Starbreeze: PAYDAY takes a step towards the screen with VICE Studios

Starbreeze announced on Wednesday that it has entered into a partnership with VICE Studios to develop film and television adaptations based on the PAYDAY franchise. We view this as a logical step within the company’s strategy to expand its core IP into a broader entertainment platform beyond gaming. While the move supports the long-term brand equity of the franchise, we believe it is currently too early to gauge the explicit financial impact, and the limited details regarding the deal's structure, financials, and timeline result in no changes to our estimates at this stage.

Leveraging transmedia to broaden the PAYDAY audience

The partnership with VICE Studios (the production house behind titles such as Gangs of London) aims to adapt the PAYDAY universe for screen and other formats. Under the agreement, Starbreeze will collaborate closely with VICE Studios to ensure the adaptations capture the franchise's specific tone and characters, while Starbreeze retains full ownership of the PAYDAY intellectual property. The partnership is led on the VICE Studios side by President Amy Powell, a veteran of Amazon and Paramount with a track record in franchise IP. While VICE Media went through a bankruptcy in 2022, the studio has since stabilized, securing a 75 MUSD credit facility and a global distribution deal with ITV Studios in 2025, making it a more robust partner than its parent company's history might initially suggest.

This move is a logical extension of Starbreeze's strategy to transition from a pure game developer into a multi-format entertainment company. For a company currently operating with a heavy reliance on a single IP, we believe transmedia projects serve as an important tool for maintaining brand relevance and attracting new audiences who may not yet be part of the gaming community.

Strategic value outweighs immediate financial impact

While we think the announcement is a positive development in future potential IP monetization, the current stage of the deal is still very early. In practice, this structure means, to our understanding, that VICE holds an option to develop and pitch an adaptation, and that the full licensing economics only materialise if and when a production is greenlighted by a buyer such as a major streaming platform or broadcaster, which is likely 2-4 years away, if it happens at all. In our view, the most significant potential value from this deal is not the licensing fee itself but the cross-pollination effect (through increased player activity and game-related revenue) if a series or film is successfully produced and distributed.  Historically, licensing deals for film and TV adaptations in the gaming industry often involve modest upfront fees for the developer, with potential royalties being heavily back-ended and dependent on the commercial success of the production. As our longer-term estimates already include, to some extent, contributions from other emerging content avenues, such as transmedia, we maintain our current estimates. We will monitor for key milestones, including a greenlighting decision, streaming buyer announcement, or further details on financial terms and production timeline.