The cooperative shooter Helltivers 2 inspires many fans with cinematic experiences in the fight against hordes of enemies. But the shooter’s recipe for success found its origin years before development.
How big is the success of Helldivers 2? Helldivers 2 is one of the most popular shooters more than a year after his release on Steam. At peak times, over 75,000 players log on to Steam at the same time (via Steamdb).
For Arrowhead Game Studios, Helldivers 2 is the big breakthrough and the greatest success so far. But the foundation for this success and the chaotic, unpredictable players of play was laid much earlier. It all started with a flying boulder.
The latest parliamentary group of Helltivers 2 has turned the game upset:
Helldivers 2 shows the new opponent faction in the trailer for “Omens of Tyranny”
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What about the boulder? Johan Pilestedt, CCO and ex-CEO from Arrowhead Game Studios, was responsible for the development of Hellt divers 2 for many years. But before his team even thought of Helldivers, they worked on Magicka, a cooperative magic adventure in which players were able to experiment with various elements and spells.
As he tells at the Game Developers Confernce, he talked to Chief Technology Officer Anton Stenmark about physics interactions during the development of Magicka. Pilestedt expressed an idea:
If I shoot a big stone on an opponent and he doesn’t kill him, we have to do something with the stone, you can’t just make it disappear. Can we let him bounce into the air or something?
Stenmark was skeptical and replied: “It is just a single physical projectile that ends up somewhere and never hits anything.” But Pilestedt did not give up: “But maybe with one of 100 million. That is okay.” So the idea implemented the idea.
During an internal game test, a tester then fired a stone on an opponent. The stone bounced off, flew through the air and landed directly on the player’s head, who tried to run away. The impact crushed it into a “blood cascade”.
At that moment Pilestedt knew: “That works. I think we will one day be rich.” But this moment was not only amusing, it fundamentally changed the philosophy of the studio. Pilestedt convinced the team that a “It could happen” approach for the game design can have an incredibly strong effect.
How did that affect Helltivvers 2? This design philosophy can be found everywhere in Helldivers 2. Every air strike, every grenade and every enemy rocket can trigger something completely unexpected and thus provide chaotic, fun or memorable moments.
In Helldivers 2, the robots are among the unpleasant opponents in the game for many players. However, the developers are not impressed and worried in the latest update, for a buff of the faction: one of the nasty robots of Helldivers 2 receives an upgrade, now becomes a nightmare by every democrat