Over 145,000 negative user reviews have hit Helldivers 2's Steam page these last few days, tarnishing its once spotless score.
Helldivers 2 has had a bumpy week after publisher PlayStation Studios announced that all PC players would need to link to an active PlayStation Network account to continue playing. Nothing gets players riled up like making a second account, but divers were especially irked because the mandate came months after launch.
That annoyance was compounded by the usual concerns around information security and having yet another company harvesting data. Countless games also require you to link to a third-party account, but many players were blindsided that it came after purchasing the game. There's also the bigger issue: the PSN isn't available in every region that Steam is, and as a consequence, Helldivers 2 has been pulled from Steam in over 170 countries.
Just yesterday, community manager Spitz took to Discord to explain that the development studio also reacted to the news negatively since the mandate was "Sony's decision, not ours" and "our team is on the side of players in this fight." Spitz also explained that "players making their displeasure known through reviews, refunds, etc. gives us more pull in the discussions with Sony."
Helldivers 2 players certainly took that last line seriously as the co-op shooter's once shining Steam rating has fallen to "Mixed" based on almost 470,000 user reviews. The 190,000 user reviews from the last 30 days average an even more worrying "Overwhelmingly Negative" rating, with over 144,000 negative reviews (and counting) posted in the last two days alone.
Several players have also reportedly been receiving refunds from Steam. Valve's usual policy only refunds players who haven't exceeded two hours of playtime in-game, but the company is seemingly ignoring that rule and refunding players with over 200 hours on record since this is a somewhat unique case.
Helldivers 2 boss responded to the backlash by saying “I guess it’s warranted.”
