The Payday series (Payday & Payday 2) are my favourite games of all time! These two award winning RPG/stealth/first-person shooter action games were developed by the one and only Overkill Software. My favourite, Payday 2, won 10 awards from companies such as Polygon, IGN, Gameinformer and more at E3 for 2013. It was released on the 13th of August 2013.
Fun factor
Payday 2 has a big fun factor… well for me. Everyone I’ve bought the game for on Steam (around 8 people) has fallen in love with it the same as I have. There isn’t much of a story through the series (Payday The heist & Payday 2) the story isn’t important on the game either, similar to games such as Mortal Kombat but the gameplay is just so good that the story doesn’t matter. The game mostly revolves around the mechanic of team work which is done extremely well in this game. Unless you’re a super high level you won’t get very far on your own.
Control and gameplay
The controls are pretty basic, and like every other first-person shooter. You know… click to shoot and WASD to move sort of game. The gameplay, on the other hand, is amazing. It’s up to 4 player co-op. There is a single player mode, but that’s no fun compared to playing multiplayer with a group of friends.
Payday 2 is about bank heists… really detailed ones. Every mission starts in casing mode. You have to try not to act too suspicious. If you walk into restricted areas or if you walk too close and they can see you guns under your freshly ironed suits, the enemies will shoot. As soon as you’re ready to start the mission you can hold F to put on your own character designed mask (you can customize it soooo much!).
While your mask is on, you’re in stealth mode. You have your primary weapon out and ready to shoot. Your weapons and masks are highly customizable. You can complete missions on stealth mode and, if you’re a stealthy enough, you will get more mission rewards. If an enemy or security camera spots you then you enter action mode in which case your only plan is basically gun blazing for minutes on end with all your team mates to depend on.
Every 5-10 minutes an assault starts and Special Forces come into the map to hunt you down. There are several different types of Special Forces during assaults which the most hated is the bulldozer (an annoying guy in lots of armor with a super strong weapon that walks super slow).
Graphics
The graphics aren’t the best but they’re definitely not the worst. The games artist/s did a pretty good in my opinion for 2013. The game’s strength is its gameplay but the graphics are not terrible.
Sound
Both the games in the series (Payday The heist & Payday 2) has its own soundtrack which is certainly perfect for the missions themes within the game. The soundtrack was designed by the audio designer along with the games . The soundtrack has genre aspects ranging from drum & bass to rock & roll. Often times I would listen to the soundtrack just to get my adrenaline pumping.
Replayability
This game has a lot of replayability. It is my most played game on Steam, and probably most of my friends Steam accounts too.
By Andrew Dahl
Man, I’m glad I’ve found someone who shares my love for the Payday series! I’ve only played the second one though, but I loved it none the less. I had it on my Xbox 360, and I remember using this weird glitch in the bank heist involving a plant by the front door that made it so the police couldn’t detect me, but I was stuck crouched! It was super helpful when I had to carry my team mates. I was wondering, what’s your favorite aspect of Payday 2?