The popular PlayStation and PC title “Helldivers II” is on the verge of dying after its last major update was the “Straw that broke that camel’s back.” This is especially shocking considering Helldivers 2 initially had immense success being acclaimed by critics and casual gamers alike.
Some people even went as far as to nominate Helldivers II as Game of The Year for 2025 such as popular YouTube and streamer “Zanny.” This is a massive deal as online multiplayer games rarely ever get nominated for Game of the Year, let alone win Game of The Year, except for Overwatch in 2016.
Essentially what the “Escalation of Freedom” update did was nerf fire damage in Helldivers to not only be significantly less effective for Players to use but also made the fire effects look much worse than they did before. Additionally, some smaller weapon nerfs were added in this update along with a massive nerf to one of the game’s most used guns the “Breaker Incendiary.” This nerf specifically combined with the overall nerfed fire damage has led to a level of outrage that we haven’t seen from the community before.
If the nerfs weren’t enough to upset the community Escalation of Freedom also buffed the enemy forces in Helldivers by adding new units like the Alien Bugs’ new “Impaler,” who features the 3rd largest health pool in the game and the Robot’s new artillery tanks and upgraded walkers who now require heavy firepower to take down.
Even before this update was released, Helldivers II had already been on a steady decline with the game losing 90% of its player base according to Game Rant.
“Escalation of Freedom,” being the most recent and largest update since launch, was marketed as being the solution to the community’s complaints about balancing, and has only further added to the preexisting complaints.
According to the player base, this is mainly due to the excessive amount of nerfs the game has received since launch. The player base has a general conscience that the developer’s approach to balancing the game through “excessive weapon nerfs and buffing the enemy’s,” to be heavily flawed. This approach prioritizes meta builds for every player and discourages build variety by making most in-game options unviable.
This belief is further enforced by the fact that Helldivers unlike most multiplayer games, Helldivers is a player vs environment game, meaning that players will never fight each other and only ever fight AI. Because of this fact players believe the nerfs to be even more unnecessary because the nerfs aren’t helping anyone from losing to overpowered builds from other players, they are just making the game harder and less fun.
Between the updates consisting of mostly Nerfs and enemy buffs and the change of leadership from the game’s original CEO the future of Helldivers 2 does not look bright.
However, Helldivers 2 is not unsavable by any stretch of the imagination, even in its current state it is still an extraordinarily fun game with stunning visuals and cinematic action. The developers just need to embrace the fact that this is a PVE game and stop with the constant nerfs and buff the game’s arsenal so that not every player is forced to use the same two loadouts. If the developers do this then I am more than confident in Helldivers 2 future especially with the game’s 3rd enemy faction the “illuminates,” on the way.
