With an over saturation of FPS games that make you fight monsters or soldiers, Payday: The Heist offers a new perspective in fps and a new co-op experience. With satisfying shooting, fast pace running with long periods of waiting, Payday offers a nice alternative to the fps genre. Taking ques from such games as Left 4 Dead, in a much smaller area is this game worth the time? Or is it just better to stick to those triple A titles.

Payday: The Heist revolves around four highly trained men. Chains, Dallas, Hoxton, and Wolf are all professional heist men. Though you may think you would be robbing banks you will only be going after one. From jewels to cash these men are paid to take on the police and get the prize. With the locations ranging from crack houses to office buildings, it seems semi diverse though currently there are only 6 heists at launch. With the announcement of Wolf Pack and No Mercy, Payday is going to receive at least 2 more heists from wolf pack and an undetermined amount from No Mercy.

It plays much like a standard shooter. Aiming down sights, shooting, and hiding in cover make it feel just fine while fighting the AI. There is no competitive mode and is simply cooperative, with 4 players going through a large area, vertically or horizontally depending on the heist and must preform objectives which can take 5-20 minutes depending on maintenance of certain devices. Since objectives can “jam” they require some attention to reactivate them. Usually there are 2-3 objectives that range from drilling locks open, explosives, or trading specific hostages for codes. Players that are shot go into a last stand state where they need to be rescued after a certain amount of time until they are arrested. Arrested players are essentially dead till a certain amount of time goes by on lower difficulties, or releasing hostages to the police as a trade. Each player can carry up to 3 different weapons at any given time. A primary weapon, a secondary weapon and a pistol along with additional equipment and perks which are unlocked through game progress.

Players level up their accounts by successfully completely heists and killing cops along with performing tasks such as taking hostages or resupplying the team with ammo and health. Leveling up is split into 3 classes with a 4th coming on the way. Switching between classes is required in-game to level them up if needed. Leveling up specific classes gives new weaponry, weapon upgrades, character upgrades which can be used at anytime when chosen during the weapon selection screen.

Payday: The Heist is an excellent example of an Indie game using an existing formula in a new fresh way. With a nice emphasis of being penalized for killing civilians keeps the idea that these men are professionals and will only fight cops and are not just random killers. At a 20 dollar price tag on steam and 4 player co-op it’s hard to pass up playing with friends.

8/10

Written by David Trout

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