Max Payne 3

Rockstar Studios' 2012 sequel moves Max from snowbound New York to São Paulo, replaces the graphic-novel panels with a colour-graded, jump-cut visual language, and keeps the one thing that mattered: shootdodge. Diving sideways in slow motion while firing remains the most satisfying single action in third-person shooting, and here it is backed by Euphoria physics, so Max collides with furniture, slams into walls and stays where he lands rather than snapping back to a stance. Every bullet in the final kill of an encounter is tracked in a slow-motion camera that follows the round in. The cover system and the deliberate weight of the animation frustrated people who wanted the looser feel of the older games, and that is a genuine trade rather than a flaw. James McCaffrey's narration carries a story about a private-security job that is obviously rotten from the first hour, and the game is candid that Max is an alcoholic rather than a stylish loner. Its multiplayer is long dead; the campaign is not.