Arrowhead Says It Won’t Make Account-Linking Required For Helldivers 2 Players In Regions Without PSN Coverage

Arrowhead Game Studios’ Community Manager has informed players that the studio does not intend to make PSN account linking mandatory for players based in regions without PSN coverage. There has yet to be any update from Sony on the recent Helldivers 2 controversy, but Arrowhead says it’s “looking for better options.”

If you’re out of the loop, Helldivers 2’s community went into meltdown yesterday afternoon after an announcement post from Helldivers 2 publisher Sony Interactive Entertainment informed players that the “grace period” for linking Steam and PlayStation Network accounts would soon be coming to an end.

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While players promised to quit Helldivers 2 after yesterday’s account-linking fiasco, Steam charts show a very different story.

Helldivers 2 launched on PlayStation 5 and PC via Steam back in February, but its mandatory requirement for PC players to link their Steam and PSN accounts was made temporarily optional due to a myriad of server issues. While the requirement has been listed on the game’s store page from day one, players were outraged when Sony announced it would be enforcing the rule soon.

From May 6th, all new Helldivers 2 players will be forced to link their Steam account with a PlayStation Network account if they want to play on PC. As for current players, the same rule applies, but they’ll have until June 4th to link their accounts. This led to players expressing their frustrations for a magnitude of reasons, but the main one was that PSN is only available in a total of 69 countries, so how are players in countries without access to the PlayStation Network supposed to play the game they’ve already purchased?

Fear Not, Helldivers, Arrowhead Is On The Case

After review-bombing Helldivers 2 on Steam and bringing its overall rating down from “overwhelmingly positive” to “mixed,” Arrowhead’s Community Manager Spitz gave an update on the ongoing fiasco.

In multiple new messages on the Helldivers 2 Discord (via Reddit), Spitz said that internal discussions are currently ongoing. “The response from our dev teams has been pretty universally negative and we’re looking for better options,” the Community Manager said.

They then went on to explain, “If a better solution isn’t provided for players who are in regions without PSN coverage, I’m assured that we won’t be making the requirement mandatory for those players. We’re not going to force people to either break Sony TOS or not play the game.”

While the review-bombing might seem rather harsh, considering the decision is out of Arrowhead’s hands, Spitz actually says it’s giving them “more pull” in the discussions with Sony. “It hurts to see the game’s popularity suffer in ratings, but discussions are ongoing and our team is on the side of the players in this fight.”

Spitz finished by saying, “It’s unrealistic to expect people to make PSN accounts in different regions to get past the account linking requirement. We’re aware of that. Discussions are ongoing.”

With any luck, the barrage of negative reviews on Helldivers 2’s Steam page could lead to Sony loosening its account linking requirement.

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