Payday 3’s lobby may finally get features the game should have launched with

Payday 3‘s launch has bordered on catastrophe due to a serious outage in its matchmaking services. Despite the rocky release, however, the game might get several new features to help make the ride more smooth—including much-needed changes to allow for communication in the game’s lobby.

While the rest of the team tackled the server issues that are still hitting the servers, global brand director Almir Listo and lead producer Andreas Häll Penninger hosted a live broadcast earlier today to update players on the game and take questions from the community. The duo pointed to potential improvements on the way, though didn’t confirm their release or a timeline.

The team is “considering” adding voice or text chat to Payday 3‘s lobbies, Listo said, though there is no timeframe for the feature. “We haven’t confirmed anything here,” Penninger added later in the broadcast, “but what I can say is this is high priority for us from a quality-of-life perspective.”

Payday 3 heists can often hinge on communication and playstyle. Going loud and not maintaining stealth can have considerable downsides in most heists, and not just due to having to face off against far stronger enemies. In Rock the Cradle, for instance, one of the heist’s most valuable rewards is located in a data drive that gets wiped if the alarm sounds. Adding more ways to communicate in the game’s lobby could make it easier for heists to go more smoothly, and would at least allow players to talk strategy before jumping into a match.

Being able to chat with your teammates isn’t the only novelty coming to heist lobbies. The team will evaluate an option to filter players by heist type (stealth or loud) in matchmaking, according to Penninger. This feature would be tied to the matchmaking network, though, and the developers are tackling the matchmaking issue first and foremost. “But as soon as we have that sorted out, this is something that we’re going to evaluate as well,” he said.

While not as instrumental as the other additions, an “unready” button in the lobby is also on the list of quality-of-life changes potentially slated for the future. As it stands, players will commit to using that loadout once they press Ready, but this button could let them revisit loadouts and would work in tandem with the other potential new features.

Payday 3‘s matchmaking is still in varying degrees of stability, but Listo and Penninger pointed out the team is working to get the servers back to full steam (echoing Starbreeze’s corporate statement from earlier today). After the connection issues subside, though, developers seem to already have a few features in stock.