Max Payne 3 confirmed

By Tom Bramwell Published 11 March, 2004

With Remedy apparently no longer in charge of the franchise.

Take-Two Interactive openly blames Max Payne 2's slow sales for its lower than expected Q4 earnings last year, and, whether by its own design or through developer Remedy's own desire to break free from the franchise, it now looks like the inevitable Max Payne 3 will be handled by a different studio altogether.

"Max Payne came out in November and did not do as well as we thought," Lapin said this week. "In fact, it did fairly poorly compared to our expectations." However, in good news for fans of Payne's exploits, Lapin was happy to confirm that a third title in the series. "There'll be another Max Payne," he told the Bear Stearns Conference. "I think we'll take a few years to make the next one that much more spectacular," he added. Hopefully we won't see a premature showing at E3 then.

Following Lapin's comments, somebody purporting to be Max Payne 2 level design Mikael Kasurinen wrote the following on Shacknews.com: "FYI: We are not making Max Payne 3," although neither Remedy, Take-Two or publishing subsidiary Rockstar Games has made any comment on plans for the franchise. If Max Payne's journey into the night is to continue as we were told at the end of his supposed Fall, then it sounds like it'll continue in the hands of another team...

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (27) Latest comment 7 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Tiger_Walts #1 8 years ago

    The flesh of fallen angels!

  • space_ace #2 8 years ago

    will be called "max payne 1/3" to appeal to the short games fans

  • kalel #3 8 years ago

    LOL

  • max #4 8 years ago

    "Max Payne came out in November and did not do as well as we thought," Lapin said this week. "In fact, it did fairly poorly compared to our expectations."

    Heh, that's a great piece of spokesperson-speak. What he clearly *meant* to say was "In fact, it did really craply", instead of almost repeating himself.

    Ah well, I liked it.

  • Sko #5 8 years ago

    I've heard Max Payne 3 is going to be called "Max Payne 3: The Rise of Max Payne". Apparently, it's gonna be a porn sim. Bullet-time money shots...

  • Chris Gardiner #6 8 years ago

    Huh! I didn't realise MP2 didn't sell so well. I remember much ranting about it at the time, and people saying how it was the best ten hours of gaming evar and stuff.

    See? Eurogamer: entertaining *and* educational.

  • Merefield #7 8 years ago

    I thought MP2 was just fantastic. Extremely atmospheric, well paced, fluid in its controls and the perfect length so you could finish it without ever feeling it was a chore to do so.

    It was obviously selling badly, though, as I got my copy for only £19.95 from Game.

    Its a shame it hasn't sold. Perhaps another Cult Classic (TM)?

  • Khab #8 8 years ago

    I believe warez may have had something to do with it.

  • dynarama #9 8 years ago

    Good game but so short that I could finish it and take it back, all within Game's 10-day thing. Don't suppose that helped sales but there you go.

  • MikeD #10 8 years ago

    Many people, including me, thought max payne 2 was only a half-assed repeat of the first game.

    The mediocre level-design was the worst part. They seemed to just make some buildings and put enemies in there randomly, instead of 1 where they created action scenes one might see in movies, which allowed for the full creative use of your moves.

    Tha atmosphere was basically gone imo. Where the jokes were funny and the dream sequences disturbing in one, here the jokes were tired GTA radioshow-ripoffs and the stranger levels really didn't do it for me.

    Warez is so easy to blame. the thing is, most people only warez if they have an excuse. Farcry is going to sell, on the merits of it's single player. Deus Ex: IW is selling.

    Only when people don't really look forward to a game, or think it's mediocre do they think of the excuses you then hear flying around on the internet. Like 'i'm not paying for an 8 hour game' and such bullshit. But if those 8 hours had been some of the most fun of their lives (like max payne 1) and if they had given the game the proper midprice of a standalone addon I am sure people would have bought the game.

  • space_ace #11 8 years ago

    MikeD- yes. those evil cleaners/ construction workers!

    "max payne 1" annoyed me in the beginning for having to replay the "soldier of fortune" subway levels, but then things got better. mp2 was all like that. we'd been sniper-protecting an ally just a month earlier, in "tron 2.0"!

  • TennesseeStiff #12 8 years ago

    I'm very surprise to hear MP2 didn’t do very well, although it not clear from the statement if it did poorly or just didn’t do as well as say GTA or something but still sold by the shed load.

    Well, I bought it and enjoyed it hugely. I thought it was a great game.
    Edited by 1 at 11/03/04 @ 11:34

  • Mugwum Verified Operations Director, Eurogamer Network #13 8 years ago

    Kristan won't like me for saying it but I got a bit bored with it too. Finished the first third or something then just couldn't be arsed to pick it up again. I liked the TV show set level though - that was quite entertaining.

  • UncleLou #14 8 years ago

    It was even more "more of the same" than many other games, true, but I thouroughly enjoyed it nonetheless. And I can't agree woth MikeD on the level design - some levels were absolutely remarkable, like Mona's playground for example. I also liked the dream sequences, some were at least as worrying as they were in part 1.

    What might have hurt sales is that there was barely any hype at all, no big advertising (at least not hereabouts), a humble number of previews (if any) before the release, and the release wasn't even delayed. He.

  • MikeD #15 8 years ago

    Mona's playground was nice the first time. But then it came back twice more. Sure, once with enemies and the second time on fire, but I thought that was a bit extreme.

  • Scuzz #16 8 years ago

    Well this was obviously gonna happen. No doubt about it, plus many would of known that Remedy won't be making it since their staff posted in the 3drealms forums several times stating this fact.

  • renzo #17 8 years ago

    "Kristan won't like me for saying it but I got a bit bored with it too. Finished the first third or something then just couldn't be arsed to pick it up again."

    I had the same problem. Finished about a 1/3, and then I went on to other games and never got back to it.

    Although I was helping my old man through the game, so I played it in bits, and I even finished the last boss for him! :)

  • Zero Beat #18 8 years ago

    It's a shame about Remedy, hopefully a similarly capable developer will get their hands on the game i.e. not Rockstar Vienna.

    I want to see a MGS - MGS2 quality makeover this time, trouble is (and it's rare that I complain about keyboard and mouse control) I can't quite see how they could add much gameplay-wise whilst keeping everything fluid to control.

  • Merefield #19 8 years ago

    @MikeD et al

    I didn't play the first game so that probably helped.

    Mona's Playground was a memorable masterpiece of a level - I wanna know which games those level designers get involved with subsequently!

    The cut-scenes were great - particular the voice acting - Payne's gruff Hollywood-PI voice was perfect for the genre.

    The voice acting in Breed by comparison is just a complete joke!

  • Fizzy #20 8 years ago

    I really enjoyed both the original and the sequel. I hope they make some changes for the third one but on the whole I thought the series has been great fun. Looking forward to the third game.

  • robo_1 #21 8 years ago

    Max Payne 2 really didn't grab me as much as the first. It all just felt like a tired re-telling of the same sorry story. I enjoy the series for it's immediate and relatively fun gameplay, and I hope a new developer injects some fresh twists to proceedings.

  • CyRUS- #22 8 years ago

    Funnily enough I never actually got into the first one, but had a lot of fun with the second... it was of course very short but i thought the phsyics using havok were a nice preview of what to expect in half-life 2 and just knocking crap over for no reason was kinda fun.

  • Royal Fool #23 8 years ago

    "Warez is so easy to blame. the thing is, most people only warez if they have an excuse."

    More like they always pirate games whenever they can to save themselves money. Any excuse will do, really; the pirates will still not get the game from the store despite saying they will/did.

  • crofty13 #24 7 years ago

    The first one was a novelty act, the second was the same but the novelty had warn off.

    What will the third one have? new realisitc rain coat physics?

  • MetalDog #25 7 years ago

    Anyone who thinks Max Payne is a wonderful noire story needs to be slapped repeatedly with a copy of 'Farewell, My Lovely' until they read it. =)

    Fun games though, on the whole.

  • Pina Verified Producer, Seed Studios, Lda. #26 7 years ago

    Maybe bullet time will have rewind and fastforward. This way who doesnt like the game can fastforward it and the fans can be constantly rewinding it.

  • Hicksy #27 7 years ago

    I never managed to get into MP2 either, it is on my to be played stack tho :p