While Payday 3 hasn’t been doing too well since its launch, developer Starbreeze believes that sales of co-op shooter will recover down the line through collaboration events, as well as partnerships with platform-holders. In its recent fiscal report, Starbreeze admitted that Payday 3‘s performance was at “significantly lower levels” than projected.
Starbreeze pointed to the title being available through PlayStation Plus as an example for how the studio will try growing its playerbase, referring to the move as “an incredible opportunity”.
“At this time of writing, Payday 3 is one of the games of the month on PlayStation Plus, meaning that during February it will be available for anyone with a Plus subscription to download and play,” said the studio in its report.
“The collaboration with PlayStation will contribute positively to Payday‘s revenue in the first quarter of 2025, but most of all, it is an incredible opportunity to let millions of people try Payday 3 as it is today, after 1.5 years of hard work to improve the game both functionally and content-wise.”
Starbreeze is also working with collaboration events with titles like PUBG: Battlegrounds and Roblox to develop some sort of Payday-styled experiences in the games.
For the sake of context, Starbreeze reported annual net sales of SEK 185.9 million (around $17.3 million), down from the SEK 633.5 million ($59.1 million) it reported last year. Payday 3 contributed SEK 82.9 million (around $7.7 million) to this throughout the year (compared to the SEK 477 million / $44.5 million from last year), while Payday 2 accounted for SEK 41.8 million ($3.9 million), which was down from the SEK 139.1 / $13 million from last year.
All in all, sales going down resulted in a loss of SEK 199.1 million (around $18.5 million) for the year.
Acting CEO Mats Juhl said that the future of Payday, along with other in-development games like the Dungeons & Dragons game internally titled Project Baxter, will lead Starbreeze to a more successful year. He also emphasises Starbreeze’s third-party publishing efforts for growth in the coming year.
“We have continued to strengthen the Payday brand through collaborations and enhancements, while making great progress with Project Baxter and establishing a strong foundation for our third-party publishing,” said Juhl.
“With a balanced risk profile, strong cash position and several ongoing projects approaching important milestones, we look forward to 2025. Our vision to be a leading multi-title studio is more realistic than ever, and we are well positioned to continue building value for our players and owners.”
Interestingly, Starbreeze had revealed in a statement from its quarterly earnings report from back in November 2024 that it would be focusing on getting more player engagement for Payday 3 while at the same time lowering its investments into the co-op shooter.
“The level of investment during Payday 3’s first year on the market, both through launched DLCs and Operation Medic Bag, has been at an elevated level,” said the company at the time. “Ahead of year two, we are confident in being able to continue delivering amounts of value to our players with a significantly lower level of investment.”
Payday 3 was released all the way back in 2023, and is available on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. For more details, check out our review from back when the title first launched.