1914...

A war erupts across the world like no other.
Cheered throughout the nations, celebrated to be the war to end all wars.
It's coming was warned by many in the know, heeded by none in power.

All had different expectations out of this greater war.
Some to regain power to their declining empires, some to build new nations and others to see old rivalries buried forever in victory.
But all had one expectation that they shared; Just another war like any other, human against human.
They were all at fault.

Enter, Hiram Maxim.
An ordinary man with a love for the technical, was the inception of what is to come.
Having the idea of cycling a gun with the power of the machine itself, he created a future of death.
His body of flesh long gone, but his legacy of the repeating machine lives strong.
Last qualities of the human spirit was extinguished in the new war, dominated by the machine forever.

Soldiers hid in mud castles and prayed desperately as the screaming maw of the artillery rained explosive death upon them.
Colors and flags diminished, forgotten and shunned. Replaced by the earthen tones to hide and survive from the eye in the scope, least the sniping bullet will catch them.
The safety of numbers and the camaraderie was reaped in the hundreds of thousands by the scything bolt.
The too proud standards of nations was now shy to face the machine that can strike without mercy or care.
Even those who pride themselves in military rank and status removed their elaborate caps and hid them, least the machine's deadly gaze would find them.

New deaths were invented which was never seen before. Ones of chemicals and fire, flying and submerging.
And a great tally the machine reaped on it's new adversary, the human.

Numbers, strength, quality, bravery and honor became empty words against the cold precision of the machine.
All vanished with the pull of a trigger.

Eventually this great war has ended and the century lived on, only to see stronger, faster and better machines.
At the last straw, the machine reached the power to end all life. And it's monkey creators ducked and covered as they did so long ago where the rumble of a thunder terrified them.

Machine stood over the world in terrible glory, it's gaze looking down at the civilized monkeys below.
From the physical dominance it went to neural, integrating thinking humans into a programmed system of electromagnetic commercial lunacy.

In that long past war the reaper of all men was born. It reaped a great tally in lives and in thoughts.
And much like any other system of power it had a single name...

MAXIM

Survive the horrors of the Great War through the eyes of a MAXIM gunner. Hold off enemy waves with the legendary first machine guns, call in inhuman artillery and try to survive the dreaded trenchworks where death in many guises wait for you.
All the while mind the new death by keeping your early prototype gasmask on and endlessly maintaining the MAXIM gun just to keep firing.
Oh and remember to seek out the Lady every once in a while, least you go insane.