After taking home two trophies at The Game Awards 2024 and boasting three wins during the Golden Joysticks earlier this year, too, Helldivers 2 is no stranger to success - and Arrowhead Game Studio says it now knows what the community wants more than ever.
Speaking in a recent interview with GamesRadar+, game director Michael Eriksson explains that the developers behind the smash-hit shooter are far more confident than they were when Helldivers 2 first dropped back in February. "We do feel a lot more confident than when we launched the game," admits the lead. "I don't think it's a secret that we were not prepared for this, for the amount of attention and success."
Eriksson continues, looking back at the game's launch and how Arrowhead handled things then: "So it's definitely true that internally, some of the processes were not working as well as they should be working. We lacked some key people in some places, just because it's a big beast to control when you have this massive of a hit. In that period after launch, we did make some mistakes, just because of this chaotic nature."
Changes have come since then, however, and the studio has a better grasp on everything now: "But we've managed to go a long way now into controlling this beast, and we have way better processes set up to make sure that we test things before we release and so forth. I think our release accuracy has gotten way, way better." That doesn't mean that it'll all be perfect from here on out, however - devs are human, after all.
"With that said," says Eriksson, "I do think that when you're in our position, and when we're trying to build the game with the community - sometimes we will fail even though we're doing our best. And I say fail, but let's say we don't exactly get the results that we want. But then we have our players that can tell us what they want and what they like and don't like." Fans are what's most important to Arrowhead.
"That means the world to us," describes the lead, "because those are the people we're making the game for. We can use that information to get to where we need to be quickly. And it's so helpful for us. So hopefully it will be less of a bumpy road when it comes to release accuracy, but we're still prepared to take risks, to deliver on everything that the players want, and hopefully, there will be a smooth ride going forward."
Production director Alex Bolle agrees. "It definitely got better from a production standpoint," he explains, looking back at Arrowhead's progress as well. "Yeah, we've made mistakes. It's like trial and error, the low lows and the high highs, and understanding the player has been something super fun and interesting, because again - very privileged position where we have so many players, not everyone wants the same."
According to Bolle, it's all about striking a balance. "It's kind of finding the magic recipe to make the game we want and they want - but who is 'they?' It's something we talk about: 'the potion that will match everyone's needs.'" While it's impossible to "match everyone's needs," devs can "create different content" - much like Arrowhead. That's where big patches such as Helldivers 2's recent Illuminate update come in.
"This update is pretty much that," says Bolle. "It's content for a certain type of player. This content is for the more hardcore players." With melee weapons, cars, and a third faction that's back with a vengeance, it offers challenging content with a little bit of everything players have asked for mixed in - and I'd argue that while nothing can ever "match everyone's needs," this update comes pretty damn close to doing so.
