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It has been a tough weekend to be a Helldivers 2 player. On Friday it was announced that all Helldivers 2 PC players would be forced to create a PSN account and connect it to their game, otherwise, they would be locked out of the game. This led to a lot of backlash from the community, especially from those in any country where PSN wasn’t available.
On Saturday, Sony delisted the game from Steam in over 170 countries where PSN wasn’t available. Then on Sunday, the community was left unsure of what the future of Helldivers 2 was, which created a lot of in-fighting. Finally, on Monday morning Sony announced that it was backtracking on its plans and no longer going ahead with the forced PSN plans.
Part of the reason why Sony did backtrack was due to the negative reception the news was met with, which included many players leaving negative reviews on Steam, leading to Helldivers 2 becoming the most negatively reviewed paid game in Steam history, more so than games such as Call of Duty and GTA 5.
U/TheWizardBlundermore took to Reddit to remind players to switch their negative Steam reviews to positive now that Sony has backtracked on its earlier plans. Although the negative reviews worked, they will have a long-term negative effect on the game as many Steam players look to user reviews to determine the quality, even if subconsciously, due to the lack of bias that is typically found. If the score remains negative then many potential future players will likely disregard the game, which could hurt the future sales of Helldivers 2.
Players already seem to be removing negative reviews as, according to Steamdb, Helldivers 2 has only 30,000 fewer negative reviews since the announcement was made by Sony, but there is still a long way to go. So, if you have left a negative review due to the backlash, make sure to remove it to help the game increase the rating score again, as it currently sits at 52% which is a long way off the 85% it was at before the controversy.
We are going to need all the help that we can get as the next Major Order is around the corner. Following the completion of the last event, a new message appeared in-game which stated that the Terminids are a “greater threat than ever before” so it looks like they will remain the focus of the game for the time being. To ensure victory against the Terminids, we highly recommend checking out our Helldivers 2 best weapons guide and best armor guide so you can bring democracy to the Terminid threat that stands between you and freedom.
