Earlier this week, Helldivers 2 players on PC were notified that they would soon need to link their Steam account to a PlayStation Network (PSN) account. Two days later, the game received 100,000 new negative reviews on Steam.
Also, the developers of Arrowhead have stated several times that they stand with the players.
“Oh, straight to the review score.” chirping Johan Bilstedt, CEO and Creative Director of Arrowhead Game Studios. “Well, I guess that’s fair. We’re all sorry for how this all turned out. I hope we can make amends and restore trust by continuing to deliver a great gaming experience. I just want to make great games!”
According to Pilestedt’s comments yesterday, Helldivers 2 still has a “mostly positive” user review on Steam, with a “mixed” rating based on reviews from the past two weeks. At the time of writing, overall ratings are mixed – it only has 59% positive reviews – and recent reviews are mostly negative.
“Internal discussions about changing mandatory linking are ongoing, and while I can’t reveal details, feedback from our development team worldwide has been very negative and we’re looking for a better alternative,” Arrowhead Community Manager Spitz wrote on Helldivers’ Discord (eg) . It was shared by Reddit user Navar4477)
Spitz also stated that the decision and announcement was made by Sony and not Arrowhead itself.
Players object to the need to link their PSN accounts for a variety of reasons, from basic inconvenience to greater data collection and privacy concerns. This change is particularly relevant for players in regions where it is not possible to sign up for a PSN account An earlier comment from Arrowhead suggested that these players should sign up for a PSN for a different region than where they live. However, this would actually violate Sony’s terms of service
“Unless a better solution is provided for players in regions without PSN coverage, I am confident that we will not mandate this requirement for those players,” Spitz wrote. “We will not force people to break Sony’s terms of service or not play the game.”
Sony has been bringing more and more games to PC in recent years, usually a few years after the first exclusive console release. Helldivers 2 is a bit different in that they are publishing the game and it is being developed by an outside studio that is not their own and it was released simultaneously on the PC and PlayStation platforms. This cross-platform release is one of the reasons for their success. That’s it It is Dr The seventh highest-grossing game released by Sony of all time, with more than half of its sales coming on PC. It’s just a great game.
All of this makes it a real shame that the player experience is distorted by unnecessary account requirements.
