PayDay 2 Hands-on and Interview

PayDay 2 is the four-player co-op sequel to 2011’s team shooter PayDay: The Heist. As a team of bank robbers, you work your way up from robbing convenience stores to banks and art galleries.

The mission lobby starts out with a group leader who’s responsible for getting “assets”, information on the job that will make things slightly easier, depending on your playstyle. In Framing Frame, we spent money to unlock a new access point – entry through the roof which allowed us to drop in behind the guards and climb down a covered sculpture to find the valuable artwork.

As you might expect for a four-player co-op game, you really do need teamwork. Each person brings their own equipment and supplies so for god’s sake make sure someone has an ammo bag. IF you’re going in guns blazing, it’s probably a good idea to bring a medi-kit as well. Weapons can be customised for low visibility and silent shooting or maximum intimidation.

At the 2:20 mark in the video below, you can see one of my teammates sawing through the bars to get at a marked painting. We royally screwed up that mission from the start by being spotted on the rooftop. The guards activated the security protocols, slamming protective bars down on all the artwork and the mission would have been over had he not brought his handheld saw.

There’s also a single-player mode that lets you run through missions with two AI companions. Not as much fun but useful for grinding cash to buy new weapons mods or scoping out a mission.

With dozens of jobs available, and some of those chaining across several phases, there’s far more to do than in the original game. Each job has random spawns as well – there might be a safe in an office or extra cameras or guards. There won’t be One True Way to complete each task and you’ll have to be ready to adapt on the fly to ever-changing circumstances.

PayDay 2 looks like a vast improvement on the previous game. It can be slow, steady and satisfying or frantic, frenetic, fun. It’s all in how you work with your team.

I spoke to David Goldfarb about PayDay 2 and the rumours that he might actually add a woman in as one of the bank robbers. Here’s the vid!

PayDay 2 will be coming to Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in August 2013.