This is one of those stories that hits close to home. You see, I am the ultimate Max Payne fanboy. I own both games on all available platforms, I can quote almost every line of dialogue from both games from memory, and… hell, my screenname on Yahoo, Xbox LIVE, PSN and every message board is “MaximusPaynicus”, so my fanboyism is not to be denied.

Max Payne: Payne and Redemption was a fan film. A work of love from director Fergle Gibson and producer Luke Morgan-Rowe that has been in production since 2006, which has cost the pair tens of thousands of pounds (£10,000 = $19,750). It had not just long time fans of the game series foaming at the mouth, but had independent filmmakers talking too. Hell, Sam Lake, the writer of both Max Payne titles (and member of a kick ass band) gave this fan film his blessing.

And now it’s dead. Killed, because of Twentieth Century Fox.

I understand a studio wanting to protect the copyrights they spent millions on, but this is ridiculous. Other companies, such as DC Comics, LucasFilm, and the granddaddy of them all, Paramount Studios and the nine billion Star Trek fan projects, allow fan films to be made — hell, LucasFilm openly supports the development of fan projects, such as Chad Vader. In my views, if you take out a project like Payne & Redemotion, you have to go after half of YouTube.

I don’t know about you guys, but I, for one, will not be seeing the Fox adaptation of Max Payne. Not just because of this, but because Hollywood has found a way to fuck up every single video game adaptation they have been tasked with, I’m not sure if I can stomach seeing my favorite franchise get raped right before my eyes.

Max Payne is expected to see an October 17th, 2008 release.

Popularity: unranked [?]