Helldivers 2
Helldivers 2 is a 2024 cooperative third-person shooter video game developed by Arrowhead Game Studios and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. The game is the direct sequel to Helldivers. Set in the 22nd century, the story follows the Helldivers, a force of shock troops dispatched to combat various threats to humanity and to spread managed democracy.
Helldivers 2 was released on 8 February 2024 for PlayStation 5 and Windows, and on 26 August 2025 for the Xbox Series X/S. The game was a critical and commercial success, having sold in excess of 20 million copies and grossed over $700 million in revenue. Considered among the best video games of 2024, it was nominated for and won a number of awards.
Gameplay
Helldivers 2 is a shooter game played primarily from a third-person perspective. Players complete operations consisting of 1-3 procedurally generated levels, conducting tasks within the missions, while fending off hordes of enemies. Players choose the difficulty level of their operations, ranging from level 1 to level 10.Players enter missions by dropping onto planets from their Super Destroyer starship in a transportation device called a "Hellpod". A core gameplay feature carried over from the first game is the use of Stratagems, powerful equipment which must be called in from their Super Destroyer by executing a sequence of directional button or arrow key inputs. Players may select up to four stratagems in advance to bring into the mission, as well as a "Booster" which affects the whole team.
Helldivers 2 features cooperative multiplayer with up to four players, but does not include a dedicated single-player campaign. It also provides optional cross-play. Friendly fire is always on except when inside of the ship in low orbit. In the initial days of release, gameplay involved staff at the studio observing players and influencing gameplay in real time. The game features live service content updates.
Players can obtain in-game currency which may be discovered during missions or awarded by completing operations, missions, and objectives. As players gain experience and progress in levels, they unlock different weapons and Stratagems to use during missions. Players can also collect samples during missions, which are used to upgrade the player's Super Destroyer, providing advantages during gameplay. By completing operations, players also contribute to the collective progress of "Major Orders", which are mass-collaborative missions that directly affect the outcome of the Galactic War in-game.
Warbonds
Helldivers 2 has a battle pass system called "Warbonds" that never expire. Warbonds can be purchased with in-game currency known as "Super Credits", which players can obtain in-game, purchase via microtransactions, or unlock as part of the Warbonds themselves. By 26 August 2025, coinciding with the game's release on the Xbox system, Arrowhead introduced a "Warbond Token" currency that allows users to purchase one kind of Warbond to their liking, and is only available as a bundle to the game's deluxe edition, the "Super Citizen Edition".Synopsis
Setting
Helldivers 2 takes place in the 22nd century, one hundred years after the triumph of the Federation of Super Earth, a self-described managed democracy, over the Bugs, Cyborgs, and Illuminate during the First Galactic War. Humanity seized faster-than-light travel technology from the defeated Illuminate, and used it to conquer the galaxy during a period known as the Great Democratisation. Humanity also discovered that the decomposing corpses of the Bugs contain a unique and highly valuable resource known as "Element-710", used for FTL travel. Bug farms are established on human-colonized worlds, and after decades of genetic engineering and accelerated evolution, they become known as Terminids.Environmental storytelling is prevalent throughout the game, with various logs, notes, in-game broadcasts, and propaganda messages available for players to find during gameplay.
Plot
The plot of Helldivers 2 develops in real time, based on Major Orders and decisions collectively taken by the player community. Below, some of the most notable moments and plot points have been included.The Second Galactic War
The events of Helldivers 2 begin in the year 2184 after the Super Earth Armed Forces fail to contain the Terminids, which have escaped their farms, causing widespread chaos and destruction. Simultaneously, a new threat emerges in the form of the Automatons, creations of the defeated Cyborgs, intending to get revenge against humanity. In response, Super Earth declares war and mobilizes the Helldivers, an elite task force, to combat the threats.The initial Automaton expedition culminated in battles on Malevelon Creek, resulting in two months of fighting and high casualties before the planet was finally taken. Meanwhile, an effort to destroy the Terminid presence on several worlds fails, and planet Meridia becomes a Terminid "Supercolony". Using a substance called Dark Fluid, the Helldivers trigger a planetary collapse on Meridia, transforming it into a wormhole. Most of the Helldivers thought it was a regular black hole at the time. Not long after the destruction of Meridia, an interstellar cloud of spores called "The Gloom" emerged deep within Terminid space, terraforming planets within and birthing new variants of Terminids.
As a result of many costly battles, the Helldivers embarked on an expansive project to construct the Democracy Space Station, a massive orbital battle station capable of supporting Helldiver campaigns with ordnance and soldier optimization. The Helldivers were deployed to defend the construction of the DSS, while destroying Automatons to utilize their technology and harvesting E-710 from the Terminids for fuel. After several weeks, the DSS was completed, and the Helldivers were granted the ability to vote on where to periodically deploy it.
The Invasion of Super Earth
On 12 December 2184, humanity discovered that the Illuminate, an ancient and technologically advanced alien race thought to be extinct, returned and began to invade Super Earth's colonies. The Helldivers repelled the Illuminate in the bloody Battle of Calypso. However, the wormhole produced from the destruction of Meridia, dubbed the "Meridian Singularity," suddenly began moving towards Super Earth, destroying multiple planets in its path.Though the Helldivers were able to halt the Singularity's advance, an Illuminate invasion fleet emerged from within, and ultimately launched an invasion on Super Earth. SEAF and the Helldivers successfully repelled the Illuminate invasion, but at the cost of tremendous civilian and military casualties and the destruction of all but two of Super Earth's Mega Cities.
Campaign into The Gloom and Magma Planets
Following the Battle of Super Earth, the remnants of the Illuminate invasion fleet retreated south, heavily entrenching themselves on various planets. In response, Super Earth began construction of a new Super Destroyer fleet. In the summer of 2185, all three factions launched a coordinated offensive, pushing the Helldivers to the brink before the new fleet arrived on 26 August 2185. The Helldivers were then ordered to perform an expedition into the Terminid hive worlds that lay within the expanding Gloom in order to extract newly discovered E-711. The first expedition into the Gloom on the hive world Oshaune resulted in the highest Helldiver casualty rate of the war thus far. After upgrading the DSS with anti-Gloom shield coating, the Helldivers managed to take Oshaune in a grueling battle, significantly reducing the Glooms' territorial spread and setting up infrastructure to extract E-711 and prepare for further campaigns.In December 2185, Super Earth discovered the Automatons were conducting large scale mining operations for platinum and other resources on volcanic planets. The Helldivers were issued emergency orders to take these planets and to repossess all the resources extracted by the Automatons.
Meanwhile, Super Earth declared the "War on Dissidence", designating all territories across the galaxy as war zones.
The Star of Peace
In January 2186, Super Earth constructed the Star of Peace, a planet-destroying superweapon. The Helldivers voted to test the weapon on the Automaton held world, Penta, turning it into a black hole. However, firing the Star of Peace resulted in the DSS being severely damaged and taken offline for repairs. Additionally, the plans for the Star of Peace were seemingly accessed by an unknown enemy. As a result, Super Earth deployed the Helldivers as commandos deep behind Automaton lines in covert stealth operations with greatly reduced support from their Super Destroyers.Development and release
On 3 December 2020, Arrowhead Game Studios revealed that work had started on a new project for PlayStation 5. It was confirmed that the game would be a third-person shooter. Like the first game, Helldivers 2 runs on the discontinued Autodesk Stingray game engine. Arrowhead Game Studios founder Johan Pilestedt confirmed on social media that "The project started before was discontinued," adding, "Our crazy engineers had to do everything, with no support to build the game to parity with other engines."On 13 September 2021, Helldivers 2 was mentioned in a GeForce Now leak. The game was teased in a TikTok post showing Arrowhead's social media manager starting their workday, which is followed by a series of posts from fans demanding them to release the game. On 18 August 2022, a 12-second clip of gameplay was leaked on Twitter, but was later removed.
On 24 May 2023, Helldivers 2 was announced during the 2023 PlayStation Showcase, with a slated release of sometime in 2023. On 6 July 2023, a trailer showcasing gameplay was released. On 30 July 2023, the game received an M rating by the Entertainment Software Rating Board for "blood and gore" and "intense violence". On 14 September 2023, gameplay was shown in a PlayStation State of Play event, and it was announced that the game would release on 8 February 2024. Pre-orders became available on 22 September 2023. On 8 February 2024, the game was released on the PlayStation Store and Steam.
Arrowhead CEO Johan Pilestedt revealed at the Game Developers Conference in March 2025, the United Nations contacted the development team regarding giving a talk related to the concept of psychological defense against manipulation. Pilestedt stated, "We do it all in fun and good spirits, and we actually try to get people to recognize the science of what is a totalitarian state. If you start wearing the same uniform as everybody else and do salutes constantly, you might be in a totalitarian regime".
On 3 July 2025, Arrowhead Game Studios and Sony Interactive Entertainment announced that the game would be released for the Xbox Series X/S consoles on 26 August 2025. The Xbox version was developed by Nixxes Software, a studio under PlayStation Studios known for its expertise in porting games to other platforms. The release features full cross-platform play, enabling users across Xbox, PlayStation, and Windows to play together. Helldivers 2 is the second game published by PlayStation Studios to be released on the Xbox platform. The release also coincided with the launch of Gears of War: Reloaded on the PlayStation 5; the Gears of War franchise had been a Microsoft exclusive since its debut in 2006. Some publications deemed the release of Helldivers 2 on Xbox and Gears of War on PlayStation as further proof of the end of the "console wars".