Many Helldivers were greeted by a concerning message from Arrowhead games last week, as they were told that they would need to link their PC accounts to a PSN account if they wanted to continue to spread Democracy throughout the system. As to be expected, players took offence to this notice as it was quite a sudden request. Players were given until the end of the month to link their accounts or they would no longer be able to play the game on PC.
While this may have seemed like an out-of-left-field request, players were actually prompted to link their PC account to a PSN account when they first started the game. However, due to server stability issues that Arrowhead Games has been dealing with since the launch of Helldivers 2, this requirement was made skippable and never prompted players to do so again.
However, it seemed Sony stepped in and issued the ultimatum that forced Arrowhead to finally require the account linking, thus leading us to the aforementioned post. Naturally, this sparked outrage as players took to the official Discord, Reddit and Twitter for Helldivers 2 and started to voice their complaints about the new requirement.
Not all of the discourse about account linking was positive, with some responses from the community managers adding more fuel to the fire rather than helping it by responding to player outrage in condescending ways. But, players wanted their voices to be heard on this issue – even calling out the CEO of Arrowhead Game Studio on Twitter, who responded that he heard players’ outrage and would convey their feelings to Sony.
Thankfully, the players have prevailed in this instance since Sony reverted the account linking requirement. Sony tweeted on Monday that ” (They’ve) heard your feedback on the Helldivers 2 account linking update. The May 6 update, which would have required Steam and PlayStation Network account linking for new players and for current players beginning May 30, will not be moving forward.” They also added that this was a learning experience for them on what is best for PC players as they branch out into the new market.
Helldivers fans — we’ve heard your feedback on the Helldivers 2 account linking update. The May 6 update, which would have required Steam and PlayStation Network account linking for new players and for current players beginning May 30, will not be moving forward.
We’re still…
— PlayStation (@PlayStation) May 6, 2024
Whether or not Sony truly learned a lesson from this event is yet to be seen but what players have learned is that their voice matters in Helldivers 2. Many are celebrating the win over Sony as one of the few times that a major change like this has been reverted so quickly. Hopefully other major game studios will take note and start to listen to their player base more often, at least on issues not concerning the balance of the game.
