Payday 2 is temporarily free forever

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**MechaEmperor7000**

Kinda confusing title but here goes. Payday 2 (the base game) is free today. The first 5 million people to download it get it permanently in their steam libraries forever. This is in anticipation of Payday 2: Ultimate Edition, which is apparently a DLC that contains all other DLCs (excluding limited time offers like the Complete Overkill Pack or cross-promotion items like Jacket).

Dunno if anyone cares, but hey free game. Mods feel free to lock/move this if it's not the appropriate forum.

Happy Heisting!

**BrookM**

Five million keys will be handed out for free, this is done to soften the release of the Ultimate Edition and the fallout from the community it ~~may~~ will bring, as they've stopped selling all previous DLC on its own, aside from one more character pack they're working on right now.

**Compel**

Nice one, cheers!

**Wyrmalla**

I played the first one to death (screw that bank vault. Those golden masks can go die in a well), but by the time I got around to thinking about the second one their handling of micro-transactions turned me off. Yeah, I remember you being a fan of the game BrookM, and well I wouldn't mind playing it, though I've not heard good things.

**BrookM**

Micro-transactions have been removed, the developers have apologised for this and admitted that it was not their intent to alienate the userbase to such a degree, though it has been implied that this was something they were forced to do by their publisher and not Overkill themselves.

Even the core game minus Ultimate Edition has a lot of free extras in there, including the classic heists, several extra heisters and if you become a member of their community group, piles of guns, melee weapons and masks.

**MechaEmperor7000**

I was cheesed off by the Microtransactions too, but free game is free. They did implement a few things to take the edge off of some of the more frustrating updates.

Imo the basic game is all you really need since you can play maps/heists from DLCs by joining other people, and you can do a lot with the basic weapons (I actually use mostly stock even though I have some of the weapon DLCs)

**Melissia**

Basic weapons with mods are plenty to keep up with even high level, high-difficulty games. I highly recommend anyone that likes cooperative shooters but hasn't played PD2 to pick it up.

**BrookM**

And again, if you join the community group you gain access to some great weapons and mods as well, some of which are quite a lot better than what you can find in the DLC packs. Though if you play long enough it's no longer about getting the best gun, but rather just picking whatever you like and letting your perks compensate for you.

If there's one DLC pack I recommend (aside from the fething awesome Sydney character pack!), though this is a bit moot as all DLC is now gone, it's I think the very first Gage's weapons pack, which allows you to hunt for his packages hidden throughout the maps and if you collect enough of them, get free weapon mods such as sights, lasers and whatever else you need to make your gat tacticool and give yourself some nice little bonuses. You also get small XP bonuses for collecting them as is, but with the DLC you can also get the upgrades, which especially when you start out can be quite nifty.

But yes, it's a great coop game. Just do NOT play it with fething randoms (or certain Dakkanauts), that's one of the worst things to do. Stealth heists are also a bit hit and miss right now, but Overkill is FINALLY working on a de-sync update that should reduce the amount of lag between clients and prevent stealth heists from suffering from bad connections and horrible latency.

Finally, the game will continue to receive support until late 2018 at the very least at this point. Overkill may have announced that they're working on Payday 3 right now (whatever happened to their Walking Dead game anyway?) but it will be at their own pace, so no worries of them suddenly dropping support and updates for this one.

**MechaEmperor7000**

It also makes for great youtube material.

Nothing is funnier than the cascade of fethups that ensue because one civilian's head poked a millimeter out from under the doorway.

**BrookM**

And that's why we bring plenty of sleeping bags, enough for several accidents.

No seriously, a bank heist is not complete without two body bag deployables.

But I never play with randoms, it always ends in disaster. I usually play with my brother and his coworkers, which is nice, as I can stick to my TechForcer build while they shoot cops and haul bags.

**amazingturtles**

Interesting! well, free is free so i have it now i guess. the only people i play games online with don't like fps games though, so i guess i'm on my own for now.

**BrookM**

The bots have been overhauled big time, so they are a lot more useful nowadays than they were years ago. They can now carry bags and you can give them different weapons and perks to give you extra boosts.

**MechaEmperor7000**

The bots got seriously buffed. I managed to survive a Deathwish Loud mission in a dedicated stealth build solely by having my bots run around with 50 cal snipers and Inspire.

(for those that don't know, stealth builds have zero survivability, weapons that do minimal damage, and no combat abilites. The only combat skill going for it is that it has incredible speed and that's it.)

**BrookM**

My brother runs around with a dodge build. Meaning no armour, but due to how he built his deck he can run around naked and still survive quite nicely. Which is another reason to not play with randoms when you do loud missions. They see someone with zero armour, warn you once, don't listen, then ban you straight away..

I prefer Sydney's deck myself, which when paired with the lightweight ballistic vest means I've got more armour than an unmodified ICTV.

Pairing the deck with the ICTV is excessive to say the least, but you become a great bullet sponge for the team.

Only downside is having 75% less health, but it's a risk I'm willing to take.

**MechaEmperor7000**

I meant I had No Dodge, No Armor and No Rogue Deck. I went down the moment anything bigger than a SWAT whiffs in my direction. Also had no ammo or medical items.

I somehow still survived the second-hardest difficulty with the national guard on my ass.