Johan Pilestedt, Helldivers 2 developer Arrowhead Games Studios’ former CEO and current COO, has been extremely active on X/Twitter since the game’s release, always interacting with fans and players of the game and asking for feedback and suggestions.
Johan recently stepped down as CEO to focus less on the business side and more on the creative side of the game. Now, he’s straight up interacting with the community one-on-one, citing it as being better than being in a conference room brainstorming with other developers.
Johan Pilestedt Wants More Eagle Stratagem Ideas for Helldivers 2
Posting on X on the 24th of May, he once again turned to the community for ideas. It’s great to see not just the developer, but the main COO of a game as big as Helldivers 2 interacting so openly with fans and taking all of their feedback and complaints into very serious consideration.
Ok – give me your best @helldivers2 eagle stratagem ideas!
— Pilestedt (@Pilestedt) May 23, 2024
This is not something you see very often in the corporate gaming world. Some of the suggestions include a heavy carpet bomber, to which Johan responded with a concept art of a SuperEarth Bomber.
Yes…. 🤔 pic.twitter.com/FdA6W0Mulp
— Pilestedt (@Pilestedt) May 23, 2024
Another use sarcastically asked for stratagems to not be nerfed once they get extremely popular, as this has been a common complaint as of late, to which Johan replied in a similarly sarcastic fashion.
For my next degree: All eagle stratagems to be p**s aweful! 😂
— Pilestedt (@Pilestedt) May 23, 2024
In Helldivers 2, Eagle Stratagems are multipurpose munitions that destroy everything in their line of sight, being extremely powerful and useful. They provide unlimited uses but with varying cooldown times.
Stratagems in the game are given to the player by the Helldiver Command to help with missions. Some are always available, while others become available after completing certain objectives and milestones in the game. The cooldown for these is shared by the entire team.
Johan Stepped Down as CEO to Become the COO of Arrowhead Game Studios
On May 22nd, Johan announced on X that he was stepping down to become the COO in order to focus more on the creative development side of the game, stating burnout to be a big factor behind this decision. Shams Jorjani became the new CEO, taking over all the responsibilities previously held by the previous CEO.
Helldivers 2 was recently surrounded by controversy that involved mandatory PSN account linking for Steam players. Published by Sony, the game launched on Steam with the PSN account linking requirement listed in the description but marked as optional and was never enforced until very recently.
This was likely due to technical hurdles at the time as later confirmed by Johan. It received extremely heavy backlash from the community, with massive review bombing on Steam which tanked the game’s extremely positive overall rating.
The mandate was later reversed by Sony, and Johan stated that the studio had no say in this and that this was Sony’s decision. This controversy might be one of the reasons why he would rather shift his focus to the creative side of things.
What are some Eagle Stratagem ideas that you would like to see in Helldivers 2? Let us know in the comments below!
