One of 2024’s most significant gaming success stories thus far has been Helldivers 2, a direct sequel to the oft-forgotten 2015 top-down shooter Helldivers. Though the sequel retains the first game’s tense co-op gameplay and its Starship Troopers-esque satirical comedy, it brings the series to the third-person perspective and features much grittier (and higher fidelity) presentation.
Following its release on February 8, it’s thrived, with Helldivers 2 breaking a new record for PlayStation Studios by surpassing 150,000 concurrent players on Steam. Since then, it’s also been at the top of the Steam Top Sellers chart, outselling even Palworld as well as other popular new games like Enshrouded. Developer Arrowhead Game Studios even announced that it’s sold about a million copies.
Curious to learn more about what’s quickly become one of the biggest games of the year? You undoubtedly have lots of questions, so we’ve put together this extensive FAQ to help answer them. Read on to learn everything you need to know about Helldivers 2.
What is Helldivers 2?
Best answer: Helldivers 2 is a PvE co-op third-person shooter in which up to four players team up to drop onto planets, complete objectives, and then extract while fighting hordes of alien bugs or armies of advanced robots.
Helldivers 2 is a sci-fi third-person co-op PvE shooter published by PlayStation Studios and developed by Arrowhead Game Studios. In it, players are put into the shoes of a “Helldiver” — a heavily armed and armored space marine that fights to defend humanity and “Super Earth” from extra-terrestrial threats such as alien bugs called Terminids or a race of technologically advanced and militaristic robots called the Automatons. As a Helldiver, you and up to three other players will squad up for missions that task you with landing on hostile planets in drop pods, completing various objectives in the surrounding area, and then calling in a gunship to extract you before you’re overwhelmed by enemy forces. You can respawn if you die, but revives are limited, though the game is pretty generous with reinforcements.
As you complete missions, collect loot from points of interest on the galaxy’s battlefields, and earn XP, you’ll level up and get various currencies that allow you to unlock new weapons and armor pieces. You’ll also be able to buy special “stratagems” like airstrikes, orbital artillery barrages, sentry turrets, rocket launchers, and ammo resupplies that you can frequently call down to even the odds against you.
Notably, while teamwork is important in all co-op games, it’s especially critical in Helldivers 2. Breaking off from your squad is a surefire way to get yourself overrun by the horde, many of the game’s best stratagem weapons have poor rates of fire unless you’ve got a buddy helping you reload them, and friendly fire is extremely lethal. Using voice communication is strongly recommended, though you’ll get by just fine with pings and a decent awareness of your surroundings.
Is there a Helldivers 2 roadmap?
Best answer: There isn’t a Helldivers 2 roadmap right now, but there will be in the near future.
Online games like this one often launch alongside a roadmap that informs players when the developers plan to add specific types of new content in future updates. There’s not an official publicly released roadmap for Helldivers 2 yet, but multiple Arrowhead developers have confirmed on the official Helldivers 2 Discord server that one is being worked on, and that it will be revealed once the studio deploys improvements and fixes for Helldivers 2 bugs and launch issues.
In terms of what to expect, new weapons, armors, equipment, stratagems, and enemy units all seem likely, as do additional planets to fight on and mission types to complete. A new enemy faction might even come at some point, though this is only speculation.
Helldivers 2 price: Is it free?
Best answer: No, Helldivers 2 is not free-to-play. The game costs $39.99 to purchase on both PC and PS5.
Some thought Helldivers 2 might be free-to-play, but that’s not the case. On both Windows PC and PS5, the base game costs $39.99 to buy. This is less expensive than the vast majority of big AAA games on the market that typically cost $60-70, but still pricier than smaller $20-30 experiences.
In addition to the Standard Edition of Helldivers 2, there’s also a “Super Citizen Edition” that costs $60 and includes some extra content like bonus cosmetics, an SMG weapon, and access to the “‘Steeled Veterans’ Premium Warbond” — essentially, this is what the game calls its paid Battle Pass that’s been available since launch. Note that if you bought the standard edition of the game, you can upgrade to the Super Citizen Edition digitally for $20.
The console version of Helldivers 2 can be purchased digitally or from physical game retailers like Amazon or Walmart, while the PC one is available digitally from Steam, Amazon, and the reselling site GreenManGaming (you’ll get a Steam code with the latter two).
Is Helldivers 2 crossplay?
Best answer: Yes, Helldivers 2 fully supports crossplay between PC and PS5 players. Just make sure you enable it in the game’s settings.
Hoping to dive into hell with players on platforms other than your own? You’re in luck, then, because Helldivers 2 fully supports crossplay between the PC and PS5 versions of the game. However, you have to enable it by going to Options > Gameplay and toggling it on.
Does Helldivers 2 have cross-save or cross-progression?
Best answer: Unfortunately, Helldivers 2 does not support cross-save or cross-progression, so your progress won’t carry over between console and PC versions of the game. However, that may change in the future.
Many games that support cross-platform play also allow you to carry your progress over to other versions as long as you link your accounts on different platforms together, but this isn’t one of them. Sadly, Helldivers 2 does not support cross-save or cross-progression right now.
This means that if you were to buy the game on both PC and PS5, your levels and unlocks won’t transfer between them — even if you linked your Steam account to the same PlayStation account you used to get Helldivers 2 on PS5. We hope to see this change in the future, and based on a Discord post from Arrowhead’s Community & Support team that notes cross-save isn’t here “at launch,” it’s possible that it might. We recommend only getting one version of the game until we know something concrete, though.
Is Helldivers 2 on Xbox?
Best answer: No, Helldivers 2 isn’t on Xbox, and likely won’t ever be, either. With that said, it’s not impossible that it could come to Microsoft’s consoles one day.
If you’re a user of one of Microsoft’s Xbox consoles like the Xbox Series X or Xbox Series S, you’re probably wondering if you can get in on the Helldivers 2 craze. Unfortunately, Xbox gamers can’t play Helldivers 2, as the game is published by PlayStation Studios and is a PS5 console exclusive. The good news, though, is that it’s also on Windows PC via Steam, so you can enjoy the shooter that way if you’ve got a capable gaming rig.
Is Helldivers 2 coming to Xbox?
PS5 console exclusives almost never come to Xbox, so sadly, the chances of Helldivers 2 ever making it onto Microsoft’s consoles are incredibly slim. It did happen before with MLB The Show, though — it even comes to Xbox Game Pass day one now — so at least it’s not an impossibility. Given that the original Helldivers from 2015 is still exclusive, though, we don’t suggest getting your hopes up.
Is Helldivers 2 on PS4?
Best answer: No, Helldivers 2 isn’t available on the PS4. To play it on console, you’ll need to own a PS5.
Some new games still launch on last-gen consoles like the Xbox One or the PS4, but Sony and Arrowhead have chosen to keep Helldivers 2’s availability limited to the PS5. This was likely done to ensure good performance and quality visuals without having to worry about how the game would run on aging hardware.
Is Helldivers 2 on Game Pass?
Best answer: No, Helldivers 2 is not available through Xbox Game Pass. It, like Death Stranding before it, could come to PC Game Pass at some point, though.
Helldivers 2 may not be playable on Xbox, but it is on PC, and that has many gamers wondering if you can jump in with PC Game Pass — the PC-specific variant of Microsoft’s buffet-style Xbox Game Pass service. Alas, you cannot, as the game is only available through a full purchase on Steam (or with one of the resellers distributing Steam codes).
Is Helldivers 2 coming to Game Pass?
Ultimately, it’s unlikely that Helldivers 2 will come to PC Game Pass, but it’s not impossible. Many forget that the PC version of the PS4 console exclusive Death Stranding eventually became available on the service in late 2022 and remained on it until August 2023. The same could happen with Arrowhead’s co-op shooter at some point down the line, giving folks invested in Microsoft’s wider gaming ecosystem an opportunity to play Helldivers 2 without buying it directly.
Is Helldivers 2 single-player?
Best answer: Helldivers 2 can be played solo, but it’s largely designed as a co-op experience for up to four players.
PvE games are generally single-player, but Helldivers 2 is an exception to that trend. You can play it solo if you’d like to, but it’s designed for four players to team up and play it cooperatively. You’ll still have a good time if you decide to live out your space marine fantasy all by your lonesome, but we definitely recommend giving multiplayer a chance.
Does Helldivers 2 have a campaign?
Helldivers 2 doesn’t have a story campaign, no. Once you finish its tutorial, every mission you play will be a nonlinear, open-ended incursion that follows the format we described earlier in this article. It does, however, have Operations, which are groups of missions that give you extra rewards when you complete them all consecutively.
Is Helldivers 2 fun solo?
Overall, we’d say Helldivers 2 is still a fun game solo, though it’s not quite as enjoyable as it is when you’ve got a squad. A big issue with solo play, though, is that completing missions on harder difficulties feels all-but-impossible, limiting how much of the game you can experience.
Does Helldivers 2 scale with players?
Best answer: There’s been no concrete confirmation of this, but Helldivers 2 does seem to raise or lower enemy density depending on how many players there are in your squad.
Since Helldivers 2 lets you play with up to four players, many are curious if the game scales combat difficulty up or down depending on how many you have in your squad. Arrowhead hasn’t confirmed this publicly — the studio has human game masters that make live changes as you play, notably — but in our testing, we found that the game generally spawns fewer enemies for teams of 1-2 players than it does for squads of 3-4.
Something that’s important to note, though, is that only the amount of mobs is affected by this scaling. The types of units that spawn are still the same, as that’s dictated by the difficulty you choose to play on.
Does Helldivers 2 have matchmaking?
Best answer: Yes, Helldivers 2 has quickplay matchmaking. It works by searching for public lobbies in which other players are getting ready to start a mission on a planet and difficulty that matches the one you’ve chosen.
While Helldivers 2 strongly encourages playing with friends and even comes with a built-in code-based friends list, it also has a quickplay matchmaking option that helps random players quickly squad up. The prompt for it appears in the War Table menu once you’ve flown to a planet and have a difficulty selected.
Instead of putting a group of players onto a dedicated server, the matchmaker simply connects you to another player’s public lobby as they’re preparing for a mission that matches your chosen planet and difficulty. If you’d like to ensure random players can matchmake into your lobby, make sure you select “Public” for your Matchmaking Privacy in the Options > Gameplay menu.
Does Helldivers 2 have local split-screen co-op?
Best answer: Unfortunately, Helldivers 2 does not support local split-screen co-op on either version of the game.
Helldivers 2 seems like it’d be a ton of fun to play with someone via local “couch” split-screen co-op, which is why it’s such a bummer that the game doesn’t support this feature on PC or PS5. That means friends and loved ones will need to purchase and play the game on a separate system in order to enjoy it with you.
Does Helldivers 2 have PvP?
Best answer: No, Helldivers 2 does not have PvP of any kind.
These days, it’s pretty rare for new shooter games to be exclusively PvE. Helldivers 2 is, though, as there’s not a single PvP mode in the game and there don’t appear to be any plans for the development of one in the future, either. Helldivers fight for Super Earth together, after all!
Can you play Helldivers 2 offline?
Best answer: No, Helldivers 2 cannot be played offline, so you’ll need to be connected to the internet to enjoy it.
The majority of online multiplayer games in today’s market require a constant and stable internet connection to their networks, and Helldivers 2 is no different. It doesn’t have an offline mode of any kind and is always online, so if you can’t get connected to the internet, you won’t be able to play it.
Is Helldivers 2 a live service game?
Best answer: Yes, Helldivers 2 is a live service game. It features daily Personal Order quests as well as community-wide Major Orders, and free post-launch updates have been announced by Arrowhead. There’s a microtransactions shop with a rotating stock, too.
Live service games have become increasingly common in the last several years, and are categorized by consistent post-launch updates, evolving gameplay scenarios, and some form of long-form monetization like microtransaction currencies you can buy with real money to then spend on exclusive items. Helldivers 2 has or will have all of these (Arrowhead has announced free updates), and thus, it’s classified as a live service game.
As you play Helldivers 2, you’ll be tasked with completing daily Personal Orders with simple objectives like “kill 200 Terminids,” as well as weekly, community-wide Major Orders that challenge the game’s entire player base to complete enough missions on the planets listed to liberate them. These, along with individual mission completions, net you special Warbond medals that you can use to unlock new equipment, gear, and cosmetics from a Warbond — a series of 10 tiered pages full of unlocks to progress through. Note that as long as you spend enough medals in total, you can start unlocking items from later pages without getting every single unlock from previous ones.
One of the things you can get from Warbonds are Super Credits, a currency that can also be found in small quantities from points of interest while on missions or purchased directly with real money. You’ll need Super Credits to buy exclusive items in Helldivers 2’s “Superstore” microtransaction shop, which rotates its stock every two days or so.
Does Helldivers 2 have a Battle Pass?
Best answer: Yes, Helldivers 2 has a Battle Pass, though it’s called a “Premium Warbond” instead. It costs 1,000 Super Credits to access, which is equivalent to $10 of real-world money. Note that you can earn Super Credits in-game, though, so spending money isn’t required.
Most live service games have a paid Battle Pass for players to progress through by leveling up or spending a currency, with each tier of the pass giving you a reward when reached. Helldivers 2 has a paid Battle Pass, too, though it works differently than most.
The game has what is called a “Premium Warbond,” which works just like regular Warbonds (see the above section for details on those). That means you’ll be using the medals you earn from orders and missions to unlock the items on it, but to access the Premium Warbond in the first place, you’ll need to buy it for 1,000 Super Credits. As we explained above, these can either be unlocked from a regular Warbond, found while on missions, or bought with real money. Notably, 1,000 Super Credits is $10 worth, which is generally what most paid Battle Passes cost in other games.
While the rewards from the Premium Warbond aren’t all cosmetic, the equipment on it isn’t any better than what you can get from the normal Warbond that’s free to access. In fact, the best kit comes from the standard Warbond, so the game is hardly pay-to-win — especially since you can’t use money to buy medals.
Does Helldivers 2 work on Steam Deck?
Best answer: Yes, Helldivers 2 works on the Steam Deck. With the settings turned to low-medium, you can look forward to consistent framerates in the mid-40s or so.
Though Helldivers 2 was unplayable on Steam Deck when it launched, an update soon released that made the game perform much, much better on Valve’s PC gaming handheld. Now, you can achieve framerates in the mid-40s or so as long as you’re using low-to-medium settings. You can opt to go even lower to push for close to 60 FPS if you want to, though the graphical quality will be rather poor. Medium and above, on the other hand, chugs down to the mid-20s or worse, so a low-to-medium balance is the sweet spot we recommend.
Does Helldivers 2 work on ROG Ally?
Helldivers 2 is also solid on the ASUS ROG Ally. For details on the settings we recommend using for the game while playing on ASUS’ handheld, don’t miss our guide on the best Helldivers 2 ROG Ally graphics settings.
Helldivers 2 is available now for $39.99 on both PS5 and PC, and so far, it’s one of the best PC games of the year.
