43 people found this review helpful
Not Recommended
0.0 hrs last two weeks / 695.4 hrs on record (673.2 hrs at review time)
Posted: 16 Oct, 2015 @ 4:04pm
Updated: 16 Oct, 2015 @ 4:19pm

Oh Payday 2, how much I loved you. You are the perfect example of the quote: “You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.” I rarely pre-purchase any games, but I gladly pre-purchased Career Criminal Edition and to be clear - I don't regret it at all. It was great game at the beginning. True to its core, it had better game mechanics than the first game, absolutely amazing soundtrack, and very fun gameplay. Sure, it had problems and it was far from perfect, but it was highly playable and so much fun.

Then it started with Armored Transport DLC. I got it for free, because I had Career Criminal Edition, so it seemed alright. Then it was followed by Gage Weapon Pack #01. Paying 5€ for few guns and grenades that should probably be available for everybody? I waited for sale because it didn’t seem worth it to me even back in 2013. Then we got Merry Payday Christmas Soundtrack DLC which was absolutely fantastic. Extremely cheap Payday 2 Christmas carols sang by old Hoxton. And then the hell began with insane flood of 5€ DLC weapon packs, 5€ character packs and 7€ heists. I’m warning you, the huge rant incoming!

I have to say that I surely don't have any problem with more content; I understand that it’s keeping the game alive and I don't have the problem with paying for it. However, DLCs are rarely worth the full price. Look, it's nice you're supporting developers, but we are not charity, we are customers and I'm not paying 5€ for few weapons and masks when I can get the whole games in sale for the same price. Actually, I bought Vanishing of Ethan Carter for less than 5€ the day when Gage Chivalry Pack was released. Can you seriously tell me with straight face that Gage Chivalry Pack is offering me the same level of quality like Vanishing of Ethan Carter? Anyway, I said few weapons - weapon packs also usually include materials and patterns, but let’s be honest here – nobody cares about them and it’s there just to make it look like you’re getting more stuff.

At the current state, the game has 27 paid DLCs. If your eyes skipped the number, I will say it again: TWENTY SEVEN PAID DLCS! Before some genius will come here to defend Overkill with the argument that Borderlands 2 or Saints Row games have more DLCs, so they can’t see the problem, then, my friends, first of all, those games have Season Passes which is something that Payday 2 doesn’t have, second – most of the DLCs in Borderlands 2 are purely cosmetic on the same level like mask patterns in Payday 2, third – and my favorite - at the time of writing this review, both Saints Rows 3 and 4 have less DLCs than Payday 2. Actually, at the time of writing this, you can buy Saints Row IV: Game of the Century Edition (including all DLCs) for 5,99€. Can you see the difference?

To be honest, we got some free updates as well - usually maps or some significant game updates. And you know what? They were usually very cool. And free heists like Hoxton Breakout are absolutely brilliant!

Let’s talk about more problems, like developer’s approach. 2014 was memorable for Crimefest which was pretty cool, but some awards from it took more than over a year to get which is ludicrous. To give you some example - let’s talk about the new enemy. Overkill claimed that the enemy was taking a lot of time because he had complicated voice acting. In the meantime they managed to release: Gage Historical Pack, Clover Character Pack, The Bomb Heists, Dragan Character Pack, The OVERKILL Pack, The Completely OVERKILL Pack (we will talk about it later), The Butcher’s AK/CAR Mod Pack, The Butcher’s BBQ Pack, The Butcher’s Western Pack, The OVERKILL B-Sides Soundtrack, The Alesso Heist, The Golden Grin Casino Heist, Sokol Character Pack, Gage Ninja Pack, Yakuza Character Pack and Gage Chivalry Pack. Obviously, the voice acting was the huge problem. Btw check this - http://payday.wikia.com/wiki/Captain_Winters/Quotes . Does this really take a year?

Continue time. Their PR is absolute mess. Perfect example is hilarious fiasco with Disappointment Bat when Overkill teased the community for 35 days to give it the bat and the announcement of their new game. Another pure insanity was Hype Train, which was something like Crimefest, but instead of being fueled by number of the people in the group, it was fueled by the people buying DLCs. See the problem here? It also introduced OVERKILL Pack DLC and Completely OVERKILL Pack DLC which was for 20€ and included 4 masks. You read right. 20€ FOR 4 MASKS. Oh and one surprise bonus that nobody still knows anything about! Before you defend Overkill that Completely OVERKILL Pack was meant to be the support DLC and to be a donation - do you really think that studio that acquired the Valhalla engine for 8,6 million dollars needs to beg for money like that implying that the game and 16 (back then) DLCs were not enough to fund their studio? Anyway, the Hype Train also included rushed Infamy Update which didn’t bring anything new, because it just changed the number of infamies from 5 to 25 while not giving any bonuses except for more XP bonuses so you can level up quicker. It was obviously rushed because community was very angry with Hype Train and it was meant to make Overkill look like it listens to the community feedback. After this horrible update, Overkill said that it listened to the community again and it would eventually remake the new infamy. That was few months ago and nothing really happened since then, so we can just forget that. Like the ability to upgrade the safe house. I know it’s just the running joke now, but they promised it in 2013. It’s 2015 and it’s still not here. They said it was coming in 2016, so I can't wait to see how 3 years of developing of safehouse upgrading will look like.

I think that Overkill is just pushing and pushing and pushing to see what they can get away with. Year 2015 was just a mess of new characters who have no connection to the Payday universe and nobody really cares about combined with lazy or ridiculous gun packs that don’t fit the game at all, which is of course subjective, but I don’t think that (for example) swords really fit with the modern heisting game, unless of course you’re the part of LOL SU RANDUM crowd that will buy 5€ DLC, make a le funi 69/420 review and never touch it again. DLCs went so far I just refused to buy anything new from Overkill this year. By the way, I think that Gage Chivalry Pack took the biggest piss this year with reskins and weapons clearly out of place, with visual bugs in trailer and by being paid (of course) while other games like Killing Floor 2 who collaborated with Chivalry offered Chivalry stuff for free. Only Payday 2 NEEDED paid Chivalry stuff, because Overkill is the small indie company and they have to survive somehow, am I not right?

You see, no matter how poor content is, Overkill is always hiding behind the excuse that they are the small indie company. Even if true, it doesn’t make it okay for them to release lazy, piss poor content.

So anyway, we waited for another Crimefest. I thought: “Well, it should be alright, it’s not like they can do anything more ludicrous than Hype Train, right? That would be quite a feat!” and... they pulled it off. The second Crimefest managed to bring microtransactions into the game on its first day. Yes, you have the game you pay for with 27 paid DLCs with microtransactions. It’s like CS:GO, but you have safes instead of crates and drills instead of keys. Oh and by the way, drill will cost you 2,19€. If you open the safe with your drill, you get some skin that will change your weapon stats, so it’s not actually like CS:GO at all, because skins in CS:GO are just cosmetic unlike here. Oh and weapon skins look like some 12 years old made them.

So you probably know what I'm suggesting to you - don't bother with buying this game. Not worth it anymore.
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