When first revealed a while back, Payday: The Heist was a fantastic concept. Robbing banks and generally being a criminal with four friends sounded like a dream come true—and a fun one at that. However, the game I got my hands on wasn’t quite as much fun as I would have hoped.
| Release Date | October 18, 2011 |
| Genre | First-Person Shooter |
| Platforms | PS3/PC |
| Developer | Overkill Software |
| Price | $19.99 US |
| ESRB Rating | Mature |
| Players | 1-4 |
Gameplay
Payday is a cooperative first-person shooter that spans six distinct missions. Those missions can be played with up to 4 human players online or up to 3 bots offline, with the option of having a player/bot mix online. Some upgrades are similar to Call of Duty and become unlocked through leveling. There are 140 levels, and it doesn’t take much time to level up if you’re a skilled player. However, the three separate skill trees are not apparent, as they’re never adequately explained. You’ll unlock different upgrades, items, weapons, and even bonuses while leveling up. These unlocks all depend on which of the three skill trees you choose. Generally, these trees allow you to become a great team, with each person having a different specialty, which is a welcome part of the game.
Presentation
Payday’s presentation is somewhat lacking in many areas. The menu for the matchmaking portion of online multiplayer is substandard, which is a great cause for concern. It took over two weeks for a patch from Overkill to arrive, making it so there’s a decent chance of getting into a game with any players, which is unacceptable, as that’s when it was at its best.
There are some good aspects to the presentation, though, such as the colorful missions and teammate indicators that were reminiscent of Left 4 Dead, and in essence, that is what Payday reminds me of as a whole. However, let’s go back to the negatives – the audio. In my opinion, the voice-overs were lackluster. They made the game feel exceptionally repetitive and monotonous.
Payday has some good and bad gameplay elements. I found it to be a lot of fun to complete all of the objectives with friends or even people online who understand what they’re doing, but when you’re stuck on a single player or with a lousy team who plays only for themselves, it can frustrate you like no other. This is simply a case where playing with friends is almost a must. The objectives will keep you busy for a while, but completing these objectives with your pals will make for a much more enjoyable experience overall.
Shooting
The shooting isn’t very accurate. I honestly felt as though I shot a lot of enemies without ever really aiming accurately at them. The objectives are essentially an R2 fest, holding R2 down until your meter is complete. This gets old very quickly. This action is used throughout the game for various functions – from setting objectives to picking up ammo. The variety throughout the levels combats this a little, but after about an hour, you’ll look for something more interesting to play.
Copy & Paste
Perhaps I’m not being fair to this new IP, but there are numerous flaws in the game that prevent me from enjoying many aspects of it. It was a fair attempt at best from Overkill to create something different, but I can’t help but feel that they just copied and pasted the better elements from many other hit games in hopes of making a good formula. It didn’t work. I already mentioned Call of Duty and Left 4 Dead in this article, and that’s precisely what this game felt like to me: a feeble attempt to mesh those two games with the interesting idea of being a criminal on the loose, heisting.
There’s a lot more that needs to be ironed out within this game for me even to consider returning to it and making another attempt. How about some different scenarios for regular levels? More levels themselves would be nice. Less clipping, which the patch has helped with, but has not eliminated the issue. A cop should not appear directly before me, which seemed absurd.
A List of Issues
The audio could use a nice overhaul. Some more lines for characters during heists have made their way onto my wish list. Worst of all is the online portion, which desperately needs a matchmaking option for difficulty, scenario, and the same player level. A level 10 can barely get into a game with a level 70, as I’ve seen dozens of times. The low-level player always finds themselves kicked from the game server. This needs to be considered and addressed when the next batch of fixes arrives. Who knows if they will even come?
Final Thoughts
Payday: The Heist is mildly enjoyable in short playthroughs, but it requires friends and further refinement to become a better overall experience. The graphics were decent, the variety of enemies was great, the environments were nicely detailed (including Vaio laptops), and the leveling system was excellent. Unfortunately, that’s where the positives end.
