Max sees it all, blames himself for everything, drowning more and more in self-digging, self-flagellation and an ocean of alcohol. Alcohol here acts as a slow method of suicide – Payne drinks heavily every day, killing the body and the remaining will to live. He himself understands this, but he cannot do anything about it, and he does not want to, since he has already convinced himself of the meaninglessness of his existence. And he decided not to look for where he could bring help to society, thereby finding the meaning of life, but simply drink away his police pension in the nearest bar. If Passos had not found him in this state, Max would not have been killed today or tomorrow by punks, cirrhosis, or the decision to rest in a snowdrift on the next way home from the bar.
I wanted to talk about Passos and, in principle, the divorce scheme that was applied to Max. But I don’t understand at all why a policeman from the USA is needed in this scheme. How it was explained in the story. There are three Branco brothers: the eldest Rodrigo, the middle Victor and the youngest Marcello. They are from a rich family and the inheritance will all go to Rodrigo, who is engaged in some kind of construction business, and Max was hired as his bodyguard. Victor is a right-wing politician who has to raise money for his activities and election campaign from other officials and big businessmen, including his older brother, and he has to launder this money through some Panama. Marcelo is just a foolish party animal, a sniffer of all sorts of prohibited things, who sometimes helps launder money for Victor.
So, Victor doesn’t like his situation, he needs all the family money. He cooperates with some government special forces U.F.E., specifically with his superior Becker, using the UFE as the official assault brigade. Collaborates with some paramilitarist gang, sub-PMC “Krache Preto”, using them as a shadow assault brigade. This sub-PMC and UFE are collaborating with each other with Victor’s knowledge. UFE organizes raids on favelas, kidnaps people, hands them over to Kracha Preto, and the militarists already strip these people for organs and sell them to respected uncles and aunts at a reasonable price.
Around the same time the election race begins, attempts to kidnap members of the Branco family begin. The first time it was Rodrigo and his wife Fabiana, the second Marcelo, also Fabiana and her sister Giovana, also Pasossa’s girlfriend. And if the first time Max saves everyone, then the second time only two out of three. Fabian Max could not be saved, and the bandits demand a ransom, the Branco family has money, and the brothers decide to give the ransom.
And this is where Victor begins to intervene, feeling that he is lucky. He conveys information about the transfer of money to the PMCs of Kracha Preto, and they break the deal, not without losses, taking the ransom money. Max and Passos have to go stupidly to the base of Commando Sombra in the hope of taking the boss’s wife by force. Max literally destroys the base, but the leader manages to escape with the hostage. Then Kracha Preto is set against Rodrigo’s office, and while the mercenaries are trying to kill Max, one of the UFE commanders, Bachmaer, kills Rodrigo and plants a bomb with an extremely long delay in the explosion. Probably so that Max has time to come to his dead boss and notice the bomb in order to escape, which is what happens.
Here Max breaks down, he decides to change himself and start saving people. Therefore, he decided to strangle the green serpent within himself, in honor of this he even shaved his head, marking his strong-willed decision. In the morning, he puts on a colorful Hawaiian shirt over a drunk T-shirt and goes to the favelas of Nova Esperanza to rescue a hostage from the remnants of Commando Sombra, which he innocently declares to Victor and Marcelo. Along the way he meets policeman Da Silva, who gives information. Well, and then, having fought his way up the hill, he sees that the ranks of hostages have been replenished in the form of Marcelo and Giovanna, who decided to give a new ransom to the bandits, but were a little delayed.
So, my essay is starting https://winzter-casino.uk/withdrawal/ to resemble a retelling of the plot – I’ll try to speed up and write out the rest in a abstract. Fabiana is killed by ragged bandits, the Favellians mixed with bandits are killed and caught by the UFE squad during a raid. UFE robbed people are sold to militaristic bandits for organs. Militarists kill Marcelo according to Brazilian classics to cover their tracks. Max kills one leader, saves Giovanna, and as a result she leaves the city with Passos. Max destroys an unfinished hotel in which people are being taken apart piece by piece, finally dealing with Kracha Preto.
Then he makes a splash in the UFE office, consolidating his successes already at the airport. He kills the head of the UFE, stops the plane on which Victor was trying to escape with a grenade launcher, and even restrains himself and does not kill him, just breaking his leg. As a result, the UFE special forces were disbanded,
Victor is sent to prison, but is found hanged a week later. Max goes into the sunset. Happy ending.
So that’s what this retelling is all about. Why is Max Payne needed in the scheme that Victor is stirring up?? I don’t understand. Let’s say the whole action will be without Max. Money laundering through Panama is carried out by Marcelo with the help of Passos, Max is not needed here. Commando Sombra kidnaps Fabiana and Rodrigo for the first time – that’s it, Victor is already happy, the plan can be carried out, send Kracha Preto, breaking the ransom – profit. They could have sent either Cracha Preto or UFE to the boat station; both of them would most likely have successfully dealt with slaughtering the bandits and killing Rodrigo and his wife; Marcelo Victor could have at any moment been incited to go with a ransom in one helmet to the heart of the favelas, where he would have been killed in any case. And that’s all – profit. The money came, and the ratings increased sharply.
On the good side, Max only brought confusion into the plans, added an element of surprise and, in the end, ruined all the plans with his intervention. And what did they want to hang on him?? That he couldn’t cope with the crowds of thugs together with Raoul? Any investigator would throw up his hands and state that one in a couple of hundred is a bit of an unequal fight. It’s more of a miracle that Max didn’t die during the first kidnapping attempt. Only divine providence in the person of the writers and player controls did not allow the old policeman to retire.
And while I’m on this topic. Have you noticed the discrepancy between the behavior of Max under player control and Max in cutscenes?? Either we shoot dozens of enemies with both hands, flying into a crowd of enemies, then a couple of gopniks wring out a mobile phone, a gun and throw it into the drain, thanks for not pissing. And there are plenty of such moments – Max could have killed Bachmaer immediately, without the need to drop a lamp on his head. Could fly into the crowd of komado sombra (on the hill) in bullet time. At the stadium, okay, Passos pissed, and Max would have killed, of course, Commander Krach Preto, without the need for another boat ride. Once, while stupidly walking along the corridor, he was almost shot, okay, his pyromaniac neighbor cleared it up. In general, in words and in cutscenes, Max is still a wreck, but everything changes under our control, when we send a dozen well-equipped, trained young people into oblivion at a time. Let’s consider this a game convention.
Somewhere around here I should have started talking about social inequality, classes and other leftist topics. But in this case it’s not very desirable. But I’ll try. Here the scriptwriters themselves tried to make some statements. It’s like how bad these rich people are, cut off from the people, moving around the city in helicopters, only thinking about parties, drugs and making money from blood. Look at the conditions in which people live in favelas, you have to deal with crime and prostitution, while at any moment the same people, perhaps from a neighboring favela, can decide to disassemble you for organs. It’s not for nothing that Victor Branco is a right-wing politician, and it’s not for nothing that the honest cop has the surname Da Silva, like the current left-wing president Lula Da Silva, who at the time of the development and release of the game was still in opposition to power.
But what do the developers offer?? What are the solutions?? In fact, we don’t have many completely positive characters. Let’s take a look at them. For example Giovanna, Passos’s bride. She is kind and does charity work in the favelas, as Max says: “Works with the poor, holidays with the rich.”. And what is the result of the activity? She may have really helped dozens of people, perhaps hundreds. But this did not change the system and did not even push for changes, it only calmed the aching soul of a rich girl and perhaps helped launder money for charity for someone.
From the same opera there is supposedly a good example of a former policeman. Who also worked in New York, but whose family was not killed. Now he is also involved in some kind of charity in the favelas of Sao Paulo. And it also doesn’t change the system for the better. And for some reason I was also in an expensive strawberry shop. Two times out of three we meet him in the toilet, which apparently means his passive position in life. And this is not about us.
Therefore, we have a young and cheerful policeman Da Silva, who is also one of the few who does not take bribes, and even digs under large clans, like the Branco couple. He looks more like a role model now. True, it’s as if he himself doesn’t really believe in his success and also prefers not to act on his own, but transfers the right to implement his plans to Max Payne. As a result of the actions of the honest cop, Victor ends up in prison, and the UFE is disbanded. Although he did not change the system, he did everything in his power to improve the situation.
So the most successful in implementing plans here is Da Silva.
What can’t be said about Max?. His main arc is psychological. In the first part, at the beginning he lost his wife and daughter, and at the end he took revenge on those involved, t. e. he was an active participant in the events as it was his conscious choice. In the second, Mona tricked them and Vlad led them by the nose, t. e. he was manipulatively drawn into this whole bloody cycle, and in the end he loses everything, including hope for at least some happiness. In the third we meet Max already going to the bottom like a bathyscaphe with billionaires on board – slowly and pitifully. Again, as in the second part, he was dragged into a bloody meat grinder, but before he finally became mincemeat, he took himself and his fate into his hands. The cutlets, so to speak, were finished by him himself, firmly holding the handle of that same meat grinder.
I also heard a complaint about the plot that they say “Max is not real!». After all, before that, for two games in a row, he was pursuing purely selfish interests, and he didn’t give a damn about society, “what did he do until the very end?”. So that’s the point. This is the real hero arc.
Let’s do it again) Max, a sample of the first part, had a conscious desire to soothe his mental pain from the loss of his family. He decided that if he took revenge on those involved for the murder of his family, the pain would go away. Ironically, the whole situation with his wife, drug addicts, mafia clans, corporations was part of the whole picture of social inequality, crime, corruption, etc. e. ordinary and familiar capitalism. Therefore, while solving his selfish problems, he also cleared the city of specific criminals. T.e. his unconscious desire was, after all, the eradication of crime. But precisely because the eradication was targeted and unsystematic, the old criminals were replaced by new ones, no different. As a result of the first part, none of the wishes were fulfilled.
In the second part, Max decided to soothe his heartache with new love, but this conscious desire also ran into crime, money, and the economy. And again Max is broke. And precisely because his unconscious desire was not fulfilled, he went deeper and deeper into a depressive binge. And by the end of the third part, Max chose to fulfill this unconscious desire associated with the public. And when he “without sparing his belly” achieved the desired result – he achieved some kind of harmony with himself, at least in the end he looked happy and during the second half of the game he did not mention his wife and daughter at all (or almost).
By the way, the writers of the third part themselves clearly showed the difference between the old and new Payne. For example, old Max. Sitting around drinking while crime increases in the city. And it begins to act somehow only when they directly get to the bottom of it. And then he decides to escape from his problems and do an easy job, as Passos assured him. It also shows his attachment to the past and the fact that he has not yet experienced the tragedy of his family, while he still has the same frivolity towards others. After all, when he came to the cemetery to say goodbye, he almost left his new friend right there, although he understood perfectly well what this farewell could threaten him with. That is, old Max is shown tired, disappointed, fixated on himself, his experiences and not seeing anything beyond his nose.
The way Max is shown in the interval from escaping from the USA to going bald is where he slipped, the bottom to which he slowly sank, right up to the point of metaphorical death and salvation from literal hell, which happened more by chance than by merit. As a result, sensing a second chance and pushing off from the bottom, Max was reborn, became a new person who took his eyes off his nose and looked around, saw blatant inequality and open crime, about which he finally decided to do something. Fortunately, he came across a person who, although he uses him, does it openly, with the consent of Max himself and, most importantly, without visible personal gain. You understand that I’m talking about Detective Da Silva.
Thus, Payne himself ceases to act exclusively in their own interests and begins to help society as best he can. What, by the way, does commander Kracha Preto draw attention to when he says that Max Payne is a “true American”. Like, he comes to a foreign country and begins to establish his own order, killing people left and right. But Navis, of course, is wrong. A “true American,” or rather a stereotypical imperialist, would do this on a thousand times larger scale and with direct economic benefit, as has happened more than once.
Max, unlike such imperialists, does this out of sheer enthusiasm and for the sake of the public good. The very fact that a group of innocent people were saved from dismemberment already suggests that everything was not in vain. In addition, further possibility of abductions was stopped. Well, in general, discrediting right-wing politicians by smearing one of the influential right-wing politicians with evidence of guilt is worth a lot. Although these guys can cope on their own – Balsanara alone is worth it.
As a result, a shift occurred in social life, life became easier for some part of the population, Max became closer to mental balance, Passos and Giovanna brought new life to our world, Da Silva probably advanced in his career, during the game representatives of the big bourgeoisie were physically cut out. Nothing but advantages. In general, I advise you to play the third Payne with a full understanding of the plot and take an example from Max – come to your senses and understand that personal happiness cannot be separated from public happiness, since you cannot be free from the society in which you live.
And if you don’t agree with me, write about it in the comments.
And that’s all for me. Love, good bye.
According to Max, to be honest there is not much content for a positive person. But what I found: