Payday 3 Finally Finds A Publisher, Set To Release In 2023

After a rough couple of years that saw Payday studio Starbreeze flirt with bankruptcy and its chief financial officer charged and convicted of insider trading, the company has finally found a publisher for the long-awaited Payday 3: Koch Media, the parent company of Deep Silver and itself a division of Embracer Group, formerly known as THQ Nordic.

Starbreeze has signed a €50m publishing deal with Koch Media for Payday 3.

The Swedish developer said Payday 3 is now due out at some point in 2023 on PC and consoles, and the investment will pay for development, marketing as well as more than 18 months of post-launch "games as a service" content. Similar to what Starbreeze has done (and continues to do) with Payday 2.

"In addition to securing the continued development, this deal secures global publishing of Payday 3 as well as the marketing efforts through the entire game life cycle," acting Starbreeze CEO Tobias Sjögren said. "We now have a strong foundation for a successful launch of Payday 3."

Despite a blowup with fans in 2015 over the addition of microtransactions (which were eventually dropped), it's a formula that's worked well: Payday 2 was released in 2013 and over the past 30 days had an average concurrent player count in excess of 25,000.

"We are delighted to welcome Starbreeze as a new partner for our global publishing business," Koch Media CEO Klemens Kundratitz said. "Payday 3 is shaping up to be an incredible game."

Alas, there is still much work to be done: Payday 3 won't be out until 2023.