Helldivers 2 dev echoes Diablo 4 and Palworld teams and says it’s OK to take a break from a game and come back later, “especially a live service one”

Joining the likes of Diablo 4 studio Blizzard and Palworld studio Pocketpair, a community manager from Helldivers 2 developer Arrowhead has reminded players that it’s fine to just take a break from a game and play something else for a while.

In a new Reddit post, Arrowhead community manager Twinbeard addresses the backlash over recent balancing changes that came with Helldivers 2’s Escalation of Freedom update, which has gotten bad enough that a group of players has been full-on rebelling against High Command under the “Chaosdivers” banner. 

Twinbeard acknowledges that “some things haven’t been where we or the players would have liked them to be” and that these missteps are the result of poor communication or “were a poor outcome caused by time restraints.”

Regardless of the cause, Twinbeard says the situation is “very unfortunate” and points to a recent message from game director Mikael E that details various changes to balancing, gameplay, and communication designed to improve the overall experience. However, until then, Twinbeard says it’s fine to just, you know, not play the game if you aren’t enjoying it.

“I hope you’ll stick around, but there’s nothing wrong with playing a game and revisiting it at a later state, especially a live service one that’s being worked on continuously,” Twinbeard says. This was notably a reply to a Reddit user who, in response to a patrol and spawn rate explainer that Twinbeard posted three months ago, said they “think I’ll be moving onto another game” because “these nerfs are just out of control.” 

I’m a fan of game developers defying all PR convention and straight-up advising players to, in much kinder terms, touch grass. Games aren’t bottomless and live service games go through ups and downs; the secret is to play more than one! At the height of the Diablo 4 backlash last Summer, I remember Blizzard saying it’s OK to “take a break and go play something else,” and back in February, Pocketpair said “if you’re no longer playing Palworld, we still love you, and we hope you’ll come back for round 2”.

With the nature of live-service games being inherently volatile, it’s natural for changes to arrive that don’t sit well with every player, and it’s refreshing to see more and more prominent developers assure their communities that they won’t be left behind if they decide to take a break and wait for a future update.

Speaking of which, here are the best online games to play if you’re looking for something new.