Nine years after the events of the second game, Max Payne has retired from the NYPD and spends his days at a bar in Hoboken, New Jersey, nursing his alcoholism and an addiction to painkillers. One evening, a man named Raul Passos approaches Max, claiming to be a police academy batchmate, and offers him a new job, which Max turns down. But, during a drunk and violent argument, Max shoots the son of local mob boss Anthony DeMarco, who puts a price on his head and orders the entirety of New Jersey's crime underlings to kill Max. After killing most of his gang with Passos' help, Max decides to leave his old life behind, taking Passos' job offer as a private security contractor in South America.
