After a complicated week for Helldivers 2, a big part of the community raised hell on the game for a new step that involved linking to the PlayStation Network before playing on PC via Steam; this was supposed to be mandatory after May 6. Many game players didn’t want to do this, claiming that Sony had security problems in the past and that the service was not available in all regions.
This kept escalating to the point that Steam users were successfully requesting refunds and even thousands were review-bombing the game on Steam, to get their point across. Making a historic move, Sony backtracked on this and apologized, which could mean that other titles will follow the same steps.
Sony Could be Setting the Path for the Future of Live-Service Games Like Helldivers 2
It is very uncommon to see a big video game studio backtrack on a decision, but few fan complaints have reached as far as the whole Helldivers 2 conundrum. Even the company’s CEO, Johan Pilestedt, has stated that he is very tired and overwhelmed by this. and even went as far as clarifying that this was a Sony idea from the start. This title passed from being the most loved game to the most hated in just a few days.
Sony and PlayStation are not the first companies to make it mandatory to link accounts with other services to play the games. Titles like Rocket League, Sea of Thieves, Red Dead Redemption 2, and many more have these steps to play the game on PC. With this particular IP from Arrowhead Game Studios, the players went far and beyond to make their complaints heard. After these extreme measures, Sony could have just set a precedent.
Playstation Could Be the First of Many
According to some answers that justified the actions of players for this particular campaign against the game, the reasons were like Sony has flaws in their security, or the PlayStation Network is not in every country, and many more. But this never happened with any other title, so in the future, this kind of behavior from fans could make studios really careful with what steps they take to play any game.
It’s also possible that this was a unique incident that will never recur, particularly in light of the recent controversy surrounding Sony’s handling of the Stellar Blade censorship issue, which infuriated some fans. In reality, this kind of camping makes no sense because it is the most common practice to link accounts to any live service title, but anything could happen in this industry. Fans are very passionate about these titles.
This didn’t significantly impact Helldivers 2, as the number of games this weekend remained consistent with previous ones. For the last two months, this game has had almost 300,000 concurrent players on Steam every day. This kind of campaign made a lot of noise on social media but really didn’t affect the game as a whole, but the refunds were the thing that scared the studio, and that’s why Sony backtracked.
What are your thoughts about other games that will repeat in the future? Let us know in the comments!
