
Now that the initial wave of Helldivers 2 enthusiasm has subsided, you may be forgiven for thinking that the title has fallen off. That’d be a mistake, because it’s worth reiterating the title is still absolutely enormous on Steam. Over the weekend, for example, it managed a peak of 411k players on Valve’s ecosystem alone – which is close to its all-time record of 458k.
What does this tell us? Well, that the game has retained its popularity, and hasn’t tailed off like other titles tend to. This is consistent with what we’ve been hearing from various retail sources, where the Arrowhead shooter’s sales have actually been increasing week-on-week – an extremely unusual trend, as most titles tend to sell the bulk of their units at launch.
Obviously, the pressure is now on the Swedish developer to continue iterating on this live service outing, but it’s been doing a decent job thus far. Sony has been publicly chasing the live service train for some time, but few could have expected Helldivers 2 would blow up quite like this. It looks like the platform holder’s got its first live service hit in the can, then, and it’ll be interesting to see how this shapes its strategy moving forwards.
Comments 39
HD2 is a perfect example of right place, right time, right marketing and right price. Empty period for games, near a huge flop like SS and coming just as Palworld fascination was waning, not high value marketing to give people the overinflated expectations, cheap to reflect the AA nature.
This popularity has had issues though as they're already having trouble with the hardcore reddit community. I would say they should hire more PR/community teams to deal with online interactions and reduce dev interactions now that they've gone legit big.
For the game itself it looks really fun and is maybe the first time since TitanFall 2 that an MP game has me intrigued. That being said what big single player or MP games has the PC had to actually compete? mainstream turnbased JRPGs (one million sales is still nothing much in the broader multi platform market), early access controversy based games (Palworld) and Suicide Squad (a bad AAA game that wasted an amazing developer). Not a very strong competition pool.
The price point was also perfect
If I had friends and free time, I'd definitely dive into this. Really enjoyed the first game.
Glad to see that it's exceeding expectations.
@TwoDents PC Gamers are just really weird I mean they took a joke phrase "PC Master Race" and actually made it their personality. I think gaming in general has never been more console friendly in fact. Playing online games without cheaters, CRPGs now coming optimised for consoles, real time strategy games and 4x games as well, the knowledge that the game can run on your device at medium-high graphics.
Most popular indies are also finding their way to consoles a year or so later.
I love it but still can't play with my friends in cross-play due to server problems
@oc1d there shouldnt be too many server problems now. Ive had a few instances where its been full but once i make it on to my ship ive had no issue with joining friends at all. Make sure you, and they have friends only tab in the options clicked so you party will be empy until they join. If not your party will just fill up with randoms and there wont be space for your friends to join.
Id wager those numbers will start to decline after month 2, that's when they need to start adding a steady stream of content every couple of months and I don't just mean a new battle pass. They need to add more maps, more enemies, more modes and some events including collaborations. This is where it's make or break for most live service games, if they can't keep the game feeling fresh then they will lose players.
There is so much potential for this game. There are plenty of folks who haven't even seen Starship Troopers and don't necessarily know HD 2's influences but it doesn't matter. The Dev's knew what would be fun and made in my opinion, the best live service game (of which I'm not generally a fan) to date. They introduced Mechs already, natural hazards and have plans for other enemy types going forward. The planetary liberation method is a fun reason to keep players engaged but at the end of the day it's just a well executed game that's immensely fun, spectacularly dramatic, hilarious and hugely satisfying, especially on higher difficulties with a full squad. Other developers should take notice of this exceptional and somewhat surprise success.
After 100 hours game do get slightly stale, because you have everything unlocked and even the resources and other currency has caps , so playing through eventually ends up paying you nothing, since max level 50, resources too are capped. You only get medals and super credits if you find them.
Which is I guess the main thing anyways.
The mechs and random weather effects and hazards did feel refreshing but I feel like there should be maybe more ways to spend your resources and such.
Great game overall.
@TwoDents pc is definitely not the best way to play, ive been gaming for 40 years and nothing beats just throwing a disc in and playing the game , I dont have the patience for pc gaming anymore nor the time, yeah its great if you've got an expensive setup , I'm sure we would all like to play at 120fps with ultra settings , but it comes with its own set of problems , that quite frankly are not worth the hassle.
I expect another spike when they add a new enemy faction.
@TwoDents
absolutely, currently it seems Super Earth is only being attacked from the (galactic) east and west.
This leaves please of invasion space from both the north and the south...
It is just a brilliant game that deserve all the plaudits it gets, great price point & no pay to win, just good fun all round!
Just bought and downloading now, so going to see what all the fuss is about with this game, been holding off but with all the buzz finally caved an going to give it a go in a bit.
@oc1d I'm not sure what the issue is but have you made sure it's not something in your network configurations? I've been literally only playing with PC players (the only squad member on PS5) and had very few problems in 30h of play.
Not saying it's definitely not server-side, just wondering where the difference is.
@SJR too true. I’ve been playing online with the same 3 mates for nearly 2 decades and it’s hard work to convince them all to shell out £70 on a new title that might be crap. This was a far easier sell.
@TwoDents apparently they have war of the worlds style tripods planned , there's also new armour on the way , one looks particularly sexy , all black number with a vader vibe
A game that is fair and reasonably priced like Helldivers 2 I have no problem throwing money at. The game is very generous, so I hope that generosity leads the game to be really financially successful, which will encourage alternatives to $20 Call of Duty skins and other nonsense like that.
@Daleaf you'll love it , crank that volume up, maybe put on some fitting music , may I suggest thunderstruck by ac/dc
Does anyone else have an issue where you cant see the number of players, deaths etc... next to the planet on the map screen? Ive also noticed that planet liberation stats dont move for me or sometimes literaly just show 0000000%.
Love the game but wasnt sure if this was just me or a general issue.
@TwoDents PC players think you're only playing games right if it's on PC. Bunch of stupid people.
@Weebleman It was never actually stated but at one point all those stats were turned off, presumably to cut down on information being sent to and from the servers(which was the main bottleneck) I thought most stuff was turned back on now, but it might depend on your time of the day etc.
The servers were completely rammed again after the mechs were unlocked.
@ChrisDeku I will keep an eye on them. Dont get me wrong, the game plays fine, just wasnt sure if there was something going on with mine. Appreciate the response pal.
@Shushibda yea had a few games now really enjoying it, still getting to grips with everything. Great choice of music classic song, especially to blast the bugs to 😁
I tried the mechs but found I wasn’t getting any post match rewards AND purchased a ship stratagem only to lose my samples with no stratagem. Decided to give it the weekend off after that.
lol at these stereotyped comments about "PC gamers" when the most obnoxiously tribal people I've seen in the gaming community have almost all been from the Playstation camp.
Anyway, this feels like the sort of game that would sell best on PC, so not surprised it has exploded on Steam like it has.
@lacerz Friday was a bit buggy like that for me too. It seemed okay by Saturday. I didn't notice a patch so it must have been an issue at their end.
The game doesn't get enough credit for its wonderful graphics and sound. When the stratagems get going it's like a real-life fireworks show
Great to see this have such success and for Sony to finally score with a live service game but it just goes to show you never know what game will resonate and do well. It’s such a risky business model imo and likely one of the reasons so many companies are losing money and making redundancies etc.
@Ralizah excluding us at pushsquare you mean? We’re a friendly bunch mostly aren’t we?
@Dodoo As a rule, most people in most communities are normal and friendly, and Push Square is no exception. Fanatics tend to be the exception, even if they're louder than most.
Which is why I'm not a fan of generalizing wide swaths of people as being any one way.
I get that it's a good fun game. But how many more of these types of articles are you going to churn out? 🙄
@Kidfunkadelic83 It's a known issue that cross-play friends request are not working at the moment, there are 400 issues on discord and 200 in the steam discussion board. Guess it came in with the recent patch and I just have to wait another week when this is hopefully fixed!
one thing that is being left out on the success of this game and that is the community itself. I have had nothing but positive interactions with random squads and those players that have been traitors to the cause have been dealt with in proportion to their betrayal to Super Earth.
@Ralizah
"Which is why I'm not a fan of generalizing wide swaths of people as being any one way."
Comment before this one,
"the most obnoxiously tribal people I've seen in the gaming community have almost all been from the Playstation camp."
Okay. One thing is clear, you think you're better than everyone lol.
@andrewsqual How on Earth you arrived at such a conclusion is beyond me, friend.
@VaultGuy415 i’m playing on PC with high/ultra high settings and the graphics are super mid , i don’t get it…
@N1ghtW1ng dude, a lot of us first Helldivers vets are also in this Managed Democracy spreading campaign. And the new dudes are also very freedom loving. Join in, any helldiver you meet will be your friend for however short their life expectancy is.
Don't wait. Join today! Do your part!
@TheDudeElDuderino
I hope to be an asset in the spread of democracy in the outer reaches of the galaxy when I deploy in around 2 years, until then, keep fighting the good fight comrade!
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