Analysis | Helldivers 2 is guaranteed fun for up to four players

Most young people nowadays haven't even heard of Starship Troopers, while the first Helldivers was more of a hidden gem than a success story. However, contrary to all expectations, Helldivers 2 is a rage on both Steam and PS5, with hundreds of thousands of players fighting hordes of robots and alien insects at the exact moment this review is being published.

After playing for dozens of hours – it's really addictive! – you can understand the reason for the noise he is making. Even with bugs and some unfinished systems, anyone who ventures to fight for democracy in Arrowhead's game can expect a lot of fun, especially with friends.

No messing around!

Helldivers two only asks for ten minutes of your time before throwing you into the space action. The tutorial here is very simple and teaches only the most basic commands, such as throwing yourself on the ground to drag, climbing on things, using one or another special ability and, of course, shooting enemies with the three main types of weapon: primary, secondary and support. From then on, your character is already a soldier ready for combat and can choose which missions he will try to complete from his ship.

At this point, it is also possible to join up with up to three other players, friends or strangers over the internet. Although it is possible to play alone, it is recommended to team up with other players to have any chance of winning at the higher levels, which guarantee more rewards. Additionally, the game is much more fun in cooperative mode, especially with friends, who can plan strategies around their chosen skills and weapons before engaging in combat.

The history here is something completely ignored and only lives as a background for the fighting. The Helldivers are soldiers who fight in space combating threats against humanity and use humor to satirize what appears to be a false democracy that is sustained by military strength and the power of colonization in space.

In other words, the focus here is entirely on the gameplay and progression of the player character as he completes missions and accumulates resources, such as money and materials.

Good diversity of missions and planets

Although the player or group of up to four of them operates alone, the impact of the missions is global when it comes to the game server. In the center of the ship there is an operations table where group members can choose a place to fight in the galaxy. On one side there are threats from robots that look like they came out of the movie “The Terminator” and on the other, various insects that could easily fit into Starship Troopers. As there are weekly objectives for humanity as a whole, such as winning defense campaigns against robots this week, choosing to fight battles of this type at the table helps complete the mission and ensures that all players receive good rewards for doing so.

You can always see when a planet is in battle against enemies and how this battle is progressing, which helps you choose where to fight. Within the chosen planet there will be several missions of various levels. At first it is only possible to choose the easiest ones, but as time passes, increasingly greater difficulties are released, which at a certain point challenge even the best and most connected groups of players.

The variety of missions and planets is really cool. On the war against robots side there are missions to extract scientists, destroy bases, confront enemy troops until their numbers are reduced and several other main objectives. On the insect side, you need to destroy eggs, nests or defeat special versions of these aliens. The planet also influences these missions, since there are always adverse or curious effects depending on the formation of the planet and its climate. Heat, rain, snow and several other factors influence the movement, abilities and various other attributes and actions of Helldivers.

Varied and fun gameplay

The game is very challenging, especially when you're still at the beginning, with few different skills or better armor. However, it is a challenge that can be adjusted before the missions, according to the size or quality of your group, which makes the matches always fun at the right point.

During my forays, many moments were hilarious, which is one of the game's focuses as well. There is friendly fire, it is possible to die from the impact of support capsules launched from ships into the stratosphere, enemies are very varied and come in droves, and the terrain generates different situations that use physics to help or hinder the player. All of this leads to heroic moments or absurd failures that leave the whole team laughing.

The action is very fast and frenetic, which contrasts with the way in which the player can request support from his ship. You need to press the button to use the communicator watch and then execute a sequence of commands with the control arrows. Each special ability or action, such as calling in reinforcements, which is nothing more than reviving friends who fell in battle, has its own sequence. More experienced players will memorize the sequences in their kit and quickly execute the commands, while beginners will despair, especially with enemies nearby, and sometimes they will die without being able to do what they wanted.

Failing here is cruel, however. Some games can yield a negligible or even zero value of experience and resources, in this sense time is wasted. It is necessary to weigh the risks in the balance to decide whether to complete only the main objective or take risks on more secondary ones, for example. As each match can last up to more than half an hour, depending on the objective, failures are really frustrating.

After each objective is done a few times and the dynamics of combat are understood, the matches become faster and increasing the difficulty is the next step. On higher difficulties there are new enemies and the challenge becomes increasingly higher. This is where another important part of the game comes in, character and ship improvements.

Monetization without exaggeration…

When completing a mission, players receive credits and experience, which are used to purchase improvements to their ship. These could be new aids, like an automatic turret or the ability to call in a bombing raid on a marked area. It is also possible to purchase new modules for the ship that improve its combat effectiveness. There are also medals to exchange for new weapons, armor and even special credits, which is the way Arrowhead uses to monetize the game in addition to the price charged in stores, that is, micro transactions.

Although always hated, here they at least don't compromise the fun or favor those with deeper pockets too much. Most of the items can be obtained with normal in-game money and you can make quite a bit of special credits with medals. It's not enough to buy everything in the store, of course, but you can get that cool set or weapon you've been eyeing over time.

…Bug overkill

As not everything is rosy, the game is still in a very unstable situation, both in terms of the server and the issue of bugs, requiring a few months of updates before things get better.

It's very common to be disconnected in the middle of matches or for one of your teammates to get stuck on the equipment selection screen and not be able to play, for example. On PC there are constant crashes. Within the game there is still the chance of finishing the mission and not gaining experience, the store has problems selling items and much more.

Even with more than 400,000 players almost all the time on Steam, the game's average rating only recently surpassed 70% positive. This is because, it is true, Arrowhead has been quick to correct as many problems as possible. In a recent update, for example, server capacity was increased, which basically eliminated the waiting lines that had been going on in recent weeks. It's a matter of a little more patience from the community.

Conclusion

Helldivers 2 is a lot of fun and one of the surprises of the year. The game has problems with bugs and a lack of polish here and there, but the action loop is a lot of fun, especially with friends. For a cheaper price than current releases, it's well worth it for those who like cooperative adventures without caring much about the narrative.

Pros

• Varied missions and different planets
• Skills generate different builds and allow creativity in strategies
• Challenging in the right way
• Comic tone is present in everything, including gameplay

Cons

• Lots of bugs to get into and also during the game
• It takes a long time to deliver mission rewards

Grade: 8.0/10.0

A copy of the game for PlayStation 5 was provided by Sony for the preparation of this analysis