Helldivers 2 players have been unhappy with the recent release of the Escalation of Freedom update, and developer Arrowhead Studios says it wants to fix that.
The studio released a statement about the incident on its Reddit page, outlining a 60-day plan to regain player trust and lost ground: It’s a message that Arrowhead acknowledges player frustration and promises to focus on “action, not talk” when it comes to the future of Helldivers 2.
“We’ve been listening to feedback and thinking about the future direction of Helldivers 2 and how we want to move forward with the game’s development over the last week,” said game director Mikael Eriksson. “In a nutshell, our latest update fell short of our goals. Not only did a few things go wrong, but there were fundamental inconsistencies in our approach to game balance and game direction. All of this is our fault, and we’re willing to own up to it.”
Helldivers 2 fan anger stems from a number of gameplay tweaks and additions made since the game’s launch in February. Specifically, many are upset at recent weapon nerfs, claiming that Arrowhead’s balancing changes have made it less fun instead of prioritizing a more balanced overall experience. This debate has divided the community, with a significant portion of them preferring the feeling of barely escaping a mission alive.
Either way, Arrowhead feels the need to intervene. In the next 60 days, Eriksson promises to revisit how balancing works in Helldivers 2. This means changes to how fire damage works and ragdollization that don’t disrupt the experience. Arrowhead also wants to improve the frame rate across Helldivers 2, prioritizing bugs that directly affect gameplay. Another change promised in the first 60 days is a rework of the relentless Chargers, though no details on how that will be done have been revealed.
“Our intention is that balance should be fun, not ‘balanced’ for balance’s sake,” the summary states.
Arrowhead’s grand outline includes several long-term takeaways to ensure Helldivers 2 sticks around for the foreseeable future, including the overriding goal of creating an opt-in beta testing environment and posting regular player surveys to streamline communication from fans to the developers, which will lead to more blog posts and more detailed patch notes.
“We also want to thank everyone for their patience,” Erickson continued. “We’re grateful for the constructive feedback and suggestions that many of you have provided on our latest updates.”
Helldivers 2 was released earlier this year and was an unexpected success, selling 12 million copies in 12 weeks on PC and PlayStation 5, making it the fastest-selling game in PlayStation history. This success came with many changes, one of the biggest being that John Pilstedt moved from CEO to CCO to focus more on the studio’s games and community. New CEO Shams Jorjani later commented on the success of Helldivers 2, acknowledging that the team “knew we couldn’t keep up with the demand and the insatiable desire to do more fun things with HD2.”
Helldivers 2 had a strong first few months but is now hitting a slow patch. We gave it a 9/10 rating, calling it “Excellent”, saying “Helldivers 2’s combat is great, the missions are fresh and fun, and the smart progression system won’t cost you a penny.”
