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Helldivers 2 certainly had no trouble selling, torpedoing the series into one of the biggest co-op sensations around and an overnight hit for PlayStation as its fastest-selling game ever. Arrowhead had never made a game so monumental before, and any who were there for its anarchic first year remember the growing pains it felt along the way—particularly in regard to its servers, which buckled under the weight of an unexpectedly massive playerbase.
In a GDC talk titled “Helldivers 2: Capturing Lightning in a Bottle,” Arrowhead CEO Johan Pilestedt recalled the chaos of those early days: “The community was super excited about the gameplay that we put out and everybody clocked in, and it became a wildfire. Everybody told everybody that you need to play this game, and it crushed us under success.”
After seeing that the game was selling unimaginably fast and the problems that created for anyone trying to keep it online, Pilestedt cautioned anyone who was wary of the game’s issues that they didn’t actually have to buy it this second in a post on X, saying “If you have no cash, get it later. While we made a really fun game it’s worth waiting until the servers can support the capacity.”
In his GDC talk, he reiterated his point: “If you spend your last dollar to be stuck in server queues, I’d be heartbroken.” Seems pretty reasonable, right? Well, he went on to say that the suits at PlayStation immediately swooped in and set the record straight.
“Took five minutes until I got a call from the friendly people at PlayStation, who asked me what the fuck I’m smoking. Don’t recommend people to not buy your game!”
It might seem harsh, but Pilestedt did point out his well-meaning comment flew in the face of “conventional wisdom.” Not that it slowed Helldivers’ roll at all, with the game experiencing such sudden and unprecedented growth that it left industry analysts speechless. Still, it shows that game development on such a huge stage is a whole different ball game, and even a casual quip telling your players they don’t have to buy your game right this second might blow your phone up with calls from a puzzled publisher.
Arrowhead introduced a lot of temporary measures around that time to keep the floodgates moving in an orderly fashion, like a login queue, but ultimately the game’s community-focused Major Orders only work because there are so many frenzied players. The game’s more modestly popular predecessor had a much slower, less exuberant galactic war; it seems like, in the end, all the hitches were worth it.
If you’re ready to dive hard for democracy, Helldivers 2 is on sale for $31.99 on Steam.
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Kurt Indovina
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