After breaking many records, the Helldivers 2 phenomenon is now experiencing a significant decline. Is the democracy developed by Arrowhead Games and published by Sony in danger?
Released on February 8th on PC and PS5, Helldivers 2 experienced a truly explosive success, rising to become one of the biggest hits of 2024. But this dazzling rising star now seems to be beginning its decline after numerous unfortunate developments for the excellent co-op game from Arrowhead Games, published by Sony.
Is Helldivers 2’s democracy in serious danger?
Helldivers 2 proved to be THE big surprise at the start of the year. Developed by Arrowhead Games and launched in the same month as the juggernaut FF7 Rebirth, this much less ambitious little game ended up being Sony’s best-selling game of all time in such a short period of time. In fact, more than 12 million copies of the collaborative title were sold in three months, dethroning the god of war Ragnarök, who held that prestigious title before it. On Steam, it ranked sixth for the largest player spike on the entire platform, with almost 460,000 concurrently connected players. Nothing seemed to be able to stop this dazzling and unexpected phenomenon.
Since then, however, the situation for Helldivers 2 has become much less positive SteamDBThe title thus lost 90% of its players, with a peak of “only” 45,000 democracy fighters. The main reason for this rapid decline: the controversy following Sony’s request to link its account to PSN. Although a backtracking was made to save the furniture after a massive wave of bombings, the damage was clearly already done. Worse still, the game was removed from Steam in the 177 countries where there is no PSN, despite the publisher’s change of strategy. Another complaint from the community against the Arrowhead Games title: too many patches of only relative interest. Since then, the studio has wanted to raise the bar in this area. But that wasn’t enough to bring back players who sulked about Super Earth.
Can Super Earth return to its former glory?
If Helldivers 2 is struggling on PC, the situation on PS5 is less alarming to begin with, although we don’t know exactly how many active players there are on that platform. We can bet that Arrowhead Games is working on future additions that could motivate Super Earth’s fighters to return to duty. Whether this comes in the form of new gear, stratagems, or even new factions remains a mystery for now.
At the same time, a serious competitor to Helldivers 2 could be rubbing its hands in the shadow of its demise: Starship Troopers Extermination. Expected on October 11, the adaptation of the film that greatly inspired Arrowhead Games could well take its place as the co-op alien extermination game most appreciated by gamers, at least on PC. Unfortunately, not everyone can live forever, as Johnny Rico would say.
