Helldivers 2 Backtracks On Its Controversial Requirement

There’s no doubt that Helldivers 2 is one of the most popular releases of this year. Arrowhead Game Studios‘ game quickly became the most successful title on PC distributed by Sony, in a bet on the platform that is gaining more strength. However, the game’s great popularity implies that when it gets involved in controversies, they are also of significant scale.

The Last Days Have Been Crazy for Helldivers 2

This past weekend, Helldivers 2 experienced one of its worst moments so far, due to a PlayStation policy that they ultimately reversed.

The problems began last week when Sony announced that starting from May 6th, all new Helldivers 2 players would have to link their Steam account to a PlayStation Network account, and that from May 30th, this would be mandatory for all players. This announcement itself was poorly received, but even worse was the fact that the game began disappearing from the Steam store in regions that do not have PlayStation Network support, such as Egypt and Jamaica.

This combination triggered a wave of negative reviews of the game on Steam, surpassing 200,000. The initial response from Arrowhead Game Studios CEO, Johan Pilestedt, was to direct players to the PlayStation support department, while Sony’s justification was that this was already announced and the only reason it wasn’t implemented earlier were the launch issues the game faced.

Backtracks On Its Controversial Requirement

Finally, after much protest from users, PlayStation decided to backtrack on this requirement. In a post on their social media, Sony commented that they acknowledged the players’ feedback, and the update that was supposed to happen yesterday will no longer take place.

Pilestedt, on his part, apologized to the players on his social media and thanked Sony for acting “quickly and efficiently.” Additionally, the executive took the opportunity to praise the actions of the fans, admitting that he is impressed by the “willpower of the Helldivers 2 community and their ability to collaborate”, a response that, to a lesser extent, also generated rejection within a sector for validating aggressive attitudes.

Helldivers 2 is available on PC via Steam and on PlayStation 5. Meanwhile, other future Sony games, such as the upcoming release of Ghost of Tsushima on PC, will require a PlayStation Network account to play their online modes.

For more Fextralife news, be sure to check out ATLUS Unveils New Trailer and Details of Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance and Hades 2 Has Finished The Technical Test & Seems To Be Ready for Early Access