PAYDAY: The Heist [Review By Uzzbuzz]PAYDAY: The Heist is a first-person shooter...sort of. The game is objective based, usually ending in breaking into a vault/safe and then escaping quickly. Be warned: the multiplayer is quiet seeing as Payday 2 is released, and the game is very difficult to play solo or with bots. Best to find a team of four beforehand as the public games are not very reliable. I would also recommend getting this before Payday 2 if you plan on playing it at all, since Payday 2 overshadows it in almost every way. This is not an easy game to 100% and will take some determination.
Mechanics/Gameplay – Obviously, the main mechanic of an FPS is to shoot. This works quite well. There is a wide variety of weapons and skill trees to choose from, allowing for different play styles, but one notable omittance is a good sniper rifle. There is not a single weapon in Payday: The Heist that has a real scope, which makes it difficult to play that way, especially for dealing with enemy snipers. Other than that, there are many viable ways to play, as the skill trees are divided between assault, sharpshooter, support, and the DLC technician. Yes, sharpshooter is a bit misleading, as it mostly deals with the rifle and accuracy enhancement but has no inclusion of sniper rifles.
Each heist has a set of objectives to complete, usually along the lines of setting up a drill and holding out until it breaks in. Every so often, an assault wave arrives which contains many special units, including bulldozers, tasers, and cloakers. Bulldozers are tough tank units that charge in shotguns blazing, often able to easily down you in no time. To defeat them, their facemask must be shot so that their head is slightly exposed. Tasers will stun you until you or a teammate shoots them to distract, or they will eventually down you. Cloakers rush at you and hit you with their baton, downing you instantly. The trick is to get them before they see you and start running, especially on the higher difficulties.
There are nine different heists, 3 being DLC. These range from a standard bank heist, to a stealthy diamond heist, and many more. Over the hours that I’ve played Payday, I have not noticed many bugs at all, other than being able to sometimes mess with the enemy spawning depending on player placement. This is sometimes needed on harder difficulties, and especially for the achievement in which you must beat the counterfeit heist without killing anyone. Overall the game plays smoothly, though a lot of the game forces you to camp out for the assault waves, which is most of the time on the hardest difficulty. 7/10
Fun Factor – I did enjoy this game, but it was less so because of the game and moreso because of working together with three others to get these difficult achievements. After the first few hours, the game feels very repetitive since there are only a handful of different heists, all of which require a lot of camping and holding out choke points on higher difficulties. If you’re looking for a fun co-op heisting experience, you are much better off playing the sequel, though this game has its moments. 6.5/10
Graphics/Animation – The graphics are pretty typical of an fps game from 2011. Nothing fancy, but they work, and the animations are fluid and clean. The default H.U.D works well enough without obscuring your vision, it is always clear where your teammates are due to a slight glow effect, and you can point out special enemies so that you always have eyes around the map. 7/10
Music/Sound – The soundtrack for each heist is pretty hype-inducing, albeit simple. One thing that deserves praise is the voice effects. This is not due to the quality of the voice acting, which is admittedly not bad, but due to the team focus. Callouts are made whenever objectives are completed, a player goes down, or a special enemy is pointed out. This is a great way to enhance teamwork without requiring voice chat in case you would prefer not to talk with random players. Though, the best team experience is through voice chat with a group of friends. All of the standard sound effects are there as well to fully immerse yourself in the fps experience. 8/10
Replayability – Wait until I review Payday 2. Yikes. If you happen to play this one first, there is some replayability. Getting to level 145 does take some time, but not too long. The real meat of the game is focusing on the more difficult achievements, one of which is for beating every (non-dlc) heist on overkill difficulty or up without anyone being traded from custody. Doing this on one level can take some time, and there are 6 of them. There are only 9 heists total, however, and a limited selection of weapons and challenges get bland quickly, so if it weren’t for the achievements, there is not all that much here unless you’re a die hard fps player. 6/10
Level Design – Every map has its own unique objectives that must be completed, but it all tends to boil down into: Get item OR do a hack OR set up a drill, camp for a bit holding off assaults, push to next objective, repeat. That does not mean each map is not vastly different in setting. We have bank vaults, armored vehicle interception, and even hospital heists. Every map feels unique and well made. However, there are only a few given spots to hold out on for each map, not counting green bridge, but that’s another beast. Thus, the level design is unique in terms of look and feel, but it all boils down to a similar idea. 5/10
Achievements – The achievements of Payday: The Heist are varied and well done. They cover the content well and fall into these categories: Heist-specific misc, general misc, and difficulty. Each heist has some achievements that are specific for that heist for completing various tasks often on a certain difficulty or higher, such as having over a certain threshold of team accuracy, destroy all cameras quickly, or do not let the cops reach a certain location until x objective is complete. The general misc are for tasks such as killing 25 fbi agent enemies in a row, amassing 1 billion dollars, or reaching maximum level. Finally, each map (save for No Mercy, the final DLC map) has an achievement for completing it on the notoriously difficult Overkill 145+ difficulty, only available at maximum level. The achievements are pretty much representative of everything the game has to offer and are a great challenge too but can be very frustrating at times. 8/10
Pros:
+ Decent co-op fps experience
+ Challenge in spades
+ Good achievement variety
Cons:
- Little variety in levels and weapons/skills
- Dead game
- Not a whole lot to unlock
Overall Score: 6.8/10
3.5