8 Video Games Where The True Ending Is The Bad Ending
4. Max Payne 2
Poor old Max Payne. The guy really can't catch a break, can he?
His family is murdered by drug addicts, his life is broken apart by crime families, and he can't even get to enjoy his "power look" aka tropical shirt and bald dome without some cheeky whippets trying to photobomb his holiday snaps by shooting him in the gut every five minutes.
Adding to the pile of misery that is his life is the death of Mona Sax, another soul on a quest for revenge that ends, as most things do when in the company of Max in a world of Payne. Her final moments see her unable to kill Max thanks to the growing chemistry between the pair, and she's shot for her inability to get the job done, as she bleeds out Max kisses her and the audience wept at the death of this rather brilliantly written character.
However, hope remained, as complete Max Payne 2 on the hardest setting "Dead on Arrival", and you unlock an ending in which Mona lived, after likely hours of perseverance.
Unfortunately, the ending wasn't the truth as it turned out this much more upbeat ending wasn't canon, meaning players were forced back into the bleak reality of her death once Max Payne 3 fired up years later.