Since the beginning of the year, Helldivers 2 has been a smash hit. The cooperative shooter has been a huge success, especially on PC. It is one of the only PlayStation games to have been allowed to release on Steam at the same time as on PS5, which has given it a colossal player base. Although they have been won over so far, news has just broken that is annoying them to the highest degree.
Indeed, PlayStation will soon make account creation mandatory even to play on PC. Before that, Steam users could simply launch the game via their library and dive straight into a mission without further ado. Now, you'll need to create a PlayStation Network account and then link it once you're on the game's homepage. In a blog post, Arrowhead studio confirms:
"Due to technical issues with the launch of HELLDIVERS 2, we've made the requirements for linking Steam accounts to a PlayStation Network account temporarily optional. This grace period will now expire."
Now or... now
The very fact that the studio dares to call these many months a "grace period" proves that the absence of this requirement made things easier for players and justifies their current annoyance. This major change will complicate the game's launch, at least for the first time, by adding steps that are unfortunately not really necessary for all Steam users.
PC players are rarely on multiple platforms, so they have no use for a PSN account other than this one manipulation. The worst thing for players is that creating accounts will become mandatory imminently. Starting May 5, new players will have to go through this step, while existing players will have to wait until June 4 at the latest.
Reminder
Please note, a PlayStation Network account is not a PlayStation Plus account. PSN is completely free while PS Plus is a subscription service only useful on consoles. You don't need a PS Plus account to play online on PC.
What is PlayStation's goal?
The studio gives reasons for this change to the terms of use. Arrowhead cites security reasons in particular. In the rest of the post, we can read:
“Account linking plays a vital role in protecting our players and maintaining the safety and security values of PlayStation and PlayStation Studios games. It is our primary means of protecting players from griefing and abuse by allowing players who engage in this type of behavior to be banned. It also makes it easier for banned players to appeal.”
Despite the studio's good faith, these justifications tend to sound like those of Apple, which has long closed its ecosystem for security reasons as well. While this is entirely likely, the company also has something to gain in terms of control over its players, their statistics, but also in tracking their progress in order to generate a higher conversion rate. After all, PlayStation is counting on its consoles to grow its sales figures and has designed its entire ecosystem on this platform before launching on the PC.
For the moment, we do not know if this will apply to all PlayStation games that will be released on Steam. But it is a safe bet that it will be the case. PlayStation is not the only company to resort to this kind of practice, which has become very widespread on games by Ubisoft, Warner Bros or even EA. An account per publisher is now mandatory to access all the game's functions, or even its basic content. A trend that does not please players.
0 Comments