Helldivers 2 has spent the last few months on fire. On the one hand, it’s easily one of the most popular games of the year, and people have loved jumping in and keeping up with the exciting co-op shooter Galactic War Story. Players log in for a few hours at a time, fight bugs or robots, and advance one of the most interesting player stories happening in gaming today. On the other hand, Helldivers 2 was peppered with Beetle And crashes which have spoiled the fun more than once, and after a few months the community begins to suffer. Now the developer’s CEO has explained why it is imperative to keep adding new content while trying to fix the problems.
Helldivers 2 Players have been very open about their issues with the game, be it game-related official Discord server or the Subredditand Arrowhead Game Studios is obviously involved in those conversations, particularly this one CEO Johan Pilestedt. So it wasn’t too surprising that Pilestedt stepped in reply to a post on the subreddit that called on the community to “ride.” [the] There’s a fine line between constructive input and whiny entitlement.” Pilestedt admitted that the team at Arrowhead, which remains a fairly small privately owned studio, has faced some difficulties as it fixes bugs and continues to put out content. This also includes the introduction of Premium War Bondswhich grant players new equipment and weapons at the cost of real money or reasonably obtainable in-game equivalents.
Pilestedt continues: “We want to deliver the best in the industry and adapt our repair efforts to new things. It’s easy to say, ‘Just fix, don’t add,’ but the reality of being competitive in this industry is that we have to do both to stay relevant.”
This tricky balance is a “hot topic” at the studio, according to Pilestedt, and an issue that has been bothering me since Arrowhead first spoke up. The promise of new in-game content gives a lively and reactive feel to the world in which the team is assembled, but it also represents a lot of work for a small group of people. The people who release new things on a regular basis are the same ones that are expected to eliminate the problems that may arise from the introduction of new things. Staffing is understandably thin on the ground, given the reality of developing one Live service game has settled in.
Countless studios have had to take time just to fix live service titles, such as: Rainbow Six: Siege and myself Payday 3which started in a broken state At the end of last year. Respawn broke away from the traditional provision of a new hero character Apex Legends In order to prioritize the long-term health of the game, various systems and systems have been overhauled characters in the meantime. The main reason to bring new products to consumers and grow numbers has often left teams burned out communitiesand represents a constant threat to countless studios risk making their games fail.
Pilestedt has a point when it comes to the field being very competitive, and I’m afraid he’s particularly on point when he says that the studio can’t afford to lag behind, especially when you consider the rhythm that the company has established for itself. While there are certainly calls to stop producing new content, there are even more people who are silently (or loudly) judging Helldivers 2 and abandon it as soon as it no longer works as advertised. It’s the unfortunate and cruel reality of working on one Live service title.
Pilestedt says that Arrowhead is “calibrating” its efforts and that the team needs to find its “step and balance,” which makes me think the studio is on the right track. The hope is that Arrowhead can continue to deliver content at a length that makes sense, doesn’t break the team, while still leaving room for maintenance. Either the company uses the resources of its new success to grow into departments that could better balance these needs.
At the end of it all, let the lesson be running a live service game Helldivers 2 is hard work no matter how much you prepare for it, and the developers working on it should be given the time and courage to find the best balance that works for the team.
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