Helldivers 2: From Retirement to Redeployment
My cousin and I were talking the other day about an unusual quirk I have with games - I'll come back to them. To the exceptional ones, anyway.
I still play Titanfall 2 from time to time. I'll go in little spurts where I fall in love with it again and binge it.
After getting to level 90 and playing Helldivers 2 since launch, I felt that I had done all there was to do with the game. The team at Arrowhead captured lightning in a bottle, nailing that "30 seconds of fun" that Jaime Griesemer coined when describing the original Halo's game loop.
Yet despite capturing that 30 seconds of fun, I had hit the wall with Helldivers 2 at level 90. I felt I had seen all there was to see in the game.
I'd check in every so often, but during the past few months, I couldn't stay longer than a few matches.
What really kicked things back into high gear for me, though, was when the Illuminate hit Super Earth. I think the weapon attachment update was released around the same time, adding an interesting wrinkle that created an unexpected amount of depth to the game for me.
I like that there are so many weapons, strategems, and kits to consider now, something that was lacking in the early days of the game. And with another set of new mission types coming out this week, I'll have even more variety.
If you're reading this, and you've played Helldivers 2, you know just how special a game it is. You can tell the moment you play the first match, just by the way it handles, that it's different. It's a level above most games, finely walking the line between allowing the player to feel both powerful and vulnerable.
And unlike my beloved Titanfall 2, Helldivers 2 is still getting content. Sure, I get that Helldivers is a live service game, but the fact that Arrowhead has released a new Warbond almost every month is honestly a little insane. If they continue to add more vehicles (which is likely, considering all the ones missing from the original Helldivers) and missions, we're in for a real treat.
Arrowhead seems to have righted most wrongs, and the game is in a pretty good place. I'd like to see some more performance improvements, but as a whole, everything is pretty solid. I've actually enjoyed messing with the in-game and Nvidia settings to squeeze as much visual fidelity and performance as I can. I'd also like to see more dynamic galactic wars that move at a faster pace, and if we lose, reset the timeline to a new war.
Overall, though, I'm pretty damn happy with the game. It's like the olden days, where I can sit for a few hours at a time and just enjoy blowing shit up with friends or strangers. I'm super stoked to see what Arrowhead has cooking. And I can't help but wonder, can we get an over-the-shoulder third-person variant of Magicka, please?
