Payday 2 developers apologize, reach out to influential players to make amends

The makers of Payday 2 will fly a group of modders to their studio, meet with a well-known player, and make other gestures as an apology to the game's community for how it handled changes to the game that angered them.

The promises came in an open letter that formally apologized "for all the distress we've caused the past few weeks.

"We've done a lot of things right in the past, but these past few weeks we screwed up," Overkill Software's Almir Listo said in the note to players. "We need to get better at many things, and we will do our best to improve as soon as possible."

"We need to get better at many things."

The most controversial change Overkill implemented was a microtransaction scheme tied to the loot won in the cooperative shooter's heists. Players could be awarded with "safes" after a successful operation, but only could upen them with a "drill" that cost $2.49. Inside were not cosmetic items, but weapon skins that altered their stats. Players also were angry that the "drills" scheme seemed to break two-year-old promises never to introduce microtransactions to the game.

Even though Overkill noted the game was a cooperative shooter, with players versus AI adversaries, players felt it was an abusive "pay-to-win" practice. "Drills" were later added in to the rotation of free, random loot drops.

Listo then participated in a contentious AMA on Reddit in which the "drills" economy was defended with don't-like-it-don't-buy-it remarks, as well as references to the development costs of keeping Payday 2 fresh. Fans resented that rationale; some of them set up a withering parody website that sought to organize boycotts of the game and negative reviews en masse from Steam users.

Volunteer moderators for Payday 2 later went on strike, and Listo's latest note mentions Overkill met with them to apologize and return them to the fold. Overkill developers also will be taking a more visible role in the Payday 2 forums beginning this week.

That said, nothing points to the end of the drill/safe arrangement. Safes still drop after heists, and drills may still be bought for $2.49, even if they are picked up at random for free.