Happy Monday Gamers!

Helldivers 2 launched earlier this month and has had a somewhat rocky but steady launch. There has been good and bad news surrounding the game with players absolutely loving the game experience, to players downright hating on it for having instability issues, crashing, overloaded servers, and using root anti cheat software. Lets dig into what the Helldivers 2 experience actually is.

What is Helldivers 2?

Helldivers 2 is the sequel to the original Helldivers (released in 2015) that was intended to be a PlayStation exclusive however, this time around Sony decided to dual launch the game on both PC and PS5 simultaneously. It’s important to note that this sequel changed things up in a big way in that the whole perspective was changed to now be a third person shooter instead of the top down shooter it used to be.

As the norm these days with pretty much every game that launches, there are some MAJOR notable issues. I started reading about complaints on day 1 and the reviews from players were very mixed. Many players warned about the anti-cheat software the game used on PC, stating that it would be impossible or very difficult to remove once it was installed, and that it could potentially have access your hardware. Others complained about the frequent crashing at various stages of the game, and some could not connect online. Yet, somehow, none of this mattered as the game continued to succeed and become the third most played game just behind Palworld.

My Experience

Regardless of the concerns and aggressive comments there seemed to be something worthwhile in the game, so I tried it out for myself. Unfortunately all of the things that were mentioned were true. I experienced multiple crashes on my first day with the game, and later I began to experience overloaded servers where I could not connect at all. On those days, I just quit the game and got into something else.

Otherwise, when the game was working, I had an awesome time and it really does have some cool features. Combat is intense and always keeps you at the edge of your seat, especially when you are trying to extract and suddenly get overwhelmed with enemies. Not only is the combat solid and satisfying, the environmental artwork is amazing. You get to fight on beautiful planets with a diverse range of biomes from snow filled mountains, to jungles and wooded areas, swamps, and even desert moon-like open spaces. Each drop into a new map felt fresh and unique.

Helldivers 2 has been a great co-op experience overall. The intense shootouts against the hordes of alien bugs and evil robots always keeps you on you toes, and after surviving their overwhelming forces, you feel like hardcore super soldier. Additionally, the theme of fighting for Super Earth and being in this patriotic war effort is both hilarious and entertaining. Helldivers 2 has been a blast to play and it reminded me of older similarly themed games like Halo ODST (specifically its firefight mode) and Gears of War (Horde Mode). It does a great job of hooking you in with intense combat moments and hilarious physics.

At this point all I could really ask for from Helldivers 2 is more server stability going forward. Once the connectivity / server issues are ironed out Helldivers 2 has a strong and promising future going for it, especially considering the strong player numbers. If you are in the market for a third person co-op shooter Helldivers 2 may be right for you. There is a ton of content to get into here between the intense combat, cool upgrades (stratagems) for you Helldiver and your ship, and the sense of accomplishment after defeating the invading forces. If you can get passed the connection issues, I highly recommend Helldivers 2 for an awesome co-op session with your friends.

As always, thank you so much for reading this post, I hope you’ve have an amazing week!