Developer Rockstar Games has announced a March 2012 release window for Max Payne 3, as well as confirming multiplayer functionality and certain story details.

The multiplayer mode, which is a first for the Max Payne series, will involve dynamically altered maps, with a levelling system, clan support and weapon selection all confirmed as core features.

The singleplayer campaign will meanwhile pick up where Max Payne 2 finished, with a shattered Max so haunted by his past that he flees to Brazil and gets a job as a bodyguard for a family.

Naturally, it isn't long before things kick off - gangs target the family and Max, refusing to see another family ruined, grabs his pistols and starts jumping through the air in slow-motion.

Multiple Rockstar studios are collaborating on the project, which will use Natural Motion physics and a new version of Rockstar's Advanced Game Engine.

A third-person cover system is confirmed, as is bullet-time.

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