Helldivers CCO Johan Pilestedt reminds players (twice) that he's not solely responsible for the latest good patch, and wants 'to clarify that I did not cook'

(Image credit: Arrowhead Game Studios)

Helldivers 2 has recently enjoyed a massive balance patch, upgrading weapon damage across the board, reducing the amount of heavy enemies in favour of more mooks, and loads more stuff I'm unable to fit into an opening paragraph.

Given that Helldivers 2's former CEO Johan Pilestedt has not only stated he wants to reassess the game's balance, but also taken a technical demotion to become the studio's chief creative officer, it might be easy to credit this latest wave of tweaks to the new auteur's divine influence. 'Pilestedt's rolled up his sleeves, and is sorting things out!'

Five days later, and the unofficial accolades are still coming—leading Pilestedt to take to his Twitter and re-affirm that he is not the chosen one, writing: "I've seen a lot of people give me lots of cred for this patch as if I am the sole person responsible. I want to make it clear that the team are the ones that made it happen. Without their effort, design sensibilities, diligence and passion none of this would have been possible."

A post that reads: &quot;I've seen a lot of people give me lots of cred for this patch as if I am the sole person responsible.I want to make it clear that the team are the ones that made it happen. Without their effort, design sensibilities, diligence and passion none of this would have been possible.&quot; — (Image credit: @Pilestedt on Twitter/X.)

While I do think there's every chance Pilestedt is being humble here, and that it's very possible that careful leadership has helped steer the good ship Helldivers 2 in the right direction, he's also just right—Arrowhead employs over 100 people and any game, especially a live service one with a lot of moving parts, is monstrously complicated to balance, requiring all hands on deck.

As a matter of fact, let's go ahead and loosely tie some red strings across some pins on a corkboard: Helldivers 2 publicly announced its intention to make less frequent, more detailed patches late May, while Pilestedt announced his new role at around the same time. I'd very much wager that, given the patches' size, the development team have been working on its constituent parts for more than 22 days.

I also wouldn't be surprised if the studio as a whole has chosen to move in this new direction with him anyway—the game's fateful PSN network review scare and a less-than-well received Warbond are both likely to have rocked the boat.

Harvey's history with games started when he first begged his parents for a World of Warcraft subscription aged 12, though he's since been cursed with Final Fantasy 14-brain and a huge crush on G'raha Tia. He made his start as a freelancer, writing for websites like Techradar, The Escapist, Dicebreaker, The Gamer, Into the Spine—and of course, PC Gamer. He'll sink his teeth into anything that looks interesting, though he has a soft spot for RPGs, soulslikes, roguelikes, deckbuilders, MMOs, and weird indie titles. He also plays a shelf load of TTRPGs in his offline time. Don't ask him what his favourite system is, he has too many.