GamesThird Person ShooterHelldivers 2Why Helldivers 2 is the best RPG of 2024When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
GamesThird Person ShooterHelldivers 2Why Helldivers 2 is the best RPG of 2024When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works.
(Image credit: Sony)
We’re lying in a crater on a barren godless planet, low on ammo, watching glumly as an army of ravenous space insects heads towards our position. In this bout ofHelldivers 2, all, it seems, is lost. But then the cool down on one of my co-player’s orbital gatling barrage expires. They target the horde and call in a strike. Within seconds the sky becomes a luminous orange inferno as dozens of giant space ants are instantly vaporized. “Eat democracy!” someone yells. “For liberty!” screams someone else. I’ve been playing with these strangers for around two hours and we no longer need the in-game victory dialogue. We make our own.
Starship troupers
(Image credit: Sony)
Barrelling laughs(Image credit: Sony)Helldivers 2 isn’t just good co-op, it’s a masterclass in designing comedy games
Barrelling laughs
(Image credit: Sony)Helldivers 2 isn’t just good co-op, it’s a masterclass in designing comedy games
(Image credit: Sony)
Helldivers 2 isn’t just good co-op, it’s a masterclass in designing comedy games
What Helldivers 2 does is invite players to take part as performers. The most fun I’ve had in the game has been with players who have quite literally role-played their way through the missions, spouting their own dumb patriotic dialogue, and I honestly think that’s what the designers want. In this game we’re not inhabiting the characters, the avatars on-screen are just automatons – they have no backstory, no biography, no relationships with each other; their very interchangeability is gleefully expressed whenever your soldier dies and a replacement is sent in. And then, when you get back to your ship after a mission, the transporter shuffles through a line up of identical arrival pods, like some factory production line, until your character pops out, like a gacha toy. The story is you and your squad mates. “Don’t go it alone” says one loading screen tip, “Join a squad in order to unleash maximum liberation!”. Nothing is real. We’re not heroic space marines, we’re actors portraying heroic space marines in a ridiculous B-movie.
Helldivers 2 is part of a long tradition of video games that openly revel in their game-ness and that want players to acknowledge they are performing in a role. The Metal Gear Solid series constantly draws attention to artifice, with boss character Psycho Mantis famously checking the player’s PlayStation memory card, while Raiden in MGS2 effectivelyisthe player, performing tasks in the game that he has only ever tried in a virtual reality simulation. Rockstar’s stealth horror adventure Manhunt has the player character performing murders for a sociopathic Hollywood director in what could be a snuff film, and Spec Ops: The Line is a military shooter about how problematic military shooters are, demanding the player questions everything they do as the “reality” of the situation gradually falls apart.
(Image credit: Sony)
“I’m noticing that, as the game goes on, voice comms are quietening down, and people are un-reflexively taking on their roles as space marines, just like they might do in Halo. I think that’s kind of a shame.”
“I’m noticing that, as the game goes on, voice comms are quietening down, and people are un-reflexively taking on their roles as space marines, just like they might do in Halo. I think that’s kind of a shame.”
Sure, you can just play Helldivers 2 straight, as a popcorn space-blaster – and sure enough, I’m noticing that, as the game goes on, voice comms are quietening down, and people are un-reflexively taking on their roles as space marines, talking only to make plans, just like they might do in Halo. I think that’s kind of a shame. I liked pretending to be a cog in a futuristic fascist empire, glorying over the “democracy” I’ve just brought to an inhospitable lump of ice in the middle of space. It was fun. I think gamesshouldask questions about how we as players relate to the characters and worlds being depicted. I think “role playing” should mean something more than simply a game type where you take a character class, level up and tick off branches on a skill tree.
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So if you haven’t done it yet, the next time you bomb an automaton factory into scrap metal, yell “Andthat’sfor democracy!” over the voice coms. Believe me, you’ll feel better – you’ll be doing your part.
Helldivers 2 review: “A fiercely challenging and visually breathtaking cooperative shooter”
CATEGORIESPS5PC GamingPlatformsPlayStation
CATEGORIES
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1Nemesis review: “A magical sense of tension”
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