Rockstar this week released a video demonstrating some of the new features in the upcoming Max Payne 3, highlighting targeting and shooting, movement and animation, artificial intelligence and Bullet Time.

The most exciting of these features is undoubtedly Bullet Time; every single bullet fired in the game is physically modelled in real time by the game engine.

Bullet Time is used by 'kill-cam' shots to dramatically show off final deaths, resulting in cinematic-quality, slow-motion footage of deaths, complete with slasher movie-levels of blood and gore.

"Each one [death] is unique, responding to your choice of weapon, the point of impact and a real-time natural motion euphoria animation reaction," Rockstar says, resulting in some truly impressive death scenes.

The shooting and movement mechanics of Max Payne 3 have been tuned to "combine the precision of a first-person shooter with a connection to the character that you get with third-person games." This results in highly accurate shooting, while allowing the character to twist and turn smoothly and realistically.

Enemy intelligence varies depending on who they are, and they "respond uniquely to weapon hits depending on each weapons force, angle of hit, animation pose, and environment around them."

All of these features combine, says Rockstar, to create an "intensely cinematic, non-stop action experience."

Max Payne 3 comes after years of delays and speculation, and follows Max to Brazil as he tried to move on from his past, but soon falls into the wrong company and gets involved in the gangs of Sao Paulo. The first official trailer (below) was show by Rockstar in September, and the game is set for release in March 2012.