A Complete Walkthrough of the Payday 2 Secret

You may have heard about the secret from mumblings around, and want to know how to do it yourself. This guide assumes you have nothing done in regards to the secret, walking you through each and every step.

Beginning

This secret can be done with up to 4 players, so assemble your crew. Everyone also needs to have Scarface's room in the safehouse upgraded so his piano is present.

Before you can begin doing anything specific for the secret, you must complete a series of hiests on any difficulty:

• Golden Grin Casino
  
• Brooklyn Bank (needs to be done on Overkill)
  
• Breaking Feds
  
• Henry's Rock
  
• Shacklethorne Auction
  
• White House (Save for last, might not be needed)

Why do I have to do this : Completing these hiests unlocks several trophies in your safehouse, all of which are required for the upcoming steps.

Safehouse Tasks

Once you have those hiests completed, enter your safehouse. Then you need to go to Duke's desk and pick up the Medalion.

Now head to the kitchen and use the medalion to open the three boxes on the table. A bunch of pieces will be laid out, and you should have the option to assemble it. It will assemble into a floating mess that is constantly spinning.

Now proceed to Scarface's room, and walk over to his piano.

You will need to shoot a series of keys in correct order. The image below displays what keys need to be hit. You'll know if you did it correctly because the saving icon will be displayed in the bottom left.

Sidenote - Why do I have to play this and where did it come from? : There was a voiceline from Duke about the oldest melody, which is Hurrian Hymn No. 6. As for the notes, there was a 12-hour stream on November 1st where the community figured out the part you needed to play, which is why you may hear some people grumbling about pianos when talking about the secret.

Now go back to the kitchen and the strange contraption will be flat and interactable.

Languages and Achievements

Everyone must go to their own seperate safehouses. Then they must interact on the device, and take a screenshot (F12) of the text that appears on the tablet.
Example:

Do this until the text starts to repeat, precisely 20 times. Then find the screenshots and get ready. The text is in an entirely made up language, which substitutes traditional characters with shapes. The key can be found below.

The language reads from right to left, top to bottom, with no spaces (so you'll need to use context clues) so the previous example would translate to "Under the cover of darkness the four thieves quietly stole the valuable metal and replaced it with white dust".

The texts on the tablets refer to specific achievements, pulled from a list of 57 (from what we can tell) and THE SET OF 20 ACHIEVEMENTS IS DIFFERENT FOR EVERYBODY. A list of all 57 possible achievements and the related translated text can be found in this guide:
GitHub Guide[github.com]

Translate your screenshots enough to identify which achievement and text it is, and put them in a list. You must complete all 20 achievements displayed on YOUR tablet in order to be deemed worthy to access the secret. This is retroactive, so if you already have an achievement unlocked, you don't have to do it again.

Alternatively, there is a mod that will highlight which achievements you need, without having to translate. You can find it here: https://modworkshop.net/mydownloads.php?action=view_down&did=23858
It also requires SuperBLT found here: https://superblt.znix.xyz/

The Actual Secret

Once you have completed the aformentioned steps, start The White House Heist on Overkill or above. It is recommended you bring lots of ammo for the next section. Proceed through as normal, however you may (not entirely confirmed) need to go loud before you enter PEOC (just shoot in the air if needed). Once in the PEOC, enter the office room on the left with the Mayan painting inside.

If all steps are done correctly, the painting frame will glow and become interactable.

Once the painting is glowing, you may interact with the painting. From this point, nobody will be able to reconnect, even if the game crashes or whatnot, so make sure you are all ready. The host will magically gain C4, which will be used on the wall to reveal a tunnel.

Go through the tunnel and onto the lift. Once all the way down, you will see a vault with the language printed in large rings. Do not interact with the vault until you read the next section, and are fully prepared, as there is no threat nor rush until you interact with the vault.

Once the vault is activated, a fourth ring will emerge and wrap along the outside. Reskinned cloakers will now also spawn behind you, in the direction of the lift. These demons will not drop ammo, and so use of Ammo Bags is vital, as you will be there for >30 or so minutes. Lay down all your deployables you have, and have 3 people defending the vault and levers. If you have 4 people, only 1 person needs to work on the next section while the crew defends them.

Riddles

Whoever has been selected to do this section will need to either have this guide and language sheet available through steam overlay, printing it out, or using a second monitor. The language guide is posted again here for your convience.

The one person will need to translate the new outer ring to spell out a riddle. However, since the list of riddles is known, just the last few words will do. Remember the language is read right to left, so be careful. An example is shown below:

This would translate to "I am trusted to guard the great wealth of the land, but do not trust my WORDS", with the bolded word being enough to identify it.

Once you have the riddle identified, you need to know the answer. This list will tell you what needs to be entered (uppercase words are the identifiers and italics are the answer):

• In the temple of gold and white, I bind myself to my psyche FOREVER - CUPID
  
• The legacy of Alessandro Cagliostro calls to the eastern STAR - GUIDE
  
• I am trusted to guard the great wealth of the land, but do not trust my WORDS - APATE
  
• Twins exchange a breath, the third sibling is banished until it RETURNS - ALGOL
  
• I am the bearer of the greatest gifts, I give what you seek THE MOST - GIANT
  
• Upon the terrace of riches and wealth, I hold what all who behold me DESIRE - JEWEL
  
• In the sand-covered lands of the pharaohs, I am followed by the missing LIGHT - SHEUT
  
• Among old recovered things, four couples are eternally locked in their LOVE - DANCE
  
• At the gates of silent memory, the lizard god speaks thy NUMBER - LAHUN
  
• I must face two to ascend, lest I meet my final journey in this CHALLENGE - CHESS
  
• I stand in front of the humble man on the wicked path as a COMPANION - SWORD
  
• With my companions wisdom and ferocity that which i fly over that is my LAND - SUMER
  
• That of the watcher which will be consuned in the voice of SUMER - ZUMRU

Now to enter the answer, you will need to use the levers. All positions assume you are facing the vault.

BACK LEFT - Rotates the first and second ring. Use this lever second to get the last two letters into position.
FRONT RIGHT - Rotates the third and second ring. Use this lever first to get the first two letters into position.
BACK RIGHT - Rotates the second ring. Use this lever last to get the third letter into position.
FRONT LEFT - Enters in your answer, do not use until you are sure you entered it correctly.

The answer should be inside the brackets. Remember that the language reads right to left, so your letters should be in this order:
2 1
3
5 4
So the above picture currently has "EAEEA" entered.

Once you get the answer in, repeat the process 3 more times. For each correct answer, golden corners will be pushed outwards, indicating your progress. If you enter an incorrect answer, you will have to restart all 4 riddles, as the golden corners will retract. Once 4 riddles are completed, there will be a bright light, and your crew will unmask.

The Finale

Once the vault is opened, enter into the chamber. Look around for a while until you hear the dentist calling to you. He will ask you to open the door behind you, so your crew should move back to the door. Once the door is opened, do not progress further. From where you stand, shoot the Dentist in the head. DO NOT MISS. Once the dentist is dead, someone needs to grab the Mayan gold from near Locke, and place it in a designated spot in the chamber. Now the crew should grab bars from that spot, and place them in slots on the floor. Once done, the secret will unlock.

Afterwards, enjoy the newly unlocked Movie Theater in the Main Menu, and revel in your glory!

End

Hope this guide helped you through this difficult secret. If you have any questions or concerns, please comment below. As all of this is recent, some of the info may be flawed or incorrect, especially in regards to the painting and finale.

Big thanks to everyone in the Payday 2 community for finding the secret, especially RandomKenny and his Discord.

If you have any more questions or something seems unclear, check out these YouTube videos that should offer some more visual clarity to some of the topics discussed here:

Credit to Connor Shaw and GeneralMcBadass for these videos.

[Gweeps21]

you can do it with ai instead

[Choppa Stringbag $12.99]

besides the brooklyn bank, does difficulty matter?

[Vipture]

Just did it solo with bots, thanks for the help! To anyone saying you can't do it with bots, you just have to call them into the lift with you, worked first try for me (but maybe I got lucky on pathing)

[flame from Halo]

I was able to do it solo loud with bots, just lined them up to gun down the demons as they spawned with Brenner LMGs and had them inspire me in the 2 rare cases where I went down.

Sadly when I shot the dentist in the head a few times he didn't react or I didn't shoot him enough and I failed the mission after the puzzle :')

[𝓜𝓸𝓳𝓲𝓽𝓸]

guys you can stealth it right to the painting, but you will need your team. I just did a complete stealth into the vault, moved the painting, used c4 and came to the elevator. Well your AI isnt able to move at all so you can probably do it solo stealth or with friends. Its not possible otherwise.

[BakedPotato]

sounds cool, i dont think ill do it


k maybe ill do this, for the shits and gigs cus im bored

[Melon]

I don't really care about the achievement; I only want the Watcher masks. Do I just need to remove the painting and I'll gain access to it?

[Athal]

I've completed all the heists required but i have only the central box, any clue?

[Jiggs, CEO of Exploding?]

got gone in 240 seconds, hostage situation, AND let them boogie as achievs >:(

[cheRRy]

Incredibly well detailed and explained guide. Thanks so much for the time that has taken to you to complete this. Hats off