Derelict Frog said:
Seems weird that you'd immediately decide not to buy a game based on this one random guy who played it, and not the stellar review under which your comment resides...
Also people keep seeming to equate noir with darkness and New York. Having completed Max Payne 1 and 2 there I can outright say that if it weren't for the game specifically saying that you were in New York you would have had no idea that you were there. It could have been any big city at night really. Apart from meaning black in French, noir doesn't have to be set at night. It's just a descriptor for a piece of work that emphasises sex and cynicism.
There's more to noir than that.
It's not just sex and cynicism. Noir is what you get when you fuse crime fiction with existentialism. There's more to it than cynical monologues. Most of the main characters in Noir are given to introspection, and tend to wonder about stuff like the nature of fate, destiny, life, etc. It's the contrast of high-minded ideas like this with the low down, everyday grubbiness of crime that gives Noir its particular flavour. Noir is detective fiction with a dual-Masters in Psychology and Philosophy. And that's what the original Max Payne games played on. They ramped up the introspection and the existentialism to ludicrous levels, but still managed to create a genuinely emotional, involving narrative. As someone already mentioned above, it's like how Quentin Tarantino at his best is able to blow up the tropes of cinema while still telling an involving story.
As for New York... as has already been said, New York was more than just a setting for the MP games, it was an integral character. So much of the action took place in dismal tenement buildings, abandoned construction yards, district hospitals. The New York setting was absolutely crucial to nailing the atmosphere of the Max Payne games. Hell, in the first game, the fact that New York was going through an unprecedented winter played a huge part in establishing the gloomy mood of the story.
You can't just throw a character into a slum, but up some blind shadows and monologuing, and call it 'noir'. The first two Max Payne games were built on the idea of Max being trapped in this particular environment from which he couldn't escape. The entire setting of New York in Max Payne was designed to be a bleak, hostile, grim environment against which the developers could integrate their larger themes and subtext. I don't see how Sao Paulo can offer the same when its a city to which Max has no connection, and no real reason to stay in beyond "bodyguard contract."
I could be wrong, but it just doesn't seem to offer the same atmosphere as 'Noir York'.