Payday 2 developer Overkill Software got itself into some hot water with its fans earlier this year when it released a “Black Market Update” that added paid items that came with skill bonuses, which led to many accusations that the game was becoming “pay-to-win,” and the studio only made players angrier earlier this month when it released a “Completely Overkill Pack” that added experience and and currency boosts on top of that.

After initially dismissing some of the accusations, Payday 2 producer Almir Listo recently apologized for the way the studio handled the updates, and he promised that Overkill would be working with the community to address their concerns.

“The past few weeks have been some of the most challenging in the history of this community,” Listo wrote on the game’s Steam Community page. “Players have been angry with us, media have written about us en masse and our volunteer moderators went on strike. For all the distress we’ve caused the past few weeks, I’d just like to take the time and say that we’re sorry. We’ve done a lot of things right in the past, but these past few weeks we screwed up.”

He added, “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 communicating with you”

According to Listo, the developer has been in touch with some of the most active members of its community to brainstorm on possible solutions for the current state of the game.

“Regarding stat boosts, [community moderators] Ashley and Jones suggested that we introduce something similar to StatTrak as part of future safes, a feature used in [Counter-Strike: Global Offensive] in their cases,” Listo said. StatTrak is essentially a cosmetic weapon skin with a kill-counter. “This is something we’ve been thinking about as well, and something that we will discuss going forward. I must stress however that we cannot currently make any promises but these are things we will be discussing as we move forward. ”

Listo promised that eight Overkill developers would begin regularly participating in the game’s forums.

“We need to get better at communicating with you and this is one of our first steps in doing so,” he explained.

Screenshot via Payday 2 | Steam Store