Sony: PlayStation Accounts Will not Be Required for Helldivers 2 PC Gamers

Following in depth participant backlash, Sony has walked again its plans to require PC gamers of Helldivers 2 to hyperlink their Steam accounts with a PlayStation Community (PSN) account. The requirement had beforehand been scheduled to take impact Could 6. Now, it will likely be optionally available for PC gamers of the third-person sci-fi shooter.

“Helldivers followers—we’ve heard your suggestions on the Helldivers 2 account linking replace,” Sony wrote early Monday morning. “The Could 6 replace, which might have required Steam and PlayStation Community account linking for brand spanking new gamers and for present gamers starting Could 30, is not going to be shifting ahead. We’re nonetheless studying what’s finest for PC gamers and your suggestions has been invaluable. Thanks once more in your continued assist of Helldivers 2 and we’ll preserve you up to date on future plans.”

Arrowhead Recreation Studios CEO and Helldivers Artistic Director Johan Pilestedt thanked Sony for altering its stance. “I’m impressed by the willpower of the Helldivers 2 neighborhood and your means to collaborate,” Pilestedt wrote Monday morning. “I wish to thank our companions and mates at PlayStation for rapidly and successfully making the choice to go away PSN linking optionally available. We collectively wish to set a brand new commonplace for what a dwell recreation is, and the way builders and neighborhood can assist one another to create the perfect recreation experiences.”

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Sony’s determination to change course comes after Helldivers 2 confronted criticism from followers over the PSN account-linking requirement. The sport, which was launched again in February, didn’t require PC gamers to create or hyperlink a PSN account upon launch and did not clearly warn gamers that they must create one at a later date or later lose their means to play the sport. In response to Sony, PSN account-linking wasn’t required at launch as a consequence of “technical points.”

Steam players felt blind-sided by the announcement that they’d have to enroll in what’s primarily an account for PS4 and PS5 console house owners regardless of being PC players. Others expressed frustration as a result of PSN accounts aren’t out there in each nation. This may have meant that players in 177 nations—primarily nations within the Center East, the Caribbean, and Africa—would have now not been in a position to play Helldivers 2 with no VPN. Some gamers cited safety issues with Sony, such because the information breaches it confronted in 2011 and 2023, as the rationale they do not wish to create or join a PSN account.

As a response to Sony’s sudden PSN requirement, gamers overwhelmingly review-bombed the sport, remodeling its optimistic Steam rating right into a “Principally Unfavorable” one. When the unfavourable evaluations got here flowing in final week, Pilestedt mentioned: “Ouch, proper within the overview rating. Nicely, I assume it is warranted. Sorry to everybody for a way this transpired.” At time of writing, Helldivers 2 has 400,000 optimistic participant evaluations and practically 360,000 unfavourable participant evaluations on its Steam web page.

Different gamers objected to the PSN account requirement primarily based on precept. “I used to be so busy having enjoyable that I forgot about company greed for a second,” wrote one Helldivers 2 participant with 162 recreation hours logged.

The response to Sony killing the PSN account requirement has been met with loads of optimistic reactions and participant responses that faucet into the satirical humor of the sport, although not all have been optimistic. “Democracy prevails,” the Opera GX net browser’s X account mentioned early Monday morning.