After the recent Payday 2 update, and the addition of the Black Market, some people got upset with the fact that microtransactions gave paying players an advantage. Overkill addressed the situation during their Reddit AMA session.

PayDay 2’s Producer Almir Listo responded to a question on the matter, and tried to fully explain Overkill's intention from the update.  He compared the game's situation two and a half years ago with now, and how they wouldn't have implemented it then.

"Two and a half years ago, during development of PAYDAY 2 and in the build-up for its release, myself and then Game Director David Goldfarb said that there would be no microtransactions in PAYDAY 2. At the time, there were games that were released with in-game microtransaction systems at launch; players were asked to pay for the full game, and then continue to spend money directly after the initial purchase. At the time, PAYDAY 2 featured a relatively advanced weapon modifications system where players for in-game money could buy, sell and modify weapons, masks and modifications. When we discussed this with people, we'd receive a ton of questions regarding whether or not it was microtransactions or not in our game too. To make sure there was no confusion, we said what we did to make things absolutely clear. If you asked me then, there would be no way we would've added a system like we just did."

Listo provided Overkill's "arguements as to why we think stat boosts are OK to have in Payday 2." First of all, he said that the game is "balanced around the vanilla experience," meaning that its core experience is DLC-free. Another arguement is that if one of your teammates have it, it benefits the whole team. Finally, he clarified that Overkill is "making sure that the boosts are balanced in such a way that it doesn't impare on the player's experience."

"There are several arguments as to why we think stat boosts are OK to have in PAYDAY 2, and here are three; - The game is balanced around the vanilla experience, that is, the game without any DLC. When we add any new difficulties, enemies, features, heists or otherwise, we balance this in relation to the base game. - PAYDAY 2 is a player-versus-environment game. You and your three friends play together against the AI; you lose together and you win together. Any advantage your friends have will only benefit the success of the group. - Making sure that the boosts are balanced in such a way that it doesn't impare on the player's experience. This is an ongoing effort on our side."

"We understand that there is a lot of fury, anger and disappointment with us adding this. From an economical standpoint however, completely based on statistics, we can already see that the Black Market update is working as we intended. Going forward, we hope we can convince the parts of the community that resist this change that this was the right decision to do to ensure the stability of OVERKILL as an independent developer and the future growth of PAYDAY 2."