Helldivers 2 designer outlines Arrowhead's "trainwreck in slow-motion" design philosophy, and another essential guiding star: "The tingle in the ass"

Helldivers 2 creates some of the most cinematic, nerve-wracking moments in any modern shooter. Battlefront 2 and the Battlefield series would be close comparisons. One of Arrowhead's designers has taken to Reddit to explain the philosophies that guided the team: "the tingle in the ass" and "a trainwreck in slow-motion."

A Reddit account with the username AHGS_Designer_Patrik, likely Patrik Lasota, states that these were the two "guiding stars" that made the game what it is today.

"The first one we jokingly (and to serious peoples despair) called 'The tingle in the ass,'" Lasota writes. "What we mean is the type of moments that make you lean in, focus, and tense your body in anticipation of things going poorly."

Comment from r/truegaming

Lasota gives the example of having to input a stratagem code while in the middle of a fight. A lot of games would let you call them in from a radial menu, but not Helldivers 2. How many times have you messed up and had to start over, or even called in the wrong thing? It makes fights way more tense.

Another example given is how "A lot of things toss you around or almost kill you, instead of just outright killing you, giving you the time to think 'oh shit' before dying (or surviving)."

As for the "trainwreck in slow motion," that's all to do with the enemy and combat design. "A lot of effort went into ensuring that the combat doesn't escalate too fast, and is recoverable at those points," Lasato explains. "We don't want the player to feel suddenly overwhelmed by the amount of enemies or pressure, but to feel their control of the situation slipping slowly. And once it has gotten out of control, still be a situation that is recoverable."

Some of my favorite moments come from feeling like my squadmates and I are about to be overwhelmed, only for us to survive by the skin of our teeth. It's a very fine balance that Helldivers 2 manages to strike.

Arrowhead does this by balancing "how many enemies we spawn with the movement speed of them," so you always feel like you're getting outmatched, even though you can normally just run away.

Think about all that when you're defending planets from the Terminids in the new Major Order.

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