Overkill's Walking Dead game will be "Payday-esque"

When you think of Walking Dead videogames, odds are you think of Telltale's outstanding adventure series. But Overkill Software announced last year that it's getting in on the action too, with a cooperative FPS that will feature elements of action, stealth, survival horror, and role-playing. Speaking at a SXSW panel over the weekend, Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman said the experience will be much like Payday, but bigger, and won't slavishly follow the plot or characters of the television show.

"I can say that it will be Payday-esque because [Overkill and parent company Starbreeze] are currently doing Payday," Kirkman said, via Polygon. "But I'm told it will be in a bigger world than Payday currently encompasses. They are going to be learning a lot of stuff from Payday that they will be incorporating into The Walking Dead game."

Overkill hopes to avoid the pitfalls that trip up most licensed videogames by doing its own thing with the property, rather than trying to pander to the existing anbase. "The key I think, which is very important, is that we're not doing, 'Hey, it's Daryl Dixon running around shooting zombies, because you like Daryl Dixon.' Or, 'It's Rick Grimes doing this because you like Rick Grimes'," Kirman continued, possibly alluding to Activision's The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct, which holds a deathly Metacritic rating of 38. "We're telling our own stories and doing our own things almost as if they are original games."

He also confirmed that, much like Payday, the Walking Dead game will feature online cooperative gameplay. "It will follow a similar approach. That's good news," he said. A release date hasn't been announced, but it's currently slated to be out sometime in 2016.