Johan Pilestedt, the creative director of Helldivers 2 and CEO of Arrowhead, advocates for a gaming philosophy where titles must “earn the right to monetize.” He emphasized that while players are encouraged to support the game by purchasing microtransactions, Arrowhead never imposes this on anyone.
These sentiments arose within a conversation on Twitter when Pilestedt responded to a player’s tweet highlighting the ability to earn in-game currency and super credits through gameplay alone. Pilestedt clarified that despite offering functionally different items, the game deliberately avoids a pay-to-win model. He humorously noted that the only potentially overpowered item, the revolver, falls short in practice.
"You have to earn the right to monetize" – I truly believe that. If people want to support this title they have an option, but we are never forcing anyone to do so.
— Pilestedt (@Pilestedt) February 11, 2024
In a follow-up tweet, Pilestedt reiterated his belief that the privilege to monetize must be earned. He emphasized that while supporting the title is an option for players, it’s never obligatory.
Arrowhead Game Studios promptly released a “rapid patch” on Steam to address matchmaking issues. Subsequently, the same patch was extended to PS5 players.
Despite these efforts, director Mikael Eriksson acknowledged on the game’s Discord channel that a comprehensive matchmaking solution is still in progress and may require a few more days of testing. Thus, players might encounter intermittent issues until a permanent fix is implemented across both platforms.
Helldivers 2 has achieved a significant milestone as the largest Steam launch on PlayStation, amassing over 150,000 concurrent users on the PC platform during its debut weekend. This surpasses the previous record held by Sony Santa Monica’s God of War reboot, which peaked at 73,529 simultaneous users, marking Helldivers 2’s substantial impact on the gaming community.
