Long-in-development co-op shooter Payday 3 was recently announced as an Xbox Game Pass launch title, which we're quite happy with considering the game feels well-suited to a service with lots of subscribers on day one. However, it does appear that you must be online to play any aspect of Payday 3 - whether you want to play alone or not.
In a recent livestream, Starbreeze developer Almir Listo touched on the topic when asked about whether the upcoming title is playable offline (thanks, VGC). Here's their answer:
"No. You will be able to play by yourself, but I do believe you will have to have a connection in order to play, because it’s made in Unreal Engine and has cross-progression and cross-play, I do believe we need you to be online."
So, while the answer is fairly vague and the developer may have been put on the spot a little bit during the stream, it does seem that the current plan is to require an internet connection for playing any Payday 3 mode.
While this could hurt the game's playability in the long run, it likely won't affect its inclusion in Game Pass, given the title would probably drop out of the service long before a server shutdown of any kind. We'll keep our eyes peeled for any further clarification on this comment from the team.