Highlights
- Payday 3 has received negative reviews and criticism due to ongoing server issues and lack of content compared to previous entries.
- Developer Starbreeze Studios is working on making the game "less dependent" on online services in the long term to address player concerns.
- Server instability, caused by a large influx of players at launch, has led Starbreeze to consider a new partner for matchmaking services and continue posting server status updates on social media.
Following server updates and fixes for Payday 3, developer Starbreeze Studios stated that it is looking into ways to make the game "less dependent" on using online services in the long term. While Payday 3 has received mostly negative reviews on Steam, Starbreeze vowed to keep providing updates to players and kept working on improving server stability with its partners in the meantime.
As a result of the ongoing server issues with the bank heist simulator, Payday 3 reviews have been negative. Points of criticism were made not only at the state of the servers but also at the lack of available content compared to the two previous entries in the Payday series. Though the game does offer cross-play progression across PC and console, that has not been enough to satisfy gamers who have been unable to log into the game, let alone make any progress or conduct any heists without issues. Payday 3 had mostly negative reviews on Steam at the time of writing, with a positive review rating of 32%.
In an effort to satisfy Payday 3 players who are unhappy with the online requirements, Starbreeze released a statement and affirmed that it is looking into ways to make the game "less dependent" on its online services as part of its long-term plans for the game. Starbreeze said that a new version of its matchmaking server software was recently deployed globally and that the update improved server performance across all platforms. However, a software update made by Starbreeze's partner on September 24 reintroduced instability to the matchmaking infrastructure, and these issues were not reported during the Technical Beta or Early Access windows of Payday 3.
Starbreeze clarified that the issues currently present in Payday 3 were largely due to a massive influx of players logging in, which included a concurrent player count of 218,250 across all platforms during the game's launch weekend. However, the influx and server issues have forced Starbreeze to consider a new partner for matchmaking services. While it remains to be seen how it will become less reliant on these online services, Starbreeze said that Payday 3 server status updates would continue to be posted on social media.
While Payday 3's rating of 32% is far from the dubious distinctions earned by NBA 2K24 and Overwatch 2, the backlash and server issues have left many players concerned about the future of the series. Only time will tell what Starbreeze and its partners will do to salvage the game.
Payday 3 is available now for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S.
Source: PR Newswire
