page_title: Max Payne (character)
section_title: Character development
hierarchical_section_title: Max Payne (character) / Character development
caption_attribution_description: English: Sam Lake (Sami Järvi) at the Electronic Entertainment Expo - E3 - 2005-18-05
context_page_description: Max Payne is a fictional character and the playable protagonist of the neo-noir video game series of the same name. Max was introduced in the 2001 third-person shooter Max Payne, which was written by Sam Lake and developed by Remedy Entertainment. The game's publisher, 3D Realms, intended Max to serve as the "foundation of a new gaming franchise". In the first game, the character was portrayed by Lake, with Timothy Gibbs and James McCaffrey later taking over the role, and consistently voiced by McCaffrey. Mark Wahlberg portrayed Max in the film adaptation. The first game in the series presents the story as retold by Max from his point of view, while the sequel, Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, alternates between his and that of the femme fatale character Mona Sax.
  In the original Max Payne, Max is an NYPD police detective and an undercover special agent for the DEA. Max becomes a vigilante following the murder of his family and, later, the murder of his police partner, which he was framed for. Later, he returns to the department as a detective before his life is soon shattered by death and betrayal.
context_section_description: In the creation of Max Payne, the publisher 3D Realms "wanted to develop another strong character that would be the foundation for a new gaming franchise, much like we [3D Realms] had done with Duke Nukem." The titular character of Max Payne was originally named Max Heat, and 3D Realms spent over $20,000 worldwide trademarking this name before someone at the company suggested the last name Payne, which was immediately adopted. He was modeled after Sam Lake (Sami Järvi), who wrote the game's story and script for the Finnish company Remedy Entertainment. Lake also dressed up and played this role for the graphic novel-style cutscenes. For Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, however, Lake declined the role. Due to having a much larger budget this time, the developers were able to hire professional actors, choosing Timothy Gibbs to be the new model for Max.
  In both games, Max's voice actor was James McCaffrey. McCaffrey recalled: "Originally, I’d worked on a show called Swift Justice, and there were some similarities between the two characters in terms of them both having experienced some family tragedy and were familiar with the concept of vengeance, but there weren’t any specific characters that Max is based on." In an early announcement from Rockstar Games (the franchise's new developer and publisher), Max's voice actor was to be recast with an older actor. In the end, however, McCaffrey did return to the role of Max in Max Payne 3, for which he also provided the motion capture material. McCaffrey said that performing motion capture helped match the dialogue to the scenes and compared it to "having to act in Avatar."
  Payne's look changed significantly for the third game, featuring an older, bald and bearded Max; this move received overwhelmingly negative reactions. In response, Rockstar Games made changes to the game, as Max's appearance shifts over the course of the game, including his 'classic' appearance during flashbacks of his time in New Jersey. According to Rockstar's Sam Houser, "This is Max as we've never seen him before, a few years older, more world-weary and cynical than ever." McCaffrey compared Max in the third game to Charles Bronson's character Paul Kersey in the film Death Wish.
caption: Sam Lake created the character; his face was used in the original Max Payne
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