It’s no secret that the multiplayer heist genre is wide open for a fresh competitor following Payday 3’s turbulent launch and Crime Boss: Rockay City’s less-than-glowing reception. Enter Den of Wolves, a new sci-fi co-op FPS from senior staff behind the first two Payday games, which was just unveiled during The Game Awards.
GTFO developer 10 Chambers’ latest is set in the fictional Midway City, a metropolis sat in the North Pacific Ocean that’s overseen by nefarious corporations. The setup is suitably dystopian: advanced AI is now a powerful hacking tool, megacorps aren’t a fan and have concocted new – no doubt dangerous – counters in the form of “biological systems based on the human brain.” Can’t imagine that going awry.
Den of Wolves’ debut trailer strikes an ominous tone, with flashes of Blade Runner, Cyberpunk 2077, Minority Report, and eventually Payday. Game director Ulf Andersson is best known for his work on Payday 1 and 2, before departing Overkill in 2016 and partnering with fellow ex-Payday dev Simon Viklund to set up 10 Chambers, whose first release was the stealth-action co-op FPS game GTFO.
The studio previously teased that it’s “back on that heist shit,” though Andersson says Den of Wolves’ sci-fi setting allows the game to “elevate what a heist can be.” That means missions are set to include “corporate espionage, sabotage, assassinations,” and more. And no, despite my comparison to Cyberpunk 2077 above, Den of Wolves isn’t an open-world game but a worldbuiding-heavy co-op adventure that casts you and your buddies as criminal entrepreneurs operating within a black market gig economy. You’ll start small before taking on more elaborate, lucrative, and no doubt deadly tasks.
Den of Wolves is set to launch first on PC in Steam early access, though the team isn’t ready to announce a release window just yet.
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