PAYDAY: THE HEIST
FIRST LOOK Welcome to the world of greasemen, getaways and greed
Banks robbers are badass. John Dillinger, Jesse James, Hans Gruber. They may be breaking all kinds of laws, but dammit, they’re
sticking it to The Man. They’re people we
daydream about—something newly
formed Overkill Studios picked up on
when diving into its first release, Payday:
The Heist. “It’s one of those concepts that
once you see it in action, you understand
that it’s brilliant and wonder why no one
has done it before,” says creative director
Simon Viklund. “We went boldly into the
pre-planning phase with the firm convic-
tion that Dane Cook was right when he
said—‘more than sex,
every guy wants to be part
of a heist.’”
Fair enough. The
premise for this online
co-op cop shooter is
simple: team up with
three friends to infiltrate,
rob, and escape from a
bank. It initially looks and
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PUBLISHER
Sony Online
Entertainment
DEVELOPER
Overkill Studios
LINK
www.overkill
software.com/
payday
plays like Left 4 Dead, albeit with capitalist
zombies rather than actual undead.
But there are a number of things that set
Payday apart. For starters, there’s an XP
system which allows players to level up
and unlock new weapons and perks. This
ties in with Payday’s use of character
classes and skill trees. Simon explains
further: “The Assault, Support and
Sharpshooter classes are the branches of
the skills tree, and you switch between
these branches at any point to change
what your reward will be at the next level.”
In other words, you’re not restricted to
the equipment of any one class. For
instance, you can level up with the
Support class and unlock a machinegun,
then switch to the Assault class and earn a
shotgun, before fooling around as the
Sharpshooter and gaining trip mines. You
can then combine all of these weapons
into one loadout, tailored to whatever
heist you’re carrying out. Viklund goes
on: “the specialty branches are a way to
categorize the upgrades you can get, but
once you actually have the upgrades you’re
not limited by any pre-defined
specialties.”
The developers are also eager to empha-
size that this is a cooperative game: “We
put all of our love into that aspect of the
product. A team of complete strangers
should still be able to fully trust one
another and work together like a tight
crew.” There are certainly plenty of
It initially looks and
plays like Left 4
Dead, albeit with
capitalist zombies.
rewards for teamwork. The more robbers
that make it to the getaway vehicle, the
more XP you’ll get. Cornered by an FBI
agent? Tag him, and he’ll be flagged on
your teammates’ screens, encouraging
your squad to focus their firepower. If
you’re a high-level player who rolls with
