• Hey Guest. Check out your NeoGAF Wrapped 2025 results here!

Helldivers 2 would be so much better as an SP game

bitbydeath

Gold Member
Helldivers 2 is a great game, carried largely by its fire and explosions.

221634.gif


The worst part of it is the gameplay loop, namely it's repetitive and lacks story. You're constantly dropping into a limited amount of samey worlds where you get limited objectives and are constantly tied to a ticking clock.

It's fun for a while but overall it lacks the replay-ability you'd find in a well-made single player game that offers greater purpose to playing.

If this had a local co-op SP mode that made winning worth a damn it could be so much better.
 
So many of these live service games should have had at the least a basic offline campaign mode. This would have at least kept the game playable if the MP portion ever went down. Games like this and Anthem, the first Titanfall, Destiny and Destiny 2 and many others should have had offline campaigns in them. Once these servers like Anthem's shut down, we lose the games. Some of us enjoy them and do not want to inevitably lose them forever. Game preservation is definitely not a priority to these live service games imho and it is sad. Just my personal take on this.
 
Last edited:
I prefer the structure of EDF. numerical missions, looting new weapons, farming shit to do the higher difficulty modes, no live service elements whatsoever, splitscreen mode, private online lobbies
 
Last edited:
While I'm sure a single player mode game would be cool, blowing up your friends is half the fun. Also seeing you can roleplay the best over the top FREEDOM loving soldier is hilarious as well.
 
I'd be up for more narrative context to the universe, but as someone who plays mostly single-player games...this would objectively be a worse game in single-player.

Literally the most fun in the game down to its theme is built around cooperation with other people, and the hi-jinks of friendly fire. That dynamism would be crushed trying to make it a single-player game because the friendly AI would never create the same degree of emergent moments, respawning due to those explosions would be worse if you're the only human player, and the meta-game elements of the galactic war involve the playerbase as a whole.

I don't think the team has the resources to make it work as a forever live-service, but game absolutely channels the fun I had in Left 4 Dead in the 2000s with my friends.
 
While I'm sure a single player mode game would be cool, blowing up your friends is half the fun. Also seeing you can roleplay the best over the top FREEDOM loving soldier is hilarious as well.
But you can have that in a campaign with co-op too. It's half of the fun in EDF.
 
Last edited:
Nah, that is a bad take. I do feel the game should have more evolving missions and objectives, but this feels perfect as an online experience. I say that as someone who already completed a few super helldive missions solo.
 
Nah, that is a bad take. I do feel the game should have more evolving missions and objectives, but this feels perfect as an online experience. I say that as someone who already completed a few super helldive missions solo.
Yes, the game would benefit from more dynamic and evolving mission structure/elements.

Right now, the loop is too simple and that's why I never really understood the praise for the game outside of watching things go boom.
 
Last edited:
Why you of course. You said that the game sold 20+ million as a MP game and that as a SP game it would have only sold 2 million.

SO....if you made it both it would be 22+ million. Simple.

And any Helldiver knows you should spread Democracy as much as you can.

:messenger_beaming:
It doesn't work like that, according to the data, on average of maybe 15% would have ever bothered with SP mode longer than the first hour.

Basically, the benefits SP would have had on the total sales would have been negligible.

😁
 
Last edited:
jonah-hill-no.gif


It's a well designed and novel MP game. That's the whole draw.

Now if you said they should make a single player/ co op HD game with this engine and physics I would agree that would be smart. Sort of like Space Marine 2 I could see it being a good time.

Also when are we playing HD2 Durin Durin BeardSpike BeardSpike ?
 
Yes, the game would benefit from more dynamic and evolving mission structure/elements.

Right now, the loop is too simple and that's why I never really understood the praise for the game
One of the elements for me is due to the cinematic sandboxy nature of it. I have over 1200 hours into the game and I still see something new happen each play session with my bros, which gets us laughing our asses off. Over 9GB of short 10-20 second videos on the SSD of wild and sometimes meme-worthy content.

Laughing is good for the soul, laughing is good for Super Earth.

outside of watching things go boom.
d9didTnuW4DcnQVq.gif
 
Right on OP. I won't touch the game until they introduce one. I don't care how good the gameplay supposedly is. I want a non tacked on reason why I'm doing what I'm doing in the game and everything that makes a great single player game what they are.
 
Absolutely agree what ruins it entirely for me is trying to find the pink/purple samples and higher
If you're playing on medium or hard then you're doing it wrong. The game doesnt reach its potential until you play on the higher difficulties. Of course the gameplay loop is boring and predictable if your survival is guaranteed. Its when when you HAVE to work together as a team to survive and try to avoid killing your team mates among the chaos when the gameplay actually clicks. Its also much easier to get samples the higher difficulty you go.
 
Tell me you didnt play the first game without saying you didnt play the first game.

Seriously, wouldnt be helldivers if they structured it any other way.

Im with you on the samey-ness over time tho OP. The lack of more unique mission types or mission structure really kept me from coming back for every update. They really fumbled home worlds and the overall length of how long a war-cycle should persist. Just stretching that content map thiiiiiin.
 
Last edited:
Go make your own if you want that so much. The game is friggin' brilliant as is. I still do daily runs with my friends, and sometimes solo to soak in the world and give myself a challenge.
 
Top Bottom