Payday 3 is set to release in 2023 after developer Starbreeze secured a publishing deal with Koch Media.
In an announcement today, acting CEO Tobias Sjögren said that the partnership secured the continued development of the game, as well as the publishing and marketing costs," and means that Starbreeze "now has a strong foundation for a successful launch of Payday 3."
That launch is now set for 2023, with Payday 3 slated to release on PC and consoles. Starbreeze is already pushing the "'games as a service' model" for its heist-based sequel, telling players that "additional content and functionalities [is] planned for long beyond the original release date."
The $50 million investment is likely to prove the end of Starbreeze's financial woes, and ensure that the development of Payday 3 gets over the line. In 2019, the company's then-CEO, Mikael Nermark, revealed that the company was facing bankruptcy, and might not last another year without additional funding. Fortunately, Starbreeze is still kicking - likely buoyed by the ongoing sales success of Payday 2, which was responsible for 95% of its developers' 2020 revenue (according to Gamesindustry.biz).
The new release date is the first update that Payday players have had since October 2020, when Starbreeze confirmed that Payday 3 was definitely in development using the Unreal Engine, but was still in the design phase with an as-yet undecided release date.
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