Drama unfolds in Helldivers 2 as players clash with Sony over account linking: Steam removes game from sales in 177 countries

The fight for democracy in Helldivers 2 has turned into a dispute between players and Sony, which is now in its third day. Notice of compulsory linking of accounts on PC has already led to 150,000 negative reviews on Steam, but at the same time confirming developers from Arrowhead studio that not their decision and that they are on the side of the players themselves, trying to find out more from Sony. Linking accounts may not be a matter of a few seconds for many players, if they already have it or create it. The problem is that, unlike Steam, PlayStation Network is not available in many countries. Although Sony finally responded, it didn’t exactly provide an adequate solution to the situation – at this time, it was simply ending sales of the game in countries without PlayStation Network support.

Helldivers 2 on Steam can no longer be purchased in several countries after it was announced that a PSN login will soon be required.

Steam has also been allowing refund requests for players even if they played over 2 hours https://t.co/8O7etaebpH pic.twitter.com/0P5hcOyiaL

— Wario64 (@Wario64) May 5, 2024

Overnight, the game was pulled from sales on Steam a total of 177 countries. Among them are African states, various islands and territories abroad, but also some European states, for example Moldova, Belarus, Albania or Serbia. However, no official statement has come from Sony yet. Paradoxically, just yesterday Arrowhead’s community manager, named Spitz, assured players on Discord that they will not force themselves to violate the terms of service or stop playing unless Sony finds a solution for users in countries or -PSN. . So at this time, it seems that the developers have not heard from Sony yet and that they have not solved anything with them, which can be seen with a rather confusing communication. Additionally, pulling the game from Steam does not address the fact that many affected players already own the game, and it is unknown what will happen to the game if Accounts are not linked under the new rules. It also begs the question of why the game was available here at all when Sony had planned the connection from the start.

On the other hand, immediately after the new duty was announced, many players began to consider returning the game and asking for their money back. The problem, however, was that most of them had already logged well over two hours in those few months, which, along with two weeks since purchase, is the standard normal for refund. According to the players’ reports, Valve decided to make an exception at least in their case. This is proven, for example Screenshot of the player, who spent nearly 100 hours on Helldivers 2, but his refund request was still granted. So it can be assumed that other players will try to do the same. But the question remains how Sony itself will deal with all this and what (we hope) will come up with the developers.

You will see a gradual development of the whole matter in our archive.