Helldivers 2 Game Director Responds to Backlash Over Escalation of Freedom Update

Helldivers 2 players have not been happy with the game's latest update.

By Tanner Dedmon

Helldivers 2 just recently got the biggest update the game's ever received with the release of the Escalation of Freedom update, but the response to it has been less than desirable for Helldivers 2 developer Arrowhead Game Studios. While it's true that the update included big additions like a new swamp planet, more missions, and a harder difficulty level, it also continued an unwanted trend of nerfing powerful items to the point that players had fewer desirable weapon choices that felt less rewarding. After taking in the feedback from players, Helldivers 2 game director Mikael Eriksson said the team is "reflecting about the path ahead" for the game.

We've seen complaints from Helldivers 2 players in the past about nerfs and other objectionable changes, but for the Escalation of Freedom update, players rallied against the changes more than usual to the point that they were intentionally tanking the intergalactic conquest objectives. Eriksson acknowledged the feedback after the update and said Arrowhead missed the mark with this update.

"I want to directly address the feedback you've raised about the Escalation of Freedom update," he said. "We've spent the last week listening to feedback, reflecting about the path ahead for Helldivers 2 and how we want to continue developing the game. In short, we didn't hit our target with the latest update. Some things we just didn't get right – and other more fundamental inconsistencies in our approach to game balance and game direction."

To that end, Eriksson laid out a series of actions that Arrowhead plans to take in the next 60 days. Some of those plans include broad commitments to rethinking things like "our design approach to primary weapons and create a plan for making combat more engaging" as well as Arrowhead's approach to balance changes overall.

"Our intention is that balance should be fun, not balanced for the sake of balance," he said.

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Ragdolling and frame rate were also concerns Arrowhead plans to explore within that timeframe. There are also plans to rework Chargers, though what those reworks will look like isn't known. 

On an even broader level, Arrowhead said it plans to implement a beta environment so that players can test some of these changes before they go live which will hopefully remove the need for backtracking big updates like Escalation of Freedom. Like most studios, Arrowhead said it hopes to communicate more via blog posts and streams regarding future plans.

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