38 Max Payne Quotes From The Video Game Series

Anusuya Mukherjee
Dec 12, 2023 By Anusuya Mukherjee
Originally Published on Feb 11, 2021
Max Payne was a police detective.
Age: 0-99
Read time: 5.8 Min

Max Payne is a video game series about a former police detective whose family was tragically murdered.

The hard-hitting quotes from the main character in the Max Payne games are one of its most appealing factors. We've compiled the best of those quotes from all three games of the series.

If you're a video game fan, then you'll also love these Master Chief Quotes and Video Games Quotes.
 

Best Max Payne Quotes

These are the best quotes from Max Payne throughout the game series.

1. "He was trying to buy more sand for his hourglass. I wasn’t selling any."

- Max Payne.

2. "No Minotaur lurked in this labyrinth, but somewhere out there, on the clanking deck of his cargo freighter, the skipper of the Charon was waiting, like the ferryman of the river Styx."

- Max Payne.

3. "They were all dead. The final gunshot was an exclamation mark to everything that had led to this point. I released my finger from the trigger. And then it was over."

- Max Payne.

4. "I knew the appetite of ghosts intimately. They hungered for revenge."

- Max Payne.

5. "I wanted to dig inside my skull and scrape out the pain."

- Max Payne.

6. "The more you run, the deeper, more terrible it grows behind you, its edges yawning at your heels."

- Max Payne.

7. "But dreams have a nasty habit of going bad when you're not looking."

- Max Payne.

8. "I don't know about angels, but it's fear that gives men wings."

- Max Payne.

9. "The past is a gaping hole. You try to run from it, but the more you run, the deeper, more terrible it grows behind you, its edges yawning at your heels."

- Max Payne.

10. "Your only chance is to turn around and face it. But it's like looking down into the grave of your love, or kissing the mouth of a gun, a bullet trembling in its dark nest, ready to blow your head off."

- Max Payne.

Max Payne 1 Quotes

Here are the best quotes from Max Payne 1.

Max Payne is a third-person shooter video-game.

11. "Vinnie Gognitti: You - you can't just kill me in cold blood!

Max Payne: You just keep telling yourself that."

- Max Payne 1.

12. "Nothing is a cliché when it's happening to you."

- Max Payne.

13. "There was nothing I could do. He was dead. I could tell by the empty accusing stare of his eyes."

- Max Payne.

14. "Relax, Max. You're a nice guy. I don't kill nice guys."

- Mona Sax.

15. "Vlad was one of those old time bad guys with honor and morals, which almost made him one of the good guys. None of us was a saint."

- Max Payne.

16. "God. I turned out to be such a damsel in distress."

- Mona Sax.

17. "When the darkness fell, New York City became something else, any old Sinatra song notwithstanding. Bad things happened in the night, on the streets of that other city. Noir York City."

- Max Payne.

18. "I didn't like the way the show started, but they had given me the best seat in the house: front row center."

- Max Payne.

19. "The flesh of fallen angels! Come to me, all!... Astaroth, Beelzebub, Asmodeus, Baphomet, Lucifer, Loki, Satan, Cthulhu, Lilith, Hela! Blood to you all!"

- Jack Lupino.

20. "Life was good. The sun setting on a sweet summer's day. The smell of freshly mowed lawns, the sounds of children playing. A house across the river on the Jersey side. A beautiful wife and a baby girl. The American Dream come true."

- Max Payne.

Max Payne 2 Quotes

Here are the best quotes from Max Payne 2.

21. "One last thing left to do. I was compelled to give Vlad his gun back... one bullet at a time."

- Max Payne.

22. "Vlad was right. There are no choices. Nothing but a straight line. The illusion comes afterwards, when you ask 'Why me?' and 'What if?' when you look back, see the branches, like a pruned bonsai tree, or a forked lightning."

- Max Payne.

23. "If you think nothing can get to you, you're lying to yourself."

- Max Payne.

24. "Like all the bad things in my life, it started with the death of a woman. I couldn't save her."

- Max Payne.

25. "The past is a puzzle, like a broken mirror. As you piece it together, you cut yourself, your image keeps shifting. And you change with it. It could destroy you, drive you mad. It could set you free."

- Max Payne.

26. "I want to sleep, to forget. To change the past. My wife and baby girl back."

- Max Payne.

27. "Hypothetically, if the only choice you've got is to do the wrong thing, then it's not really the wrong thing, it's more like fate."

- Vladimir 'Vlad' Lem.

28. "Without Mona's help, I'd be a dead man. Suddenly, for the first time in I don't know how long, I realized, I didn't wish to be dead."

- Max Payne.

29. "The dead had plenty to say. And once they started, they would never shut up. Their words would keep you awake at night. The bodies, all the evidence of all the murders the cleaners had done, all the answers. It would take days to dig through it."

- Max Payne.

30. "The genius of the hole: no matter how long you spend climbing out, you can still fall back down in an instant."

- Max Payne.

31. "Einstein was right. Time is relative to the observer. When you're looking down the barrel of a gun time slows down, your whole life flashes by, heartbreak and scars. Stay with it, and you can live a lifetime in that split second."

- Max Payne.

Max Payne 3 Quotes

Here are the best quotes from Max Payne 3.

32. "I needed to get to my unhappy place."

- Max Payne.

33. "I ain't slipping, man. I'm slipped."

- Max Payne.

34. "Say what you want about Americans but we understand capitalism. You buy yourself a product and you get what you pay for, and these chumps had paid for some angry gringo without the sensibilities to know right from wrong."

- Max Payne.

35. "I didn't think there was anything left of him to fill a grave."

- Max Payne.

36. "I needed something to improve my game."

- Max Payne.

37. "The way I see it there's two types of people, those who spend their lives trying to build a future and those who spend their lives trying to rebuild the past."

- Max Payne.

38. "Time was a luxury I couldn't afford."

- Max Payne.

Here at Kidadl, we have carefully created lots of interesting family-friendly quotes for everyone to enjoy! If you liked our suggestions for Max Payne quotes then why not take a look at Mass Effect quotes, or [Sally Face quotes].

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Written by Anusuya Mukherjee

Bachelor of Arts and Law specializing in Political Science and Intellectual Property Rights

Anusuya Mukherjee picture

Anusuya MukherjeeBachelor of Arts and Law specializing in Political Science and Intellectual Property Rights

With a wealth of international experience spanning Europe, Africa, North America, and the Middle East, Anusuya brings a unique perspective to her work as a Content Assistant and Content Updating Coordinator. She holds a law degree from India and has practiced law in India and Kuwait. Anusuya is a fan of rap music and enjoys a good cup of coffee in her free time. Currently, she is working on her novel, "Mr. Ivory Merchant".

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