Helldivers 2 director Mikael Eriksson has shared an update with players regarding Escalation of Freedom.
He posted this message on the official Helldivers subreddit:
“I want to directly address the feedback you’ve raised about the Escalation of Freedom update. We’ve spent the last week listening to feedback, reflecting about the path ahead for Helldivers 2 and how we want to continue developing the game. In short, we didn’t hit our target with the latest update. Some things we just didn’t get right – and other more fundamental inconsistencies in our approach to game balance and game direction.
All of that is on us and we are going to own that. As many of you have pointed out, and we agree, what matters most now is action. Not talk.
To that end, here’s what we intend to do in the upcoming updates.
Our aim within the next 60 days:
- Continue to re-examine our approach to balance. Our intention is that balance should be fun, not “balanced” for the sake of balance.
- Update how the fire damage mechanic works to tweak how the flamethrower serves as a close range support weapon. (A quick straight revert won’t work, as it would break other things)
- Rework gameplay to prevent excessive ragdolling
- Re-think our design approach to primary weapons and create a plan for making combat more engaging
- Re-prioritize bug fixes so that the more immediate gameplay-impacting bugs are prioritized.
- Improve game performance (frame rate is a focus)
- Rework Chargers”
Eriksson also promised improvements in the way they make communications and provide feedback in the future. There will be more blog posts and livestreams, regular surveys, and an opt-in beta test environment, which Eriksson says is a high priority. They will also improve how they release patches and their accompanying patch notes.
While there had been recent discourse regarding the ‘fall of Helldivers 2’, the people who dismissed the idea clearly hadn’t been paying attention to how things were playing out. Yes, it’s true that even their low active player numbers would be the envy of other live service games, and it’s not like Arrowhead has no opportunity to bring those numbers back up. But you can actually see the trend of players going lower, and it’s one that Arrowhead hasn’t been able to reverse.
If anything, speaking out on this downward trend is the right thing to do, so that Arrowhead can address these issues properly and not just dismiss it with notions like ‘that is just how live service games are.’ The studio’s got a thankless job ahead of them, since a fraction of those lapsed or refunded Helldivers 2 players were region locked out of playing the game. Until Sony reverses that change, which they did not do after walking back the PSN requirement, Arrowhead can’t actually get those players back, and they’ll need to find ways to bring in new players.
We’re certainly rooting for Arrowhead and the Helldivers player community, and we hope the studio can successfully take their game forward to its next season.
