Helldivers 2’s runaway success continues. It’s simply received two BAFTA Game Awards: one for Best Multiplayer, one other for Best Music. That’s from 5 nominations. The BAFTA wins convey to an finish a fruitful online game awards season, drawing a line beneath what has been a exceptional 12 months for Swedish developer Arrowhead.
Helldivers 2 accepts the win for Multiplayer on the #BAFTAGamesAwards ✨ pic.twitter.com/rYWwyc1KGR
— BAFTA Games (@BAFTAGames) April 8, 2025
Let’s bear in mind, Helldivers 2 is the fastest-selling PlayStation Studios recreation of all time, with an astonishing 12 million copies offered in simply 12 weeks. It is a report no first-party Sony-developed recreation will seemingly ever beat. But a lot has occurred since that preliminary explosive launch: a dramatic U-turn on PSN account necessities on Steam, review-bomb campaigns, and a neighborhood typically at conflict with Helldivers 2 itself as nerfs and buffs both went too far or not far sufficient.
Through all of it, Arrowhead has struggled to deal with an even bigger, extra mainstream playerbase than it’s ever needed to cope with. But now, 14 months after Helldivers 2 hit PC and PlayStation 5, how does Arrowhead mirror on what’s gone earlier than? Has it lastly began to become familiar with the brutal, unforgiving world of live-service? And after that Killzone collaboration, might Warhammer 40,000 be subsequent?
IGN sat down with Alex Bolle, manufacturing director on Helldivers 2, to seek out out extra.
IGN: Congratulations on all of the awards! When you had been within the thick of growth and issues weren’t maybe going in addition to they may have in any other case been, did you ever think about {that a} 12 months after the sport got here out it could be thought-about among the finest video games of 2024 and win all these awards?
Alex Bolle: No, no, positively not. It’s a really humbling expertise. I might say a 12 months in the past precisely, we had a touch that it could be a candy 12 months for us, however we had been additionally within the thick of it. We had been nonetheless fixing plenty of issues, making ready our subsequent huge launch for the content material. So no, positively not realizing we’d get there.
Last time we spoke, we had been making ready Omens of Tyranny. Even then we’re like, okay, we now have The Game Awards. We had been making ready the entire shadow drop and every thing. We had been able to make that shadow drop and be like, okay, this one goes to be enjoyable. The awards half, possibly not that a lot.
I used to be subsequent to my launch supervisor attempting to watch the progress of Omens of Tyranny and the entire main order with the Illuminate. And I turned my head in the direction of the TV on the workplace, it was like 2am. And I see Mikael Eriksson, the sport director, simply shaking fingers with Snoop Dogg. And I’m like, what’s going on right here? Which actuality are we?
So yeah, it has been good. The Golden Joysticks, DICE, all these awards, it is a great way to take a step again and have a look at the influence of the sport. We’re nearing the tip of the awards season and this one feels actually good, as a result of the credibility and the celebrity of it’s simply superb. So yeah, it is nice. It’s going to be a very good addition for the crew, I hope.
IGN: It’s been over a 12 months for the reason that recreation got here out, so folks have had time now to mirror upon its launch and its influence. Have you come to know why it is received so many awards, why it is achieved so effectively? Why it is resonated a lot with players? Have you labored out why Helldivers 2 has ended up being the success it has been?
Alex Bolle: I want the interview was two hours! It’s a complete soup recipe, or possibly extra like a really refined French dish. I do not assume we figured it out. One factor we preserve at coronary heart is simply the interplay with the neighborhood. All the gamers, taking the time to essentially discuss to them, perceive what they need. We have so many devs which are constantly taking a look at Discord, at Reddit. We have plenty of issues that come from there and we need to preserve that interplay degree.
That has been the factor that we thought, okay, once we put together the fantasy for the subsequent updates and so forth, that is the half that we need to preserve. We had been speaking about the way forward for the sport with Mikael and it was all about that. What is it that the participant needs? What is it that we aren’t reaching but? What’s subsequent? And that is at all times like, gamers in thoughts. It’s what works effectively. It’s the flexibility to speak to them, means to make that form of fantasy within the recreation across the Galactic War.
Last week with Pöpli IX, it has been a 12 months and we nonetheless handle to get these moments in-game. I believe it is essential. These are wanted. I used to be speaking to our Game Master this morning, it feels good to have that. It’s one of many issues we’ll cherish till we do not make the sport, however to this point it is working effectively.
IGN: You’ve spoken as a crew earlier than in regards to the influence Helldivers 2 had on you as a studio, and it was a giant shock to the system. Do you’re feeling like now you are beginning to get a deal with on what Helldivers 2 is, what the viewers is, and settling right into a sustainable, wholesome manner of retaining it going as a reside service? Especially after having that inflow of gamers that you simply weren’t maybe anticipating and the kind of gamers that had been totally different than what you had been anticipating?
Alex Bolle: We’re nonetheless attempting to determine the great recipe for a wholesome cadence for the builders, for the gamers as effectively. Who will we cater to as effectively? It’s been tremendous attention-grabbing. I’ve been at Arrowhead for a bit greater than three years now, coming from larger studios and yeah, there’s plenty of issues that we had to return to sq. one, on the way it works at Arrowhead.
Johan Pilestedt, as considered one of our founders and the lead of the studio for therefore lengthy, has been key in setting a growth tradition that we attempt to preserve at coronary heart whereas sustaining that reside service side. This has been catching lightning in a bottle.
And I really feel like each week is taking learnings once more from the totally different wins and failures that we had alongside the best way. Also from different builders. I believe it has been one of many good benefits that we had, is that success additionally permits us to speak far more overtly with all of the devs. It’s been excellent on that facet. It’s sharing methods to do it, higher methods, extra sustainable.
On who will we make the sport for? That’s a difficult one. Arrowhead’s motto has at all times been ‘a recreation for everybody is a recreation for nobody.’ When you add this quantity of gamers, nobody and everyone seems to be a bit muddy. So it is at all times a little bit of a puzzle of like, okay, this content material is for these sort of gamers, this content material is for any such participant. And that is the place we’re nonetheless working very onerous with PlayStation, with the crew internally to know, hey, while you need to make this enemy, who do you take note of?
I believe it is a very fingertip sensitivity that we’re getting slowly. I believe there’s plenty of work inside path as effectively to remind us who we had been making the sport for on the very, very, very starting, as a result of we now have plenty of the outdated guard of Arrowhead nonetheless round to assist us determine this out. We have one of many options upcoming that we have been growing with considered one of our old-time founders for instance, and it has been so good as a result of he brings that magical angle on the co-op.
IGN: The web loves to speak about Steam concurrents, however I want to get your take as somebody who is aware of the info. Do you assume Steam concurrents are deceptive? Do they provide some perception into the success or in any other case of a reside service recreation? Obviously you had an enormous peak, however it’s unreasonable to count on that to keep up itself perpetually, and Helldivers 2 appears to have settled on Steam. From your perspective, how do you view that?
Alex Bolle: I’m removed from being the professional of the studio on this. I do see generally a little bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. The extra you speak about it, the extra you present it, the extra individuals are like, wow, attention-grabbing, it is going up.
It’s a metric amongst many others. There’s many causes for a recreation’s success or failure. I believe we have been doing good numbers, like breaking some traits and every thing. On our facet, the one factor I can say is that, yeah, we need to preserve that regular ground of gamers and bringing folks once more for brand new memorable moments for the sport and for the neighborhood. So I might say that is just about the place we need to go. Do we now have screens throughout the studio with CCU [concurrent users] and all these metrics? Of course, as a result of it is at all times good to maintain them in thoughts. But we’re not obsessed by it. I believe we’re able we do not have to be, however we need to ensure that, hey, once we make one thing, it is significant. That’s the factor.
IGN: Whatever occurs, you may most likely perpetually now be the fastest-selling PlayStation Studios recreation of all time. I am unable to see a recreation ever actually topping that. As a studio, does that imply you is usually a bit extra relaxed about what you are doing with Helldivers 2?
Alex Bolle: Yes and no. Yes, in a manner, particularly in as of late for the trade, it looks like such a privileged scenario. That is superb. I believe we’re cherishing that so much. At the identical time, we do not need to take this without any consideration. There’s a studio, we now have builders to pay. We have a studio life to maintain on for years and years and years. So that is the factor the place we’re like, yeah, it has been good. We want to ensure it retains going nice.
There’s additionally an accountability for, once more, the folks we make the sport for. We’re not going to only begin to be like, okay, it is advantageous. It’s going to be advantageous. We can take a bit extra time. We need to take extra time to make issues higher, particularly now that the gamers are asking for it. But yeah, there’s positively an ambition to maintain issues going, preserve our requirements of growth, preserve discovering creativity and innovation. If we simply turned complacent, I do not assume Arrowhead could be Arrowhead.
IGN: Do you assume it is cheap for a recreation like Helldivers 2 to have a multi-year plan that envisages the sport being round for a decade? For me, Helldivers 2’s gameplay feels virtually timeless, so it might turn out to be a perpetually recreation. Or will there come some extent the place you need to take into consideration what’s subsequent in relation to Helldivers itself?
Alex Bolle: Thank you for acknowledging that the sport may not age in any respect! I really like while you boot a recreation after 15, 20 years and it nonetheless performs the identical.
IGN: Helldivers 2 has that about it doesn’t it? It‘s in regards to the issues that occur within the recreation and the physics at play and the texture of it, versus it being future-proofed by way of visuals, for instance.
Alex Bolle: Absolutely. When I discuss with the crew, once I discuss to the administrators, once I discuss to Mikael in regards to the future, it’s thrilling as a result of we wish it to be round for years and years and years to come back. And it is virtually like, how will we keep true to the Helldivers 2 fantasy, difficult sufficient that we preserve making superb new options and new techniques and all that whereas we keep true to who we’re? And I believe it is one thing that’s so motivating for the years to come back.
The extra we work out easy methods to thrive in a reside setting, and we nonetheless have a solution to go to determine plenty of issues round that, the extra we will let creativity unfastened on new techniques that we’d’ve by no means thought of a 12 months in the past once we launched. I’ve labored on reside video games earlier than and it is the place you’re feeling like you might have one thing you possibly can work out: what if I might do that cool factor I’ve seen in different video games and adapt it to our sauce, that also makes it true to ourselves? I’m trying ahead to this second.
IGN: You’ve achieved a Killzone collab. I’m a large Warhammer 40,000 fan, and as quickly as I began enjoying Helldivers 2 I assumed, oh my God, if I used to be an Imperial Guard soldier dropping down, going through off in opposition to waves of Tyranids or Necrons… are you able to give me any hope as a fan of each Helldivers 2 and Warhammer 40,000 that that is even potential?
Alex Bolle: What I can say is that we had a blast engaged on the collaboration with Guerrilla on Killzone. One factor that everybody agreed internally is that making one thing from a special recreation IP in our universe, that is fairly enjoyable. It has challenges as a result of once more, we’re very, very cautious about our fantasy. So we wish to have the ability to discover these prospects. We obtained tremendous excited with Killzone. We need to do extra for certain. I am unable to inform you extra.
Our devs are gamers, they play so many video games. Obviously Warhammer 40,000 is one thing that plenty of guys internally like to demise. So the devs are discussing, the devs are proposing stuff, and the hype is constructing. So these are discussions internally that we’re having. Warhammer 40,000, I am unable to actually inform you. Maybe. Who is aware of? We’ll see!
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can attain Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
