Payday 3 is playable only on PS5 and offers co-op heist-focused shooting. While it had an awful launch, Overkill Software has since released numerous updates, quality-of-life changes and content. Granted, it’s still not at the level of Payday 2, but it could satisfy longtime fans who want to try something new.

High on Life and Pac-Man World Re-Pac are playable on PS4 and PS5. The former is a first-person shooter from Squanch Games with Rick and Morty-esque humor as players battle an alien cartel to save humanity. The latter is a remake of 2004’s Pac-Man World, a 3D platformer unlike its arcade brethren (though the original classic is unlockable).

All three titles will be available until March 3rd. Check out this month’s offerings here, including Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.

The High Octane Tailor Pack features two outfits in 4 varieties each, 6 masks, and 2 pairs of gloves. The general theme for the High Octane Tailor Pack is the biker gang aesthetic.

The High Octane Tailor Pack is a single part of the 4-DLC Lost in Transit bundle, which is going to see content released over the course of three months. The bundle as a whole is already available to buy, priced at $9.99 Buying the whole bundle will get players access to every DLC part of the bundle as they are released.

As part of the Lost in Transit bundle, Payday 2 will get the Tijuana Music Pack on August 31, McShay Weapon Pack 2 on September 21, and the bundle will wrap up with the release of the Lost in Transit heist.

Lost in Transit as a bundle is set to be a chapter of the Texas Heat campaign, which will see its story continue over time.

Wonnevi revealed that Payday 3 will be set in New York, and described the world as “a living, enormous representation of the city.” The game will be set several year after Payday 2, and the original gang from the first game – Dallas, Hoxton, Chains, and Wolf – will step back into the limelight, who will be forced back into a life of crime for reasons that weren’t revealed.

Meanwhile, Wonnevi also said that Payday 3’s world has “transitioned into the digital age”, and that software giants, crypto currencies, mass surveillance, and the dark web will all be playing a role in the game’s story, impacting everything from new gadgets in the game to challenges and opportunities.

New artwork for Payday 3 has also been revealed. It’s not gameplay, but at least it’s something- check it out below.

Payday 3 is currently targeting a 2023 launch, and will be published by Prime Matter, Koch Media’s newest publishing label.

It’s been a long slow process for Payday 3, Starbreeze’s latest sequel in the acclaimed heist franchise. But it appears that development is making some headway. The official Payday 2 Twitter confirmed that the game is in the design phase and will run on Unreal Engine.

Unfortunately, the release date is still “TBA” and we still don’t know if it’s coming to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S or planned to be a cross-gen title. Production began as far back as February 2017 but even in October 2019, the company said that fans would have to wait a long time for it. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic this year, plans for publishing Payday 3 had faced some snags back in May.

Nevertheless, it’s in the works, though why Starbreeze decided to tease it again now is unknown. Perhaps a bigger announcement is coming in the next few months? Stay tuned for more details as always. Payday 2 is currently available for PC, Xbox One, PS4, Xbox 360, PS3 and Nintendo Switch.

ACCESS: PAYDAY TWITTER MAN
MEMBER COUNT: 100,000

REQUEST RECEIVED, ACCESSING CRIMENET…

CONNECTING…

ONLINE.

TIME: 13:37

STATUS PAYDAY 3

☑️CONFIRMED
☑️DESIGN PHASE
☑️RELEASE DATE TBA
☑️UNREAL ENGINE pic.twitter.com/fqnWYEaCSg

— PAYDAY 3 (@PAYDAYGame) October 3, 2020

The company behind the wildly successful Payday series hit some very…odd troubles over the last few years. The company has had a string of resignations and reconstructions that seemingly brought the company to the edge. But apparently, they have survived to live another day and heist at least one more job (or well, hopefully, anyway). Unfortunately, it’s not particularly good news at the moment as it seems their next big job, Payday 3, has hit some virus-related snags. 

Starbreeze released their financial results for the first quarter of 2020. On the good side, it seems the company has managed to cut their losses by a decent amount, going from $17 million in Q1 2019 to $9.9 million now. The not so great news however, is it seems plans on Payday 3 have been affected to at least some degree. CEO Mikael Nermark has that talks with potential publishers are still ongoing, but due to the various different travel restrictions surrounding COVID-19, it’s “somewhat impeded ongoing discussions.” So, it sounds like there still isn’t a solid publishing plan in place (Thanks to GamesIndustry for transcribing the report).

Just to give you an idea of how important Payday 3 will be to Starbreeze, in that same finical report it was revealed the Payday series accounted for 99% of Q1 sales and is essentially all the company has left at this point. We’ve heard brief snippets about Payday 3 here and there, though it’s still probably a good ways off. It seems that a lot is riding on the game for the company, so fingers crossed all goes according to plan.

BUNGIE-ACTIVISION SPLIT

2019 kicked off with a bang, with Bungie and Activision ending their partnership. With Activision deeming Destiny 2 and its expansions’ performances to be unsatisfactory and with Bungie disagreeing with that, and with both of them differing on how to take the series forward, the two entities ended their 10 year agreement prematurely, with Bungie retaining the rights to Destiny, and deciding to self-publish all future games in the series. This also resulted in Destiny 2 finally coming to Steam. For fans of the series, these were all positive developments, and we can’t wait to see what the future holds for Destiny.

]]> 425472 https://gamingbolt.com/payday-2-console-versions-will-receive-no-more-updates-for-foreseeable-future https://gamingbolt.com/payday-2-console-versions-will-receive-no-more-updates-for-foreseeable-future#respond Fri, 13 Dec 2019 12:45:45 +0000 https://gamingbolt.com/?p=425352

Over the years, there’s been several cautionary tales, of sorts, of developers or publishers who grew too fast and ended up crashing because of it. One such unfortunate example was Starbreeze, whose Payday series saw huge success which saw them expand at a rate that eventually came back to haunt them. They seem to be trying to get back on track with reviving active development for Payday 2, but it’s come with some drawbacks on the console side.

As announced via a blog post from the developer, the console versions of the games are soon to be behind update wise. They acknowledge that keeping up with consoles has been a huge issue for them and say that after the current console update 1.5, it may be a good while before we see any significant updates on PS4 and Xbox One.

“Consoles has always been something of an Achilles heel in our production pipeline and while we’ve made several efforts through the years to strengthen the team and effectivising the PC production to better align to consoles, it hasn’t been enough. As of April 2019, the PAYDAY 2: Crime Wave Edition with its DLC’s is almost caught up to PC, but not quite.

“We’ve had to look at the future console updates from our situation as it looks today, with the limitations that we have, rather than looking back at what has been said and done before and make choices accordingly, even though they might not be what we wish them to. We simply have too many constraints in available manpower to be able to fix the situation in the short term. We see this as an opportunity to, at least, be as forthcoming as we can be regarding the road map ahead.

“To be clear as can be, we will out of necessity, at this time, have to accept disparity between the PC and Consoles versions for PAYDAY 2 going forward.”

The Nintendo Switch version of the game is looking to fare even worse as they say due to the outsourced nature of the port, updating it would take too much work. It seems there will be no updates at all for that version going forward.

“We’re very sad to announce that PAYDAY 2 for Nintendo Switch will be very unlikely to see further updates, despite what our initial ambitions were on the contrary. As per above, we’ve been forced to make many hard decisions along the road, and this is yet another. To put the Switch version separately into context, the transfer of the game over to the Switch-platform was not made in-house and would require significant further investments to happen.”

Well, it seems as if the revived development of the game will mostly center around the PC version, as Starbreeze does what it can to get everything back on track. It’s obviously a very disappointing thing for those on consoles, but maybe Payday 3, should it actually happen, will be different.

Payday 3 has been a long time coming. We first heard about it all the way back in 2016, while the game reportedly entered production the following year, while in 2018, reports emerged that Starbreeze had raised funds to help with the game’s development. There have been next to no updates on the shooter since then- but Starbreeze assures that it is coming, even if it takes a while.

In an update talking about estimates of future cashflow, Starbreeze said that it expects to see a rise in revenue in the coming years, and as one of the reasons for that boost, it mentioned an expected launch of Payday 3 in the 2022-23 financial year. That’s all that was said about the game, but considering that time frame, a release on next gen consoles (and PC, of course) seems obvious.

Starbreeze have been going through some tough times of late. Owing to the failure of Overkill’s The Walking Dead – developed by Payday developers Overkill Software – the company faced major financial losses. That said, Payday has been a proven success for both of them in the past, and doubtless, they’ll be hoping that the sequel – far away though it might be – brings them some respite from their financial woes.

Skybound Entertainment announced earlier today that it had terminated its contract with Starbreeze Studios for Overkill’s The Walking Dead. This was because the game “did not meet our standards nor is it the quality that we were promised”, as per Skybound. In a follow-up statement, Starbreeze have revealed that due to this license-related complaint, the game is “expected to be removed” from Steam in the near future.

“Skybound, the license holder of OVERKILL’s The Walking Dead, has filed a license related complaint with the main digital distribution platform for the Starbreeze game OVERKILL’s The Walking Dead. As a consequence, the product is expected to be removed from new purchases on Steam within a near future,” said the publisher.

If you’re wondering about the fate of season 2 and its content, then there might be some hope. The two companies are currently discussing the same and looking for an “amicable solution with the ambition to finish and deliver Season 2 of the game, as previously communicated.” Starbreeze’s acting CEO Mikael Nermark further stated, “We are deeply sorry for the issues this may cause anyone who has bought the game looking forward to the resolution of Season 2 and are working urgently to attempt to resolve the issue. Please keep an eye on the official OTWD channels for further news.”

Overkill’s The Walking Dead released in November 2018 for PC, with the console versions being delayed to 2019. It released underwhelming responses from critics, and according to reports from behind-the-scenes, the actual game was put together over just a year and a half of development. Overkill Software continued to support it with post-launch story missions, but the game’s sales were lower than expected, having a “negative impact on fourth-quarter earnings” for Starbreeze.

Overkill’s The Walking Dead has been stumbling from one disaster to another- after a very troubled development cycle, the game launched to disappointing sales, which has led to some serious financial troubles for publishers Starbreeze. There had been reports recently that the PS4 and the Xbox One version of the game – which was originally due out this month but got delayed – had been cancelled, following PS4 owners receiving emails from Sony regarding the same.

However, 505 Games, who are in charge of publishing the console version of Overkill’s The Walking Dead, have clarified that that is not the case- the game isn’t cancelled, just delayed – as announced earlier – to allow development on the product to be finished. The publisher says more news on the game’s release will be shared “as soon as possible”.

The console version of the game hasn’t exactly had a smooth schedule so far. Even before it got delayed out of February, it was originally supposed to launch in November of last year, simultaneously with the game’s PC version, before it received its first delay.

We just wanted to clear the position on the OVERKILL’s The Walking Dead on console and confirm that the game has not been cancelled, purely postponed whilst development is on-going. We will share further news as soon as possible.

— 505 Games (@505_Games) February 20, 2019