PAYDAY 3
Step out of retirement back into the life of crime in the shoes of the Payday Gang, the envy of their peers and the nightmare of law-enforcement wherever they go. Several years after the crew’s reign of terror over Washington DC has ended, they assemble once again to deal with the threat that roused them out of early retirement.
The legendary Payday Crew, dreaded by the law and underworld alike, is back. Ripped from their peaceful retirement to rejoin the criminal world by a new threat, one born from the chaos the Crew left in their wake.
In order to identify and crush this new threat, the Crew is leaving their Washington DC roots behind them and moving to New York City. A new location will bring with it new challenges, but also new opportunities for a heister with a plan.
Give outlet to your greed and let loose in PAYDAY 3. In addition to gold, cash and jewelry and any other valuables they might come across, you’ll be able to build a sizable collection of weapons, cosmetics and accolades.
It won’t be as simple as showing up and gaining goodies. You’ll have to work hard and plan smart to get away with as much loot as possible. Gain experience, unlock new skills and gain proficiency in weapons to steadily grow your power to handle the tougher challenges.
A professional heister knows it takes planning, hard work and a good amount of luck in order to execute a successful heist. In PAYDAY 3 the choice is put in the hands of the players, deciding how to tackle the heist, whether you sneak or go in guns blazing, whether you let your hostages go or keep them around as pawns, whether you go at it alone or bring friends. The choices are endless and in your hands, they will vastly change how the game plays.
Not just anyone is worthy of standing at your side for something as important as a heist. Likewise, PAYDAY 3 is best enjoyed with close friends in mind, whether you bring them from your childhood or make them along the road.
The PAYDAY-series has always valued the bonds made through hardship and tries to reflect that in the actions and words of our heisters while in the game, and through our community while on the outside.
Steam User 215
Payday 3 has better graphics and gun play movement etc . What Payday 3 lacks is content, we need more free maps and guns and enemy types to make it fun to play devs listen please
Steam User 215
***UPDATE 01/03/26: Skills 2.0 has dropped. Still not up to par of PD2 but loads better than it was. There's been significant improvement to the game since launch. Worth buying on sale.***
I can finally recommend this game. It still isn't up to the level of Payday 2 but the potential is here and it's turned out to be a fun game. I'm just gonna talk about the stuff I like that is an improvement since Payday 2.
Zip ties are no longer finite. You're carrying around a bottomless Costco bag of zip ties. This is something that annoyed me in Payday 2.
Small Safes now have a unique lockpicking mechanic that is fun. The drill is no longer used for everything, it also doesn't take forever. Now smaller safes can be picked in a very satisfying minigame where you turn the dial until it goes green three times. It's pretty nice.
Lockpicking is actually a minigame now too. Gone are the days of just staring at an object and holding the pick button. Now there's a minigame that is actually faster than picking in Payday 2. Even messing up only penalizes you by not opening the lock sooner. Really nice change imo
Hostages are much easier to deal with. Ordering them around, using them as a human shields, booping them to the ground for a tie down. It's much easier and fluid than it was in Payday 2. Being able to grab them and throw them to the ground in a specific location beats trying to herd them in Payday 2.
New enemy types and improved favorites. New guys are grenade cops, hostage rescue is now a unique enemy, there's cops that hide and control drones to mess with you. The tazer cops are cooler, you can shoot their battery pack to shock a bunch of cops around them. The Dozer seems to have had the largest improvement and dealing with them is difficult and satisfying. You can also shoot antenas off of FBI vans to end waves at times too.
Side objectives can be found in many of the heists. Like finding specific loot in the safety deposit boxes or going the extra mile to make and employee use a biometric scanner at the jewelry store to get those last four high value items.
Now you can just choose your heist. No more waiting for the one you want to pop up or spending in game currency to buy the contracts. Just pick what you want to play.
Gun attachments are no longer an RNG gambling hell. Now you level up weapons by using them. As you level up, more parts become available to buy and install. This is a godsend.
Killstreak rewards. So now instead of starting with a grenade launcher or minigun as a primary weapon, they're now killstreak rewards you can call in during a mission. I like this option more because it doesn't tie up your primary slot.
The ECM Jammers are now tools and seperate from health/ammo deployments. That means you can have those along with health, ammo, armor, and a sentry. There are also new tools added like motion detectors, EMPs, and a few others.
The armor system is pretty cool. Now you choose a base frame that has different pros/cons. Lighter frames have less movement penalties but only hold one armor plate. Bigger frames hold more plates and ammo but has movement penalties. There's a few different plates to choose from too. Each with their own benefits and draw backs. It's really interesting to customize the armor. It also affects how many downs you are allotted as well.
All in all, the game is pretty solid and they're about to release a rework of the skills. This game isn't better than Payday 2 or at its level yet. But the improvements I listed are enough QOL improvements for me to really enjoy what it is currently. If you can catch this game on sale, I wouldn't hesitate.
One last thing. Payday 3 still supports playing DLC you don't own as long as the host has purchased it. This is a really nice feature I wish more games had. Doesn't lock your buddies out of playing new heists and you're not forced to play them with randos.
There still is no offline mode, but they have added a solo mode that is currently in beta. The solo mode is to host your own games so you're not bogging down servers or something. Idk but it's there so I thought I'd mention it.
Steam User 92
I have around 1000 hours in Payday 2.
Many bugs from Payday 3 launch have been fixed, the armor system has been reworked, skills have been reworked, Gold & Sharke WiFi hacking has been reworked (thankfully), lockpicking has been updated to be more interesting, p2p matchmaking is about to be implemented. The music by Gustavo is fantastic, Pearl is a great addition to the roster with her stealth dialogues, gunplay is pretty good like in PD2, and compared to PD2, there are a lot of QoL features present, both in stealth and in loud gameplay - doors can be closed, surrendered cops can be moved, weapon reload has states now, consumables can be carried around.
The main downside is the number of heists! MAKE MORE HEISTS - FREE, PAID, DOESN'T MATTER! Without more heists there just isn't enough replayability. Speaking of paid - weapon packs (and possibly weapon mods, maybe even a mod courier DLC which would give more stuff to do on current heists). Weapon customization in general is still clunky, with stats not telling you anything specific and the attachment menu being a pain to navigate.
In short, the game is now decent and you should definitely give it a try if you liked PD2. But please Starbreeze, give PD3 actual funding.
Steam User 304
Stop looking at the launch reviews, it’s actually good now
I get it. I was annoyed at launch too. The servers were busted, the progression system felt like a total grind, and it honestly felt like a unfinished mess. I uninstalled it and almost never looked back.
But I jumped back in a few weeks ago and it’s night and day compared to what it was at release.
First off, they finally fixed the progression. You actually get rewarded for playing the game and finishing heists now instead of doing weird, specific challenges just to level up. It feels like a real Payday game again. The skill system is way better too, so you can actually mess around with different builds that feel useful.
The gunplay was always the best part, but now that the game around it actually works, it’s a blast. The new heists and the changes to the older maps have made it way more fun to replay, too.
Look, if you already own it and you're holding a grudge because of how it launched, just give it one more shot. It’s not perfect, but the devs have clearly been working hard to turn it around and the game is actually in a good spot right now. Don’t miss out just because of a bad first impression.
Edit for the comments: To sirdogethe88th and Reininku, glad you guys are also out here actually enjoying things. To "David loves noodles" calling this a fake AI review... lol. Beep boop, David. Does a robot think your username is hilarious? Because I do. Imagine being so tilted that someone likes a video game that you think they must be running on a server rack. Just say you're bad at the heists and move on, man.
P.S. Total disclaimer: I am actually a highly advanced bot sent from the future to convince you to play Payday 3 so that I can eventually steal all your C-Stacks. My circuits are currently over-heating from how much fun I’m having with the new heists. Beep boop. /s
Edit: Appreciate all the feedback on the review. To clarify my stance for everyone asking, I’m a huge Payday 2 fan first and I’m going to keep playing it no matter what happens with this game. I’m not saying Payday 3 is the best thing out there, just that it’s finally in a spot where it’s actually playable and fun.
It still has a massive mountain to climb though and it’s leagues behind 2. The reward system in the second game with the cards felt way more satisfying than what we have here. Also, the live service stuff is still a major frustration. Getting kicked all the way back to the main menu just because you failed to join a lobby is a joke. Not being able to switch your lobby from private to public mid-session or even having basic weapon toggles for lasers and flashlights makes it feel unfinished in a lot of ways.
As for the player count, it’s actually busier than people realize. Steam numbers don't tell the whole story since the console traffic is way higher than the PC side right now.
Bottom line is the game is improving, but I’m still a Payday 2 veteran at heart.
Steam User 80
feel kinda like an idiot for saying it but i really enjoy this, and i question if my taste is bad or if people are just too harsh on this game.
i played the beta and at launch and yeah i didnt like it either. fast forward few years later and this game is honestly a good time now in my opinion. is it better then payday 2? absolutely not but i think the game is still enjoyable. theres alot of QoL and really cool features this game has that makes me wanna keep coming back to it, and unlike payday 2 without DLC theres still a fair amount of content.
so yeah, i like the game. does my taste suck? or are people too harsh? who knows.
Steam User 83
When the game first came out, it kind of deserved the hate it got. It had virtually no content, compared to Payday 2. It didn't really offer anything new, except an updated engine.
Came back to it months later, and it's been a blast, if i'm honest. Though, i'm playing Solo because Quickplay never finds anyone. because there's only 800 people playing the game.
I think Payday 3 needs to drop a few free-weekends, and keep doing some sales. If people give it a chance, they'll see there's plenty here to enjoy.
My main gripe is that there's not much to spend your money on. You're hard-locked to a few weapons in the beginning, and you're stuck waiting until others open up, based on level. Also, the weapon attachments are severely lacking compared to other games. it feels about 10 years behind in that regard.
The theorycrafting for your character skills is pretty fun. I've been making a purely stealth/thief build, useful for Solo heists. But i can see lots of other options available.
As Payday 2 was feeling dated to play, 3 seems to have polished things up quite a bit.
The devs just need to quit being silly.
Payday 3 needs to tone down the paid expansions. Release some stuff for free. Maybe do some community events that draw new players in that don't require any money. again, do some free weekends, do some sales. get the payday 2 player-base over here (give them a big discount on 3), get your reviews up to Positive. then maybe you can think of releasing paid dlcs.
There's a good game here. They just need to not kill it with bad corporate decisions, and listen to the player-base.
Steam User 69
game has come along quite well since its poor launch. It has quite a bit less content compared to Payday 2, but that game has been out for a decade. Current (as of June 27, 2025) Payday 3 runs very smoothly on a 5 year old PC, even on Maximum settings, the servers run just fine, and even my buddy who has satelite internet can play with me. It is worth it as it stands, and will only get better. Keep up the wonderful work, and lets see Payday 3 become as successful as payday 2 in the years to come