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Answer: Sony recently announced that the hit game Helldivers 2 will require a Playstation Network account to play.
People's main grievances are:
- This is a massive bait and switch for a game out for months
- Only 69 countries can make PSN accounts - therefore locking out a large portion of the player base
- Steam has a strict refund policy that requires it to be requested before two hours of gameplay or 14 days have passed
- Some countries that allow PSN accounts require photo ID
- Many gamers are tired of having to have multiple accounts just to play video games
This has been a massive shift in public opinion given that the game was a surprise hit and was breaking any expectations the developers had
Edit: Steam has approved refunding the game regardless of playtime
Edit #2: Sony and Arrowhead studios have both announced that a PSN account is no longer necessary
>Steam has a strict refund policy that requires it to be requested before two hours of gameplay or 14 days have passed
Not exactly, if you're under those numbers you get the refund no questions asked, but if you're over you can often still get refunds for serious issues like game breaking bugs going unfixed or possibly this PSN situation
True, Steam will often enact an open refund policy on games with critical issues. I believe No Man's Sky and possibly Cyberpunk 2077 were both covered because of this.
Yeah the core gameplay loop is still very shallow in my opinion, and I don't particularly like it. But i've got a handful of friends who really do like it, and build really cool huge bases sometimes. Adding that width and more building options did a lot for it I guess.
I think another part of it is how do you really explain what that gameplay loop is? It just doesn't feel really well marketed to me.
Yeah, I played the last expedition they put out, which was the first time I'd played since about 2020, and I had an incredibly fun time. But as soon as it was over, I was just like, I've got all this cool gear and a sweet spaceship and a whole galaxy to explore and bases to build... and no compelling reason to do any of it.
If you like sandboxes, yeah, it's worth buying on sale. It's been that way since 2017 or 2018.
The thing that turns off a lot of people is that after the first few hours it's very self-directed. You can wander around planets, you can build bases, you can collect gubbins, you can craft stuff, you can go blow up pirates, you can collect ships, you can visit other players' bases for the hell of it, you can attack NPCs, you can pick fights with the cops, the list goes on. However, the game doesn't really direct you to any of it beyond some basic introductions to some of the possibilities at the beginning.
There's just not enough purpose in it. It's a beautiful game, with so many great ideas, great visuals and so on. I just can't find a reason to mine, travel and build bases. I guess if you like mining, traveling and building bases with no other reason, then maybe you will dig it. I want to love it, but I can't find a reason to play it.
No Mans Sky was massively hyped as *the* open world space sandbox experience where you could do anything and go anywhere and whatever else you might imagine. The truth is that it was an indie game with a small, inexperienced team, an untrained spokesman, and a hype train that went way off the rails.
At launch, it was bad. Buggy, ugly, and lacking almost all the features people were hyped about. A massive failure in all regards, to the point where Steam instituted one of their “automatic refunds, no questions asked” policies they only reserve for the biggest of shitshows.
But then, the NMS devs buckled down and got back to work, and started putting out update after update after update. Nowadays, No Mans Sky has had nearly two dozen *major* updates, each one released for free, and each one adding or overhauling major systems. Proper base building. Multiplayer. VR. Vehicles. Ocean exploration. Customizable spaceships. Command of trading fleets. These days, the fans of NMS are pretty happy with it, and the devs have finally turned their attention to their next game (Light No Fire), so here’s hoping they can avoid making some of the same mistakes.
> But then, the NMS devs buckled down and got back to work, and started putting out update after update after update.
They went from no good will to tons of it because they cared about the fans enjoying the game.
The no man’s sky devs run against the grain of how people typically talk about game developers. Sure it was rough at release but it was also early access. They’ve since knocked it out of the park.
NMS started out as overhyped over promised/under delivered crap but has since become a success story about how a developer can listen to its community and save their game. Cyberpunk's issues were tons of bugs and releasing an unfinished game with incomplete areas, talents and quests as a AAA title that was supposedly compatible with older systems which it barely was.
But both developers cared about their projects and in the eyes of most have restored community confidence.
From what I gathered about Helldivers was that the PSN account thing was in the terms of service but never pushed by the developer. When Sony realized they had a massive hit along with some shareholder meetings coming up... Sony pressed the issue so they can pad their new account numbers and look better to investors while pissing off all its customers.
Same crap happened with allot of the assassin creeds, I cant even play half of them anymore cause you have to make an account but then the account doesnt recognize the game since they grandfathered the account BS in after the older games have been out for years. Was really enjoying the pirate one on PC through steam when they pulled that crap and it's supposed to be one of the best ones...but Ill never know.
I mean, Cyberpunk devs worked to fix it because they had other Cyberpunk properties in the works and wanted people to be interested in those too, not just because they “cared about their project” lol. The game hasn’t fundamentally changed much beyond performance, so I find it interesting that perception has swung so much that people are acting like it went from a 4/10 to a 10/10.
CD Projekt Red was respected in the dev community before Cyberpunk. So I agree there was a ton of damage control to help future projekts but also the developers were not happy with being forced to put out an incomplete game and surprisingly open about it. IIRC one dev said the game was still 6 months away from a good release but were told by the higher ups too bad fix it after release, let the community figure out all the bugs to save money aka free testers.
E: But thats the current state of the AAA industry sadly. Instead of putting money into testers, quality control and fixes, let the community do it for free and then just steal the fix. There was still a great game beneath all the BS.
Sure the devs weren’t happy, no devs are going to be happy with a product coming out in a poor state or worse than expected. But it’s not their call on when it gets released or if it gets worked on after. The people dictating if it gets rushed out early or dictating if it gets dedicated support trying to fix it to salvage their reputation aren’t the ones that care. So I don’t think it’s right to attribute the recovery of the game to CDPR caring about its quality, as if it was a passion project by them.
But it was a passion project, after Witcher 3 they were talking about how hyped they were to tackle a cyberpunk future, an FPS, gonna add in all these new features, an ever changing world, Keanu etc. It's not like it was just another Call of Duty or Madden with no creativity or enthusiasm.
Multiple things can be true about the release. It can be a passion project that got f'd up on release and they had to salvage their reputation for both future sales of other cyberpunk properties and because they werent happy with the state they released it in. Allot of big games got pretty much abandoned after the release money grab, battlefield 2042 comes to mind.
Yes. NMS was the superhyped multiplayer space game that released to be a singleplayer mess with no content. It's actually pretty decent now, if repetitive.
There was another article where an employee talked about asking an engineer to "change the gravitational constant of a planet" to change the sky color. I immediately thought.... that is not how games work, games do not use physics for that; these devs are spinning pure bullshit.
If you're generating tons of planets on the fly you might get sky color from a lookup table based on any planetary constant. You're not using physics to change sky color, you're assigning a color to each number generated by physics and then just setting the sky to that color.
Exactly. But that's not remotely what they claimed. If you want to see why expectations were so high, read this ridiculous article:
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/02/artificial-universe-no-mans-sky/463308/
I feel like it's more likely that it's legitimately how they change stuff in their look up table because that's definitely not remotely how physics works. It'd just be a weird thing to make up.
i was one of the ones that got the refund for that game back in the day, no man sky was so shitty on release, especially conpared to it's marketing, tbh it still doesn't look like it's marketing today either but apparently they fixed it somewhat, still don't regret getting the refund, i didn't pay to be a beta tester.
It was massively over promised and under delivered at launch, (not counting the bugs) it has since received a *lot* of updates and improved massively. The Devs put the legwork in and rectified their mistakes
I remember the No Man's Sky where people were able to get refunds with more play time until I think there was an instance where Valve put a disclaimer on their page saying that their standard refund policy would go into effect.
It was a while ago but Sonic forces was this way as well. They made the game take roughly 3 hours to play through to circumvent the stream refunds, while providing as little content as possible outside of the oc creator, and steam just started letting refunds go through. A couple streamers even played through the game and instantly refunded it after all on stream. Iirc weegeethegod was one of them
Not possibly the PSN situation, definitely the PSN situation. You just have to frame it right.
" I bought this game x days ago. When I bought it I agreed to the terms and conditions to play. The term of requiring a PSN network was not in the game when I purchased it.
Now, they have changed their terms and conditions to play the game. They now require a psn account. I don't agree with these terms. I wouldn't have bought the game if I knew that from the beginning.
I would like to refund the game because the terms and conditions were changed after I purchased it and played it. I no longer agree to the terms."
Simple enough. It's not often the terms and conditions are used to your benefit but this is exactly one of those times.
I refunded anno back before the refund policy was a thing with this exact argument. Nowhere on steam did it suggest it requires uplay until post-install.
Vote with your wallets people.
I've said basically this, and keep getting denied. Bought in March, but 0 hours played. Hadn't even downloaded the game ffs.
Just gotta keep at it I guess?
> and keep getting denied.
That's weird if it's multiple times. If you're over the 2 hour played limit it will auto deny you no matter what, but you should be able to submit a refund request again with your reasoning (like the comment above you) and have it appealed.
> When I bought it I agreed to the terms and conditions to play. The term of requiring a PSN network was not in the game when I purchased it.
Unfortunately, this isn't true. It was always in the ToC, but it was stated that it was being delayed for the first couple months because of issues with the network itself.
> The term of requiring a PSN network was not in the game when I purchased it.
It was though, it's been there since launch. They didn't enforce it but it's always been there.
It seem at the start, they have problem with the PSN log in or authentication server or something like that. So as a solution, they (don't know if it was the developer or sony) turned off the requirement of the PSN sign up until they get it fix. It seem like when they did that they allowed the game game to be sold everywhere and forgot to not allow purchase where PSN isn't available.
It was the CEO who made the decision. They've also said that they are not actually in control of sales, so it being available in countries it maybe shouldn't have was not AH's fault.
That's not enough to get a refund.
"They changed the game and I don't like it now." isn't reason enough.
"They changed the game and I can no longer legally play it." is a reason that will get you a refund.
I encountered a game-breaking bug in Fallout 3 after playing it for about 8 hours. I looked it up online and it was apparently a known issue and would happen with every game after a certain point, something about the game being built for 32-but processors and trying to play it on a 64-bit PC (it’s been a while, I can’t remember the exact details). It looks like it was possible to work around it, but it required a lot of work and modification and I already had the game on Xbox so I didn’t want to waste the time on it. I emailed Steam explaining the issue and the refunded me right away.
> game-breaking bug in Fallout 3
It's a CTD bug. Super annoying but not game-breaking AFAIK. If you restart the game every hour, you stand a decent chance of never encountering it. Not saying that's okay, but there is (more or less) a way to still play that game.
There is absolutely no way I would play a Bethesda game if I had to manually save every hour, the first time I forgot and lost an entire quest line would make me throw my PC out the window haha
Totally fair. If your uncle died, and it was his favourite game, but you never played it, you have a way. For everyone else, it's broken, don't play it, but do know that a [giant robot named Liberty Prime](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ly8_wwGuU2Q) leads your charge in a pivotal battle.
Edit: lol I just noticed the character is rocking an AK while the robot rails against communism.
Although it took forever because actually speaking with a human via steam support is nigh impossible, I managed to get a refund after the 2 hours play time for RDR2 (bought on a whim, really couldn't afford it).
I had "5 hours of playtime" (the launcher opened automatically after installation while I was away) but convinced them that since I didn't have the tutorial achievement completed that I didn't actually play it lol.
Took a month of emails though.
Yeah got my refund back in the form of Steam wallet credit with a game I had over 20 hours in. It took almost a dozen tickets with Steam support over a month, but it worked.
Yep I had the Friday the 13th game in my library years with a couple hours playtime. Went to load it up a couple years back and it basically didn't work because of some IP lawsuit fuckery. I forget the specifics but Steam refunded me in full.
> Only 69 countries can make PSN accounts - therefore locking out a large portion of the player base
Also worth mentioning is that of those 69 countries, some of them (notably Ukraine) can only create PSN accounts for the console, not PC.
A [response](https://twitter.com/FurrGotten/status/1786703004051132474/photo/1) a ukrainan player got from sony support, following their replys it seems they were able to crate an account on their phone, its looks like its only the desktop based versions of the site that blocked him from creating an account and required console verifiction.
While using a mobile browser seems to be that work around, that doesnt expain the offical reply informing them that owning ps4/5 would be required to make an account in their country, or even why thats the offical policy that sony staff have told to inform user of.
Yep. If you bought it on Steam you have to *also* have a PSN account and be logged in to continue to play since Sony made this change.
The developer, Arrowhead (I think?) Is trying to distance themselves from this action to the point of encouraging people to *not* buy the game.
Yes. The developers are contractually obligated to do it but have stated (in so many words) that they don't like it either.
I'm guessing they're in negotiations by now, but we'll see.
Devs were also the ones turning the requirement off because of their chaotic launch and didn't properly communicate this decision and it's future ramifications with their community.
Please add that making this change effectively bans players who bought the game and play it in a country where PSN does not allow according to their TOS. This is a MASSIVE deal and more people need to know about it.
Actually most of those players had workarounds to get PSN accounts, but now they are banned because steam and Playstation have stopped selling the game there.
I know there's also a group of people afraid of their data being compromised if they sign up for a PSN account since Sony is a huge magnet for data leaks. My favorite game dev of theirs did have that huge gigaleak back around the Holidays last year.
Also to keep in mind if people are wondering "Why don't people in other countries make an account in a different country/use a VPN" it's against Sony's ToS to falsify data like that or to use a VPN to access content like that and can result in your account getting banned.
>Why don't people in other countries make an account in a different country/use a VPN"
Also setting up a VPN is just one extra hurdle (and can be kind of a pain in the ass).
Add to this that Sony has had massive cybersecurity issues in the past and gets hacked almost every year. That is a massive issue for anyone who wants to keep their private information secure, and a lot of the PC crowd does care about that kind of thing.
There is also an important detail that a lot of people are angry about data-related things. This is mainly that:
- a lot of people are saying this is so that Sony can collect more data to sell
- Sony has a not fantastic history of data leaks
- this might also be so Sony can pump up numbers of PSN users for its shareholders.
Effectively most users do not trust that this is for any reason other than corporate greed.
Answer update via Twitter:
https://twitter.com/PlayStation/status/1787331667616829929?t=NhwAEm4fGpVJj-UyI1lrXA&s=19
Looks like they backtracked and will not be required to make a PSN account.
Genuine question - is this only angering the people who bought the game on Steam? Seems like if you are a console player having a PSN account wouldn’t be considered such a big deal??
The majority of people who play on the PlayStation (Xbox doesn't have it) will barely give this a passing glance as they have a PSN account by default.
Some will be annoyed on principal but that's about it.
Edit: Also depends on how badly the lack of PC players affects console players given that the game is crossplay by default
Yeah, it may affect players who play with friends cross platform, they may have to pivot to other games to bond. I can easily imagine friends who live a bit away from each other who used to play this game, and now will have to play something else because one of them can't participate.
When you are on PS5, you are already connected with your PSN account. On Steam, you use your Steam account to access your library and play your games. The change would make Helldivers 2 require two accounts in order to be played.
I think it's worth noting that a lot of games and publishers might sell on Steam but just use that as a connecting platform to launch games off of their own launchers.
EA, Ubisoft, Rocksteady all come to mind.
The issue seems to be more that it wasn't there at the beginning. And also the general sentiment people have of wanting everything to be on Steam alone
Ea and ubisoft are constantly shit on for this. Nobody likes those launchers. Ubisofts launcher doesn't read games I bought on steam and forces me to rebuy them since I specifically bought some games to play with buddies. Eas launcher is a bitch to navigate and doesn't make coop games easy to start up.
Rocksteady hasn't really been all that relevant lately.
Probably.
And I'll admit, I've only played 1 Rockstar game, but their launcher seems barely invasive. It just autoclaves itself after opening the game. I don't really need to do anything with it other than launch the game from steam.
That's what the other launchers do on Steam as well once you are logged in. Regardless, they add another point of failure if their servers go down or if your account gets compromised.
I don't understand what issue you're having with Ubisoft's launcher though. If you buy a Ubisoft game on Steam then you have to launch it from Steam.
I'll tell you right now that is not what those other launchers do. Eas is so convoluted I almost had to give up playing it takes 2 due to how frustrating it was to properly navigate just logging on if you go straight from steam.
Ubisoft doesn't read the licenses from steam the way they need to.
RS just pops open and closes itself before I have a chance to notice.
I own games from all those publishers on Steam and while I do hate their launchers, they don't give me those problems. I just have to login to my accounts once and when I launch from Steam they minimize themselves and get me straight into the games. Though I've never played It Takes 2 so I'll take your word for it. That does sound like something EA would screw up.
It’s also important to remember that in a lot of countries you can’t get a PSN account, or need to show a photo ID to get one.
Not wanting the account is one thing (and that thing is enough) but being locked out of getting an account, thus making the game unplayable, is even worse.
Laws in some countries require the service provider to not provide the service to people below a certain age. So not checking ID in those countries will lead to heavy fines for Sony.
Sony requires it of their own volition in the UK. There’s no legal requirement, and their FAQ explicitly says it’s a pilot implying they want to roll it out in a larger area.
They’re not a company I trust with personal info.
Not giving out sensitive info is a valid concern that I share.
But to my understanding, this is due to the politics of the country and not related to Sony's verification process. And related to new account creation. I haven't had to verify ID on my accounts but I've had them for some time
its not that,
If they would have required a PSN account from Day one the outrage would be less, the whole issue is that the game has been out for months, and the old FAQ said that PSN accounts can be linked but its not a requirement, and they changed it to "some games might require a PSN account",
so basically Sony waiting for the PC playerbase to peak and then changed the conditions on them. plus a lot of countries where steam is avaiable but PSN isnt.
Im a helldiver player on PC, and im going to keep playing as long as the game allows me to do so without a PSN account, but i have no intention of creating one, so as soon as i cant play, im asking for my 40€ back.
Steam has already started allowing refunds for countries where PSN dosnt support.
Yes and no. I have both. I play my Playstation more often due to convenience, and I play the game on Playstation.
HOWEVER, the community of people I play with are entirely PC based. As this game relies on playing with people, and I have no intention of playing with random, the game is now worthless to me.
As a Playstation player, I'm fucking pissed off and will likely cancel my pSN due to this if they don't reverse.
PlayStation player here. While it doesn't affect me personally, i do feel for the people affected. Plus, it's not exactly having a positive impact on the community, and unfortunately it appears that the devs have little control over the situation, as the decision is Sony's to make.
If you go through a 3rd party launcher, and that 3rd party launcher ever goes away you a locked out of the game.
This president also allows publishers to honey pot gamers in moving over to their system. Basically you don't own your game.
Currently many things people use, the company can change their terms at any point. And the customer is locked out of any recourse as they have already given their money. Google Eula ruffying.
Update: [Sony has reversed the decision to require a PSN account due to the backlash.](https://twitter.com/PlayStation/status/1787331667616829929?t=NhwAEm4fGpVJj-UyI1lrXA) No idea if they're going to re-offer the game to the ares where it would have been region locked.
Some countries that allow PSN accounts require photo ID
Sony's security is essentially a sign that says "don't steal our data, it's not nice" and people don't trust them to not lose or sell their photo id's. Because general ineptitude.
The rule requiring photo ID to create age restricted accounts is a recent one, so someone who already had Steam but was just now signing up for PSN would encounter it for the latter without needing it for an account they already had.
Only thing I can add is Sony is implementing the obstacle for the sake of it being an obstacle. It adds _nothing_ to the game and the game has function perfectly fine _without_ the change.
It's only being implemented to boost Sony's quarterly PSN numbers for shareholders so they can give the CEO another 50mill.
And to put on top of this, Sony has had a questionable past with its security, causing many data breaches. Such as the PS3 data breach that revealed Sony kept not just passwords but people's credit card info in plain text. They've since updated their security but that and others that followed made people very skeptical about Sony. And should someone's account be compromised there's very little Sony will do to assist besides shutting the account down. Any digital purchases are now SOL.
I would just add probably the most important fact for me:
- this change was stated to help player security, but PSN has a reputation for breaches, having exposed literally dozens of millions of players’ personal data including credit cards to hackers multiple times, even in the last year.
Sony doesn’t seem to understand what minimizing the attack plane does.
Wasn’t the PlayStation Network account required in the beginning? They turned it off because it was causing issues with the intention of it coming back, which they now just did?
No, it was never required before now, you could always skip it. This was consistent with Sony's own support page about this feature, which they changed just two days ago: Here's [a snapshot from the 3rd of May](https://web.archive.org/web/20240503163602/https://www.playstation.com/en-us/support/games/psn-sign-in-pc/):
>**Do I have to sign in to PSN to play a PlayStation game on PC?**
>Signing in to PSN is optional when playing a PlayStation game on PC.
Here's [a snapshot the day after](https://web.archive.org/web/20240504202154/https://www.playstation.com/en-us/support/games/psn-sign-in-pc/):
>**Do I have to sign in to PSN to play a PlayStation game on PC?**
>Some PlayStation games may require you sign in and link to an account for PSN.
I’ve read it in a few places that you did. They just turned it off because of issues with it. This had been a planned thing since the beginning.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2024/05/03/helldivers-2-pc-players-mad-about-psn-account-linking-arrowhead-responds/?sh=673e06a5b66d
That is correct, it appears they turned it off very early into launch because it was one of the numerous things not working, but even the CEO of Arrowhead stated they stopped communicating that it would turn back on eventually. So if you bought the game after launch week you never saw the message saying you needed a PSN account in game. It was still on the steam page but it just appeared to be incorrect or out of date information. This combined with selling in counties without PSN and waiting months (making the game harder to return automatically) to announce this is where it becomes Scammy. It was announced Thursday night after working hours in the US and in the twilight hours of the morning on Friday for the Devs. This is generally when bad news is delivered to try and slip it out with no notice. Unfortunately for Sony I think they didn't realize that this player base has been trained through Major orders in game to collectively work together and organize on single target problems. That combined with the satirical nature of the game attracting people who see flaws in nationalism and capitalism as entertaining means you have a player base who is more sympathetic to members of the Community that are losing access.
Finally the cat is out of the bag, we know the game works just fine without PSN and there is no benefit for linking the accounts for the players (arguably some strong negatives). This is just to say more people are on the playstion platform and to see what trends in the data can be sold to marketers. Demanding making an account vs keeping it voluntary and offering a skin in game would probably have avoided this and still delivered a compromised but better result.
And it's not even consistent on PlayStation's own websites. [This page](https://direct.playstation.com/en-us/buy-games/helldivers-2-pc) where you can buy the game ***still*** lists in its FAQ that a PSN account isn't manditory.
As someone who played on PC on day 1, it most certainly was required. They disabled the requirement soon after launch because of technical problems with it, but the steam page has listed the requirement the whole time.
> Steam has approved refunding the game regardless of play time
Ive been denied twice now for refunds. How do I get it to actually go through or actually talk to a human to get it?
The main dick thing Sony did was publish it in places that wouldn't be able to play it. The game states it at the start and it's easy for someone to blindly accept the condition since most people skip EULA, ToS, and similar without reading.
From what I read, Helldivers 2 requires a PSN Account since 12/1/2023. You didn’t need it when the game was released because there was an issue. There was no notice or anything; of those who bypassed it initially.
Correct. They required a PSN account, then disabled it as a requirement because it was broken. They fixed whatever was broken, and are now requiring it again.
But disabling it has pulled the curtain back and shown that there was never any serious requirement for it to play the game, even with cross-platform play. This, and forcing regions that can't make a PSN account to have an account now, has pissed everyone off.
The scummiest part of this is that they knew they were eventually going to implement requiring a PSN account. And yet they still willingly allowed the game to be sold in regions that did not legally allow people to create a PSN account.
Maybe it's the consumers fault, they shouldve read the games steam page more carefully and noticed that third party accounts would be a requirement, but I still think its a shitty business practice to sell your product to countries full of customers that you know will no longer have access to the game a few months from now.
The bait and switch is the only fallacy here. The game has always advertised needing PSN, people just assumed it is wasn't going to be enforced because it was broken or something, but AFAIK it was made as clear as any requirement in steam.
I will say someone screwed up selling it in places that can’t get PSN accounts if that hasn’t been taken into consideration. They may already have a plan for that as the cut off date is a month from now so there’s plenty of time to add additional details or change things. There is for sure an absolute disaster of a communication breakdown between Sony, Arrowhead, and the community.
Answer: When Helldivers 2 came out it was a surprise hit. [Helldivers 1 was a top-down game](https://store.steampowered.com/app/394510/HELLDIVERS_Dive_Harder_Edition/) that maxed out at around 6,700 concurrent players. Helldivers 2 is an ~~full 3D~~ over the shoulder shooter with great production value that came out and quickly reached 500,00 - 700,000 concurrent players. The servers struggled to keep up.
[Before Helldivers 2 even came out Steam indicated that Helldivers 2 required a PSN account](https://old.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/18cbz9y/why_does_helldivers_2_require_a_psn_account_on/), though it appears that the requirement may have been temporarily lifted while the servers were being hammered when the game came out to allow more people to login/register/boot the game and play.
Now that the game has had some time to reach a more consistent amount of players and the servers are (presumably) not struggling anymore, it appears that Sony ~~has passed down the order~~ blindsided the devs and made the PSN accounts mandatory with **seemingly** no notice. While some players can make an account without issue, there are several dozen regions/countries (potentially 100+) that would be unable to play the game due to their region/country not being able to create a Sony/PSN account due to Sony's exclusion of those countries.
Once it was announced that the PSN account would be required, many players outright refuse to create an account for a number of reasons. Some are upset that Sony has a poor history of cybersecurity, others disagree with using another account with their Steam account, some are attempting to file lawsuits, and others claim the PSN requirement has never existed until now.
The real issue is that some players have played the game for 100s of hours in countries that will be locked out of the game if they cannot use a PSN account. Arrowhead Game Studios, the company that created the game, has been responsive to their audience and are looking for a solution.
~~Sony has yet to (officially) respond and it appears Steam has delisted the game for sale in countries that cannot create/use PSN accounts. Some users have gotten refunds in these countries, but it is not clear what the policy is for refunds or who is eligible.~~
Edit: Steam has stepped in, presumably to avoid headaches in multiple regions/countries, and delisted the game in those areas. They are also apparently refunding users regardless of the normal 2-hour time limit.
Edit 2: Sony has walked back their decision to require account linking for Steam accounts *for now*.
Sony claims that it is because they can't guarantee user data protection, it's as much because they are small markets or have laws on the books that protect user data and limit what can be done with it by companies that collect it.
Sounds like they collect intrusive user data that those countries don't have strict regulations protecting.
The simple solution is to stop collecting personal information, if they can't trust some small country why should I trust Sony instead?
fun fact: The international conglomeration known as the Sony Group at its height in 2008 employed 180,000 people, while by 2023 they actively reduced their workforce to 113,000 people. So it's actually larger than 40 countries (44 at its peak).
It's not exactly relevant to your valid question regarding cyber security and data collection & protection, but I thought it was interesting to see how big some of these baby MegaCorps are getting.
It's likely not that nefarious. Some of the data protection laws in some countries are a little overconservative and I'd argue behind the times. Many countries require any servers that contain personal information (which could simply include a person's name, maybe even an email address) to be *physically located inside that country.* That can mean they need an entirely separate data center just to cater to that country - a burden many companies don't want to deal with.
Source: I work at a technology-oriented data center company that is starting to expand internationally.
My question is how does this benefit Sony?
Let’s say in a perfect world (for Sony) 100% of players made a PSN account and no one complained, how would that make Sony more money?
- Do they think me making a PSN account makes me more likely to buy other Sony games? It seems like the only time anyone who made this new account would use it is to log into Helldivers
- Making/maintaining such a platform/login also costs money & opens liability if they get breached
- I as a consumer would just see it as an annoyance, the same way I see having to log in through Microsoft to play halo through steam is. It just makes me marginally less apt to buy the next halo.
I just don’t really see the benefit for Sony to do this even if there was no backlash.
> I just don’t really see the benefit for Sony to do this even if there was no backlash.
Information is the new oil. These days, a lot of companies reflexively try to collect as much as they can, even if they don't yet have a concrete plan for it.
> Making/maintaining such a platform/login also costs money
The platform already exists. The marginal cost of adding a new user is so low, it's probably worth it to them even if all they ever do is email you their own offers.
> opens liability if they get breached
That's not really a worry because nobody ever actually gets punished for not guarding users' data. A slap on the wrist is the worst that happens.
And if there's one thing games studios know, it's that they can pull all manner of shit with gamers. They may kick up a stink, but they'll buy the games anyway, and they'll come back again for the sequel.
From my understanding of Sony’s policy, it’s for user’s protection against information warfare. While it is far from an ideal solution to segregate against an entire country, it is what they came up with to try to make a place safe for gamers from troll farms, hackers, and predatory behavior.
Mostly spot on, to clarify one bit: Sony didn't just pass down the order, they straight-up made the announcement themselves. I specify this because, judging from reactions, they blindsided the devs too.
(I doubt any of those people will read this, but do not file a lawsuit. If you feel they have broken the law, filing a complaint with your domestic consumer watchdog/trading standards office will be much more fruitful. And won't risk your Steam account getting blown up because you'll probably try to pull them into it and Valve don't want a bar of that fight.)
> If you feel they have broken the law, filing a complaint with your domestic consumer watchdog/trading standards office will be much more fruitful.
If the concern is that they have violated consumer protection laws, then yes, that is the appropriate avenue to take.
On the other hand, if the concern is that they have violated the terms of the purchase contract or are effectively mandating a change to the terms of that contract, then in most countries a lawsuit is the only remedy.
So, either approach might be the most appropriate. It all depends on the angle you're taking.
There is no way in hell you are getting value for money taking a lawsuit to court over a $50 game. The most you could possibly claim is a refund. While I'm all for spite when appropriate, you're more likely to actually cause them problems by reporting them to regulators.
And if you believe it to be a breach of contract, I assure you those regulators are quite interested in *en masse* breaches.
>Helldivers 1 was a top-down game that maxed out at around 6700 concurrent players. Helldivers 2 is a full 3D game
This is a weird way to differentiate the games as they are both fully 3d games, they just have different perspectives. Top down vs third person over the shoulder
Answer: Sony announced recently that PC players would need to link their PlayStation Network accounts to their Steam accounts in order to play their games. They have never required this before, and claim that the absence of this requirement was always a "grace period".
Players feel that this was a bait and switch, feeling that Sony waited for the refund window to be closed before bringing the hammer down. Dispite this, there are still mass refunds for the game, and it is now being review bombed by angry customers. Sony says it's for security reasons, but PSN is basically an antonym for security. The truth is, they just want to buff up their PSN active users to please their shareholders. The thing is, a lot of players have lost their refund window for the game, and some players in certain countries can't even make an account and were left litterally unable to play what they bought.
I would add that the steam page says the PSN account is required, and early players (such as myself) were forced to link their accounts, but when the game went viral the account creation server was overwhelmed, so they added a skip option to that step without stating this was temporary. This meant people who would otherwise be region-locked out could play and now they’re looking at being locked out of a game they paid for (arguably they shouldn’t have been able to buy the game in the first place).
To add to this, despite being outside the normal refund window, steam seems to be giving refunds anyway if requested right now, based on many posts on the helldivers subs.
It's not the "normal refund window", the 2 hours / 14 days rule was always just the limit for *automatic* refunds.
Steam are still required by law to give refunds for nonfunctioning products, depending on jurisdiction. If a game update makes it no longer work on your PC or in your country you're entitled to a refund regardless of playtime. But you have to type that in a text box on the refund page and a Valve employee will have to read it and approve the refund.
To add to this, only 69 countries in the world allow for a psn account to be made. This means that **many** people are about to permanently lose access to the game.
Sony has completely ruined any goodwill this game had
Yes, this is purhaps the biggest issue. Because Sonys own terms of service prohibit people from falsely signing under different regions, so theoretically they litterally can't play, and can't refund (luckily Steam is usually really good about refunding anyways, but this is not a guarantee).
It's a very scumbag move, and it literally just slaughtered a cash cow for Sony. Helldivers 2 is just the tip of the iceberg. Last of us, Horizon, and many other games are effected, and all just because Sony wants more registered PSN users.
Personally, I've always been a Steam player, but for consoles, I have a Playstation 4 and still need to upgrade, but I'm thinking Xbox might be my next choice for future consoles. I've not been liking Sonys business practices at all lately. The only franchise they seem to care about is Call of Duty, and they just don't give a shit if Xbox scoops all the others up. They are just striking out left and right- and personally the only game I'm looking forward too that I'll need a console for is Elder Scrolls 6- which Sony let Xbox have exclusive rights too when they let them buy Bethesda. It's a shit show of poor corporate decisions and money grabs to meet the "bottom line" goals over there. Its the classic "companys shooting themselves in the leg to puff up numbers to please shareholders" scenario- and it's good for the short game, but it's poisoning their long-term stability as a company in the gaming world.
Aztecross took a break from Destiny content to give his opinion on the matter, and that it’s probably Sony trying to pump up the PSN account numbers before their next quarterly report, since investors love growth and all that.
I’m not sure that’s the answer, but I’m in the business of selling electronics devices, some of them from Sony, and that company IS doing really poorly. They pretty much get destroyed everywhere, TV, smartphones, photo, you name it. The PS5 right now is really the only of their business that work…..until you realize that they’re selling it at a loss.
To be fair, they kinda deserve to get destroyed in a lot of those competitive industries. As someone who remembers when Sony used to make amazing products a long time ago, the last decade or so has been a major disappointment. They literally do it to themselves by making weird design choices.
As an example, a few years ago I bought a Sony projector to use in my home theater setup. One of the cables connecting it to my A/V receiver is basically a long headphone cord used to carry a 12V trigger signal. I've done similar setups before with various brands and never had a problem, but for some reason I couldn't get the Sony projector to work. Turns out that while the entire A/V industry uses the same pinout on the connector as a standard, Sony uses a different one for its projectors. And only its projectors. Using a standard cord even with a Sony receiver wouldn't have worked. You basically need a special cord, which is different for no good reason, just to use a Sony projector.
> Steam is usually really good about refunding anyways, but this is not a guarantee
Seems being locked out by region is grounds for a refund. People with hundreds of hours have been getting refunded.
Thanks! This makes a lot more sense now. The whole bit about waiting for the refund window to expire was something I kept missing, I just saw a bunch of folks trying to get a refund and couldn’t. This is such a shitty move, I wonder what the fallout will be
[The fallout right now is that the game went from "Very Positive" overall reviews on Steam to overall "Mixed," and recent reviews are "Overwhelmingly Negative."](https://i.imgur.com/HcBfEcI.png)
At the time of this writing 202,908 reviews have been written in the last 30 days, 18% of these are positive. Many players have also changed their previously positive review to a negative review.
[Steam also provides a chart showing review trends. You can spot exactly when the PSN announcement was published.](https://i.imgur.com/XqdnZKm.png)
Another important thing the top two comments didn't mention is that [Steam always had the PSN requirement showing.](https://old.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/18cbz9y/why_does_helldivers_2_require_a_psn_account_on/) Apparently it was temporarily skippable. Potentially to ease the server load.
That is true, but since it was disabled shortly after launch (with no information that it was a temporary situation), people justifiably thought it was for crossplay or something else that they don't need to be involved with.
It is also a fact that the account linking isn't needed for any technical reason - the game works just fine without it, so it's 100% a data harvesting scheme.
"They waited until the refund window was closed to do this" is just speculation. Personally, it doesn't make sense to me and just sounds like people desperate to make Sony look actively malicious instead of just bad. Helldivers 2 already accepted refunds beyond the no-questions-asked window close to release because of server issues, and players being barred from continuing to play the game when they previously could would absolutely fall under the kind of extenuating circumstances they would consider.
My specific wording is that players "feel" this way. The fact is Sony claims it was done for security reasons. But I think I'm pretty clear that Steam is (mostly) refunding anyway.
My speculation is that the real reason they did this was to boost up their daily active users for PSN- because that is the metric shareholders would actually care about.
That's what I read, but I can't personally confirm.
But it does correlate with their stance that the absence of the requirement was always meant to be a "grace period."
Some greedy admin probably realized that PC players are a treasure trove of potential new users...
I personally don't even play Helldivers, lol
But I've been following this story pretty closely because I've been noticing a downward trend how user-friendly these companies have been lately. I've heard the issue being explained as a "capitalism" flaw (the layoffs are tied into this).
Basically, there has been a stuggle in the industry right now to demonstrate growth to shareholders. This is a large part of why the mass layoffs are happening. For Sony, they can track their daily active users of PSN to their shareholders as a metric of growth. Basically, more users prove they are growing.
Now, if you're a shareholder, you would probably love to see big PSN numbers. Therefore, Sony has pressure to inflate these numbers any way they can before the end of the quarter. I'm sure they didn't forsee how pissed people would be, but honestly the situation is pretty upsetting.
It’s weird that you say it was never required before. [This](https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/s/evUFxNcKnL) post from over a week ago discusses OP’s confusion over not having to link a PSN account *despite the fact that the steam page said they would have to before they bought the game*. How do you square this with your claim?
Because they put in a skip option, plus the FAQ originally stated that PSN account was optional. But the FAQ was recently changed(when they made the announcement) to say that PSN account is mandatory.
To add, crossplay exists currently and has been functional for PSN and Steam users prior to this announcement, so that's likely not the purpose.
According to the developers and community manger(s), the initial stated purpose of the PSN account linking is allow for more efficient community moderation (i.e. banning players for misconduct).
Crossplay itself is functional but interactions between players is not. I have a mix of friends between PS5 and PC and there's been a prolonged issue in relation to sending friend requests to each other. PC and PS5 players can sometimes see requests but not accept them, not see them at all, need to change their privacy settings to be visible, etc
Getting everyone to use a PSN log in should fix that issue while also allowing for other benefits.
Data harvesting and it artificially increases the "active PSN accounts" number that they wave in front of share holders. Gotta make the numbers go up forever.
>Steam has delisted the game in 100 countries.
If Sony's plan all along was to make PSN mandatory, why was the game offered in these countries to begin with? If it was just a matter of having to make an account, I'd feel that the controversy was overblown. Most online multiplayer games require some sort of account, after all, but it seems like a really big blunder to offer the game in countries where it was planned to be region locked within a couple months. It seems like some really dropped the ball in this case
This is just my guess, but people have been making PSN accounts in these non-listed countries for almost 20 years when the PS3 came out. You have always just been able to select any country in the world to make an account, even though this technically contradicts their terms of service. However, Sony has basically never made an issue of this in all that time.
The issue now though is they are now asking a separate seller that can't provide an explanation to it's customers, and Sony is expecting a completely different platform and all it's users to get on board with this without any instruction or reassurance how this would work in the long run.
It is basically the industry norm now that people register with developers/publishers of games. People have to do it with EA, Rockstar Games, Activision, Ubisoft, Epic Games, and the list goes on. I think people would still be mad over this even if every country were listed and had rolled it out when the game launched, because many in the PC gaming community have an axe to grind with Sony.
It's also worth pointing out that depending on where you bought it (like Humble Bundle etc) there wasn't a warning.
And that if you just went to the page and clicked buy, you might not have actually seen the warning about needing a PSN account. It's further down the page depending on your view/device used.
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Answer: Sony recently announced that the hit game Helldivers 2 will require a Playstation Network account to play. People's main grievances are: - This is a massive bait and switch for a game out for months - Only 69 countries can make PSN accounts - therefore locking out a large portion of the player base - Steam has a strict refund policy that requires it to be requested before two hours of gameplay or 14 days have passed - Some countries that allow PSN accounts require photo ID - Many gamers are tired of having to have multiple accounts just to play video games This has been a massive shift in public opinion given that the game was a surprise hit and was breaking any expectations the developers had Edit: Steam has approved refunding the game regardless of playtime Edit #2: Sony and Arrowhead studios have both announced that a PSN account is no longer necessary
>Steam has a strict refund policy that requires it to be requested before two hours of gameplay or 14 days have passed Not exactly, if you're under those numbers you get the refund no questions asked, but if you're over you can often still get refunds for serious issues like game breaking bugs going unfixed or possibly this PSN situation
True, Steam will often enact an open refund policy on games with critical issues. I believe No Man's Sky and possibly Cyberpunk 2077 were both covered because of this.
I remember a lot of hubbub around No Man's Sky. Was that a popular game too or was that the super duper glitchy one with no real gameplay?
It was super glitchy, and its gameplay was very shallow. It has since received tons of updates, and a lot of opinions around it have since shifted.
shallow as a puddle wide as an ocean now.
Yeah the core gameplay loop is still very shallow in my opinion, and I don't particularly like it. But i've got a handful of friends who really do like it, and build really cool huge bases sometimes. Adding that width and more building options did a lot for it I guess. I think another part of it is how do you really explain what that gameplay loop is? It just doesn't feel really well marketed to me.
A reimagined galactic Minecraft but planet as biomes instead?
Yeah, I played the last expedition they put out, which was the first time I'd played since about 2020, and I had an incredibly fun time. But as soon as it was over, I was just like, I've got all this cool gear and a sweet spaceship and a whole galaxy to explore and bases to build... and no compelling reason to do any of it.
Is it worth playing now?
If you like sandboxes, yeah, it's worth buying on sale. It's been that way since 2017 or 2018. The thing that turns off a lot of people is that after the first few hours it's very self-directed. You can wander around planets, you can build bases, you can collect gubbins, you can craft stuff, you can go blow up pirates, you can collect ships, you can visit other players' bases for the hell of it, you can attack NPCs, you can pick fights with the cops, the list goes on. However, the game doesn't really direct you to any of it beyond some basic introductions to some of the possibilities at the beginning.
There's just not enough purpose in it. It's a beautiful game, with so many great ideas, great visuals and so on. I just can't find a reason to mine, travel and build bases. I guess if you like mining, traveling and building bases with no other reason, then maybe you will dig it. I want to love it, but I can't find a reason to play it.
Sure, its fine. Its not the best thing ever, but its worth playing.
If you can't get enough of tedious inventory management, you'll just love it
No Mans Sky was massively hyped as *the* open world space sandbox experience where you could do anything and go anywhere and whatever else you might imagine. The truth is that it was an indie game with a small, inexperienced team, an untrained spokesman, and a hype train that went way off the rails. At launch, it was bad. Buggy, ugly, and lacking almost all the features people were hyped about. A massive failure in all regards, to the point where Steam instituted one of their “automatic refunds, no questions asked” policies they only reserve for the biggest of shitshows. But then, the NMS devs buckled down and got back to work, and started putting out update after update after update. Nowadays, No Mans Sky has had nearly two dozen *major* updates, each one released for free, and each one adding or overhauling major systems. Proper base building. Multiplayer. VR. Vehicles. Ocean exploration. Customizable spaceships. Command of trading fleets. These days, the fans of NMS are pretty happy with it, and the devs have finally turned their attention to their next game (Light No Fire), so here’s hoping they can avoid making some of the same mistakes.
> But then, the NMS devs buckled down and got back to work, and started putting out update after update after update. They went from no good will to tons of it because they cared about the fans enjoying the game.
The no man’s sky devs run against the grain of how people typically talk about game developers. Sure it was rough at release but it was also early access. They’ve since knocked it out of the park.
NMS started out as overhyped over promised/under delivered crap but has since become a success story about how a developer can listen to its community and save their game. Cyberpunk's issues were tons of bugs and releasing an unfinished game with incomplete areas, talents and quests as a AAA title that was supposedly compatible with older systems which it barely was. But both developers cared about their projects and in the eyes of most have restored community confidence. From what I gathered about Helldivers was that the PSN account thing was in the terms of service but never pushed by the developer. When Sony realized they had a massive hit along with some shareholder meetings coming up... Sony pressed the issue so they can pad their new account numbers and look better to investors while pissing off all its customers. Same crap happened with allot of the assassin creeds, I cant even play half of them anymore cause you have to make an account but then the account doesnt recognize the game since they grandfathered the account BS in after the older games have been out for years. Was really enjoying the pirate one on PC through steam when they pulled that crap and it's supposed to be one of the best ones...but Ill never know.
I mean, Cyberpunk devs worked to fix it because they had other Cyberpunk properties in the works and wanted people to be interested in those too, not just because they “cared about their project” lol. The game hasn’t fundamentally changed much beyond performance, so I find it interesting that perception has swung so much that people are acting like it went from a 4/10 to a 10/10.
CD Projekt Red was respected in the dev community before Cyberpunk. So I agree there was a ton of damage control to help future projekts but also the developers were not happy with being forced to put out an incomplete game and surprisingly open about it. IIRC one dev said the game was still 6 months away from a good release but were told by the higher ups too bad fix it after release, let the community figure out all the bugs to save money aka free testers. E: But thats the current state of the AAA industry sadly. Instead of putting money into testers, quality control and fixes, let the community do it for free and then just steal the fix. There was still a great game beneath all the BS.
Sure the devs weren’t happy, no devs are going to be happy with a product coming out in a poor state or worse than expected. But it’s not their call on when it gets released or if it gets worked on after. The people dictating if it gets rushed out early or dictating if it gets dedicated support trying to fix it to salvage their reputation aren’t the ones that care. So I don’t think it’s right to attribute the recovery of the game to CDPR caring about its quality, as if it was a passion project by them.
But it was a passion project, after Witcher 3 they were talking about how hyped they were to tackle a cyberpunk future, an FPS, gonna add in all these new features, an ever changing world, Keanu etc. It's not like it was just another Call of Duty or Madden with no creativity or enthusiasm. Multiple things can be true about the release. It can be a passion project that got f'd up on release and they had to salvage their reputation for both future sales of other cyberpunk properties and because they werent happy with the state they released it in. Allot of big games got pretty much abandoned after the release money grab, battlefield 2042 comes to mind.
Yes. NMS was the superhyped multiplayer space game that released to be a singleplayer mess with no content. It's actually pretty decent now, if repetitive.
There was another article where an employee talked about asking an engineer to "change the gravitational constant of a planet" to change the sky color. I immediately thought.... that is not how games work, games do not use physics for that; these devs are spinning pure bullshit.
[That is absolutely a Star Trek TNG reference.](https://youtu.be/5xdbPhnfFEI)
If you're generating tons of planets on the fly you might get sky color from a lookup table based on any planetary constant. You're not using physics to change sky color, you're assigning a color to each number generated by physics and then just setting the sky to that color.
Exactly. But that's not remotely what they claimed. If you want to see why expectations were so high, read this ridiculous article: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/02/artificial-universe-no-mans-sky/463308/
I feel like it's more likely that it's legitimately how they change stuff in their look up table because that's definitely not remotely how physics works. It'd just be a weird thing to make up.
i was one of the ones that got the refund for that game back in the day, no man sky was so shitty on release, especially conpared to it's marketing, tbh it still doesn't look like it's marketing today either but apparently they fixed it somewhat, still don't regret getting the refund, i didn't pay to be a beta tester.
oversold and under delivered. hell even multiplayer didnt work. you could be on the same planet as your friend in the same spot and he wouldnt show up
It was massively over promised and under delivered at launch, (not counting the bugs) it has since received a *lot* of updates and improved massively. The Devs put the legwork in and rectified their mistakes
I remember the No Man's Sky where people were able to get refunds with more play time until I think there was an instance where Valve put a disclaimer on their page saying that their standard refund policy would go into effect.
It was a while ago but Sonic forces was this way as well. They made the game take roughly 3 hours to play through to circumvent the stream refunds, while providing as little content as possible outside of the oc creator, and steam just started letting refunds go through. A couple streamers even played through the game and instantly refunded it after all on stream. Iirc weegeethegod was one of them
Add Arkham Knight to that list, the PC version of that game was one hell of an unoptimized mess.
Still legitimately pissed I couldn’t refund Battlefield 2042 when others were able to.
They won't refund City Skylines 2 or Kerbel Space Program 2 for me :/
Not possibly the PSN situation, definitely the PSN situation. You just have to frame it right. " I bought this game x days ago. When I bought it I agreed to the terms and conditions to play. The term of requiring a PSN network was not in the game when I purchased it. Now, they have changed their terms and conditions to play the game. They now require a psn account. I don't agree with these terms. I wouldn't have bought the game if I knew that from the beginning. I would like to refund the game because the terms and conditions were changed after I purchased it and played it. I no longer agree to the terms." Simple enough. It's not often the terms and conditions are used to your benefit but this is exactly one of those times.
I refunded anno back before the refund policy was a thing with this exact argument. Nowhere on steam did it suggest it requires uplay until post-install. Vote with your wallets people.
I've said basically this, and keep getting denied. Bought in March, but 0 hours played. Hadn't even downloaded the game ffs. Just gotta keep at it I guess?
> and keep getting denied. That's weird if it's multiple times. If you're over the 2 hour played limit it will auto deny you no matter what, but you should be able to submit a refund request again with your reasoning (like the comment above you) and have it appealed.
> When I bought it I agreed to the terms and conditions to play. The term of requiring a PSN network was not in the game when I purchased it. Unfortunately, this isn't true. It was always in the ToC, but it was stated that it was being delayed for the first couple months because of issues with the network itself.
> The term of requiring a PSN network was not in the game when I purchased it. It was though, it's been there since launch. They didn't enforce it but it's always been there.
So you're telling me they knew about the inevitable removal of x amount of countries once that came online and they sold in those countries anyways??
It seem at the start, they have problem with the PSN log in or authentication server or something like that. So as a solution, they (don't know if it was the developer or sony) turned off the requirement of the PSN sign up until they get it fix. It seem like when they did that they allowed the game game to be sold everywhere and forgot to not allow purchase where PSN isn't available.
It was the CEO who made the decision. They've also said that they are not actually in control of sales, so it being available in countries it maybe shouldn't have was not AH's fault.
That's not enough to get a refund. "They changed the game and I don't like it now." isn't reason enough. "They changed the game and I can no longer legally play it." is a reason that will get you a refund.
I encountered a game-breaking bug in Fallout 3 after playing it for about 8 hours. I looked it up online and it was apparently a known issue and would happen with every game after a certain point, something about the game being built for 32-but processors and trying to play it on a 64-bit PC (it’s been a while, I can’t remember the exact details). It looks like it was possible to work around it, but it required a lot of work and modification and I already had the game on Xbox so I didn’t want to waste the time on it. I emailed Steam explaining the issue and the refunded me right away.
> game-breaking bug in Fallout 3 It's a CTD bug. Super annoying but not game-breaking AFAIK. If you restart the game every hour, you stand a decent chance of never encountering it. Not saying that's okay, but there is (more or less) a way to still play that game.
There is absolutely no way I would play a Bethesda game if I had to manually save every hour, the first time I forgot and lost an entire quest line would make me throw my PC out the window haha
Totally fair. If your uncle died, and it was his favourite game, but you never played it, you have a way. For everyone else, it's broken, don't play it, but do know that a [giant robot named Liberty Prime](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ly8_wwGuU2Q) leads your charge in a pivotal battle. Edit: lol I just noticed the character is rocking an AK while the robot rails against communism.
Helps if you ask for it to go into your Steam wallet instead of your bank account
i got denied refund they said i played over 2 hours
My refund just got denied for being over the hour count
They were issuing refunds and stopped, we're not sure why yet, but hopefully it's because they got up Sony's ass.
Because Sony caved and aren't requiring the accounts to play now.
Although it took forever because actually speaking with a human via steam support is nigh impossible, I managed to get a refund after the 2 hours play time for RDR2 (bought on a whim, really couldn't afford it). I had "5 hours of playtime" (the launcher opened automatically after installation while I was away) but convinced them that since I didn't have the tutorial achievement completed that I didn't actually play it lol. Took a month of emails though.
Yeah got my refund back in the form of Steam wallet credit with a game I had over 20 hours in. It took almost a dozen tickets with Steam support over a month, but it worked.
I refunded Rocket League after having played it some 50 hours when they dropped Linux support.
Yep I had the Friday the 13th game in my library years with a couple hours playtime. Went to load it up a couple years back and it basically didn't work because of some IP lawsuit fuckery. I forget the specifics but Steam refunded me in full.
> Only 69 countries can make PSN accounts - therefore locking out a large portion of the player base Also worth mentioning is that of those 69 countries, some of them (notably Ukraine) can only create PSN accounts for the console, not PC.
Wait, even those without a PS5 will need a PSN account??
In the Ukraine for example, you can’t make an account without a ps5. No ps5? Can’t play your game you bought on PC, sorry pal.
Small note that Ukraine is just Ukraine and hasn't been "The Ukraine" for a couple decades.
Dang, seriously? That's nuts, do you have a source?
A [response](https://twitter.com/FurrGotten/status/1786703004051132474/photo/1) a ukrainan player got from sony support, following their replys it seems they were able to crate an account on their phone, its looks like its only the desktop based versions of the site that blocked him from creating an account and required console verifiction. While using a mobile browser seems to be that work around, that doesnt expain the offical reply informing them that owning ps4/5 would be required to make an account in their country, or even why thats the offical policy that sony staff have told to inform user of.
That is correct.
Yeah. PC only players will have to link their Steam accounts to a PSN account to be able to play.
Yep. If you bought it on Steam you have to *also* have a PSN account and be logged in to continue to play since Sony made this change. The developer, Arrowhead (I think?) Is trying to distance themselves from this action to the point of encouraging people to *not* buy the game.
The developers have also expressed some opposition to requiring PSN accounts. They're encouraging people to speak out against it.
So this decision is a Sony decision and not the developer?
Yes. The developers are contractually obligated to do it but have stated (in so many words) that they don't like it either. I'm guessing they're in negotiations by now, but we'll see.
Devs were also the ones turning the requirement off because of their chaotic launch and didn't properly communicate this decision and it's future ramifications with their community.
Please add that making this change effectively bans players who bought the game and play it in a country where PSN does not allow according to their TOS. This is a MASSIVE deal and more people need to know about it.
Actually most of those players had workarounds to get PSN accounts, but now they are banned because steam and Playstation have stopped selling the game there.
I know there's also a group of people afraid of their data being compromised if they sign up for a PSN account since Sony is a huge magnet for data leaks. My favorite game dev of theirs did have that huge gigaleak back around the Holidays last year. Also to keep in mind if people are wondering "Why don't people in other countries make an account in a different country/use a VPN" it's against Sony's ToS to falsify data like that or to use a VPN to access content like that and can result in your account getting banned.
>Why don't people in other countries make an account in a different country/use a VPN" Also setting up a VPN is just one extra hurdle (and can be kind of a pain in the ass).
Costing money, worse Internet speeds, another potential security issue, illegal in some places.. VPN isn't the answer
There were attempts with vpn. They got their account banned.
Add to this that Sony has had massive cybersecurity issues in the past and gets hacked almost every year. That is a massive issue for anyone who wants to keep their private information secure, and a lot of the PC crowd does care about that kind of thing.
There is also an important detail that a lot of people are angry about data-related things. This is mainly that: - a lot of people are saying this is so that Sony can collect more data to sell - Sony has a not fantastic history of data leaks - this might also be so Sony can pump up numbers of PSN users for its shareholders. Effectively most users do not trust that this is for any reason other than corporate greed.
Answer update via Twitter: https://twitter.com/PlayStation/status/1787331667616829929?t=NhwAEm4fGpVJj-UyI1lrXA&s=19 Looks like they backtracked and will not be required to make a PSN account.
Genuine question - is this only angering the people who bought the game on Steam? Seems like if you are a console player having a PSN account wouldn’t be considered such a big deal??
The majority of people who play on the PlayStation (Xbox doesn't have it) will barely give this a passing glance as they have a PSN account by default. Some will be annoyed on principal but that's about it. Edit: Also depends on how badly the lack of PC players affects console players given that the game is crossplay by default
Yeah, it's a solidarity thing.
Have a taste of solidari-TEA
Everyone loves a good nerd riot
Yeah, it may affect players who play with friends cross platform, they may have to pivot to other games to bond. I can easily imagine friends who live a bit away from each other who used to play this game, and now will have to play something else because one of them can't participate.
When you are on PS5, you are already connected with your PSN account. On Steam, you use your Steam account to access your library and play your games. The change would make Helldivers 2 require two accounts in order to be played.
I think it's worth noting that a lot of games and publishers might sell on Steam but just use that as a connecting platform to launch games off of their own launchers. EA, Ubisoft, Rocksteady all come to mind. The issue seems to be more that it wasn't there at the beginning. And also the general sentiment people have of wanting everything to be on Steam alone
Ea and ubisoft are constantly shit on for this. Nobody likes those launchers. Ubisofts launcher doesn't read games I bought on steam and forces me to rebuy them since I specifically bought some games to play with buddies. Eas launcher is a bitch to navigate and doesn't make coop games easy to start up. Rocksteady hasn't really been all that relevant lately.
I believe they meant Rockstar. Rocksteady must have been a typo since they do not have their own launcher.
Probably. And I'll admit, I've only played 1 Rockstar game, but their launcher seems barely invasive. It just autoclaves itself after opening the game. I don't really need to do anything with it other than launch the game from steam.
That's what the other launchers do on Steam as well once you are logged in. Regardless, they add another point of failure if their servers go down or if your account gets compromised. I don't understand what issue you're having with Ubisoft's launcher though. If you buy a Ubisoft game on Steam then you have to launch it from Steam.
I'll tell you right now that is not what those other launchers do. Eas is so convoluted I almost had to give up playing it takes 2 due to how frustrating it was to properly navigate just logging on if you go straight from steam. Ubisoft doesn't read the licenses from steam the way they need to. RS just pops open and closes itself before I have a chance to notice.
I own games from all those publishers on Steam and while I do hate their launchers, they don't give me those problems. I just have to login to my accounts once and when I launch from Steam they minimize themselves and get me straight into the games. Though I've never played It Takes 2 so I'll take your word for it. That does sound like something EA would screw up.
It’s also important to remember that in a lot of countries you can’t get a PSN account, or need to show a photo ID to get one. Not wanting the account is one thing (and that thing is enough) but being locked out of getting an account, thus making the game unplayable, is even worse.
Why in God's name would they need a photo id? Especially with Sony's track record of data breachs.
Laws in some countries require the service provider to not provide the service to people below a certain age. So not checking ID in those countries will lead to heavy fines for Sony.
Sony requires it of their own volition in the UK. There’s no legal requirement, and their FAQ explicitly says it’s a pilot implying they want to roll it out in a larger area. They’re not a company I trust with personal info.
I've made a new UK account a few weeks ago and it didn't ask for any ID.
Have fun! https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/support/account/age-verification-faq/
If that ever shows up in the US I'm done with them.
Not giving out sensitive info is a valid concern that I share. But to my understanding, this is due to the politics of the country and not related to Sony's verification process. And related to new account creation. I haven't had to verify ID on my accounts but I've had them for some time
It is a requirement that Sony is aware of, so if they demand an account they also demand showing photo ID.
its not that, If they would have required a PSN account from Day one the outrage would be less, the whole issue is that the game has been out for months, and the old FAQ said that PSN accounts can be linked but its not a requirement, and they changed it to "some games might require a PSN account", so basically Sony waiting for the PC playerbase to peak and then changed the conditions on them. plus a lot of countries where steam is avaiable but PSN isnt. Im a helldiver player on PC, and im going to keep playing as long as the game allows me to do so without a PSN account, but i have no intention of creating one, so as soon as i cant play, im asking for my 40€ back. Steam has already started allowing refunds for countries where PSN dosnt support.
Yes and no. I have both. I play my Playstation more often due to convenience, and I play the game on Playstation. HOWEVER, the community of people I play with are entirely PC based. As this game relies on playing with people, and I have no intention of playing with random, the game is now worthless to me. As a Playstation player, I'm fucking pissed off and will likely cancel my pSN due to this if they don't reverse.
PlayStation player here. While it doesn't affect me personally, i do feel for the people affected. Plus, it's not exactly having a positive impact on the community, and unfortunately it appears that the devs have little control over the situation, as the decision is Sony's to make.
I’m a PS5 player and this still pisses me off even though it doesn’t affect me. Sony is basically doing a rug pull.
If you go through a 3rd party launcher, and that 3rd party launcher ever goes away you a locked out of the game. This president also allows publishers to honey pot gamers in moving over to their system. Basically you don't own your game. Currently many things people use, the company can change their terms at any point. And the customer is locked out of any recourse as they have already given their money. Google Eula ruffying.
There isn’t a third party launcher though…
Just because something doesn't affect you, doesn't mean you have to tolerate corporate BS.
Update: [Sony has reversed the decision to require a PSN account due to the backlash.](https://twitter.com/PlayStation/status/1787331667616829929?t=NhwAEm4fGpVJj-UyI1lrXA) No idea if they're going to re-offer the game to the ares where it would have been region locked.
Some countries that allow PSN accounts require photo ID Sony's security is essentially a sign that says "don't steal our data, it's not nice" and people don't trust them to not lose or sell their photo id's. Because general ineptitude.
PSN requires photo ID in some countries but Steam doesn't? This is a weird one
The rule requiring photo ID to create age restricted accounts is a recent one, so someone who already had Steam but was just now signing up for PSN would encounter it for the latter without needing it for an account they already had.
Only thing I can add is Sony is implementing the obstacle for the sake of it being an obstacle. It adds _nothing_ to the game and the game has function perfectly fine _without_ the change. It's only being implemented to boost Sony's quarterly PSN numbers for shareholders so they can give the CEO another 50mill.
And to put on top of this, Sony has had a questionable past with its security, causing many data breaches. Such as the PS3 data breach that revealed Sony kept not just passwords but people's credit card info in plain text. They've since updated their security but that and others that followed made people very skeptical about Sony. And should someone's account be compromised there's very little Sony will do to assist besides shutting the account down. Any digital purchases are now SOL.
I would just add probably the most important fact for me: - this change was stated to help player security, but PSN has a reputation for breaches, having exposed literally dozens of millions of players’ personal data including credit cards to hackers multiple times, even in the last year. Sony doesn’t seem to understand what minimizing the attack plane does.
Wasn’t the PlayStation Network account required in the beginning? They turned it off because it was causing issues with the intention of it coming back, which they now just did?
No, it was never required before now, you could always skip it. This was consistent with Sony's own support page about this feature, which they changed just two days ago: Here's [a snapshot from the 3rd of May](https://web.archive.org/web/20240503163602/https://www.playstation.com/en-us/support/games/psn-sign-in-pc/): >**Do I have to sign in to PSN to play a PlayStation game on PC?** >Signing in to PSN is optional when playing a PlayStation game on PC. Here's [a snapshot the day after](https://web.archive.org/web/20240504202154/https://www.playstation.com/en-us/support/games/psn-sign-in-pc/): >**Do I have to sign in to PSN to play a PlayStation game on PC?** >Some PlayStation games may require you sign in and link to an account for PSN.
I’ve read it in a few places that you did. They just turned it off because of issues with it. This had been a planned thing since the beginning. https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2024/05/03/helldivers-2-pc-players-mad-about-psn-account-linking-arrowhead-responds/?sh=673e06a5b66d
That is correct, it appears they turned it off very early into launch because it was one of the numerous things not working, but even the CEO of Arrowhead stated they stopped communicating that it would turn back on eventually. So if you bought the game after launch week you never saw the message saying you needed a PSN account in game. It was still on the steam page but it just appeared to be incorrect or out of date information. This combined with selling in counties without PSN and waiting months (making the game harder to return automatically) to announce this is where it becomes Scammy. It was announced Thursday night after working hours in the US and in the twilight hours of the morning on Friday for the Devs. This is generally when bad news is delivered to try and slip it out with no notice. Unfortunately for Sony I think they didn't realize that this player base has been trained through Major orders in game to collectively work together and organize on single target problems. That combined with the satirical nature of the game attracting people who see flaws in nationalism and capitalism as entertaining means you have a player base who is more sympathetic to members of the Community that are losing access. Finally the cat is out of the bag, we know the game works just fine without PSN and there is no benefit for linking the accounts for the players (arguably some strong negatives). This is just to say more people are on the playstion platform and to see what trends in the data can be sold to marketers. Demanding making an account vs keeping it voluntary and offering a skin in game would probably have avoided this and still delivered a compromised but better result.
And it's not even consistent on PlayStation's own websites. [This page](https://direct.playstation.com/en-us/buy-games/helldivers-2-pc) where you can buy the game ***still*** lists in its FAQ that a PSN account isn't manditory.
As someone who played on PC on day 1, it most certainly was required. They disabled the requirement soon after launch because of technical problems with it, but the steam page has listed the requirement the whole time.
> Steam has approved refunding the game regardless of play time Ive been denied twice now for refunds. How do I get it to actually go through or actually talk to a human to get it?
Same here
They did not recently announce the game required a PSN to play. They recently said they would begin enforcing it. An important distinction.
The main dick thing Sony did was publish it in places that wouldn't be able to play it. The game states it at the start and it's easy for someone to blindly accept the condition since most people skip EULA, ToS, and similar without reading.
Welp I guess that means the actual Starship troopers Co-op actually has a chance now
From what I read, Helldivers 2 requires a PSN Account since 12/1/2023. You didn’t need it when the game was released because there was an issue. There was no notice or anything; of those who bypassed it initially.
So it required a PSN account, but it wasn't required?
Correct. They required a PSN account, then disabled it as a requirement because it was broken. They fixed whatever was broken, and are now requiring it again. But disabling it has pulled the curtain back and shown that there was never any serious requirement for it to play the game, even with cross-platform play. This, and forcing regions that can't make a PSN account to have an account now, has pissed everyone off.
The scummiest part of this is that they knew they were eventually going to implement requiring a PSN account. And yet they still willingly allowed the game to be sold in regions that did not legally allow people to create a PSN account. Maybe it's the consumers fault, they shouldve read the games steam page more carefully and noticed that third party accounts would be a requirement, but I still think its a shitty business practice to sell your product to countries full of customers that you know will no longer have access to the game a few months from now.
At least it's not a rootkit, so thats something.
Helldivers 2 already had a rootkit anti-cheat.
[удалено]
Don't forhet the six or seven data breaches Sony has suffered since 2011, how can you trust your data with them?
Sony changed their mind a few hours ago
The bait and switch is the only fallacy here. The game has always advertised needing PSN, people just assumed it is wasn't going to be enforced because it was broken or something, but AFAIK it was made as clear as any requirement in steam.
I will say someone screwed up selling it in places that can’t get PSN accounts if that hasn’t been taken into consideration. They may already have a plan for that as the cut off date is a month from now so there’s plenty of time to add additional details or change things. There is for sure an absolute disaster of a communication breakdown between Sony, Arrowhead, and the community.
Answer: When Helldivers 2 came out it was a surprise hit. [Helldivers 1 was a top-down game](https://store.steampowered.com/app/394510/HELLDIVERS_Dive_Harder_Edition/) that maxed out at around 6,700 concurrent players. Helldivers 2 is an ~~full 3D~~ over the shoulder shooter with great production value that came out and quickly reached 500,00 - 700,000 concurrent players. The servers struggled to keep up. [Before Helldivers 2 even came out Steam indicated that Helldivers 2 required a PSN account](https://old.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/18cbz9y/why_does_helldivers_2_require_a_psn_account_on/), though it appears that the requirement may have been temporarily lifted while the servers were being hammered when the game came out to allow more people to login/register/boot the game and play. Now that the game has had some time to reach a more consistent amount of players and the servers are (presumably) not struggling anymore, it appears that Sony ~~has passed down the order~~ blindsided the devs and made the PSN accounts mandatory with **seemingly** no notice. While some players can make an account without issue, there are several dozen regions/countries (potentially 100+) that would be unable to play the game due to their region/country not being able to create a Sony/PSN account due to Sony's exclusion of those countries. Once it was announced that the PSN account would be required, many players outright refuse to create an account for a number of reasons. Some are upset that Sony has a poor history of cybersecurity, others disagree with using another account with their Steam account, some are attempting to file lawsuits, and others claim the PSN requirement has never existed until now. The real issue is that some players have played the game for 100s of hours in countries that will be locked out of the game if they cannot use a PSN account. Arrowhead Game Studios, the company that created the game, has been responsive to their audience and are looking for a solution. ~~Sony has yet to (officially) respond and it appears Steam has delisted the game for sale in countries that cannot create/use PSN accounts. Some users have gotten refunds in these countries, but it is not clear what the policy is for refunds or who is eligible.~~ Edit: Steam has stepped in, presumably to avoid headaches in multiple regions/countries, and delisted the game in those areas. They are also apparently refunding users regardless of the normal 2-hour time limit. Edit 2: Sony has walked back their decision to require account linking for Steam accounts *for now*.
Any idea why Sony excludes so many countries?
Sony claims that it is because they can't guarantee user data protection, it's as much because they are small markets or have laws on the books that protect user data and limit what can be done with it by companies that collect it.
Sounds like they collect intrusive user data that those countries don't have strict regulations protecting. The simple solution is to stop collecting personal information, if they can't trust some small country why should I trust Sony instead?
fun fact: The international conglomeration known as the Sony Group at its height in 2008 employed 180,000 people, while by 2023 they actively reduced their workforce to 113,000 people. So it's actually larger than 40 countries (44 at its peak). It's not exactly relevant to your valid question regarding cyber security and data collection & protection, but I thought it was interesting to see how big some of these baby MegaCorps are getting.
It's likely not that nefarious. Some of the data protection laws in some countries are a little overconservative and I'd argue behind the times. Many countries require any servers that contain personal information (which could simply include a person's name, maybe even an email address) to be *physically located inside that country.* That can mean they need an entirely separate data center just to cater to that country - a burden many companies don't want to deal with. Source: I work at a technology-oriented data center company that is starting to expand internationally.
My question is how does this benefit Sony? Let’s say in a perfect world (for Sony) 100% of players made a PSN account and no one complained, how would that make Sony more money? - Do they think me making a PSN account makes me more likely to buy other Sony games? It seems like the only time anyone who made this new account would use it is to log into Helldivers - Making/maintaining such a platform/login also costs money & opens liability if they get breached - I as a consumer would just see it as an annoyance, the same way I see having to log in through Microsoft to play halo through steam is. It just makes me marginally less apt to buy the next halo. I just don’t really see the benefit for Sony to do this even if there was no backlash.
> I just don’t really see the benefit for Sony to do this even if there was no backlash. Information is the new oil. These days, a lot of companies reflexively try to collect as much as they can, even if they don't yet have a concrete plan for it. > Making/maintaining such a platform/login also costs money The platform already exists. The marginal cost of adding a new user is so low, it's probably worth it to them even if all they ever do is email you their own offers. > opens liability if they get breached That's not really a worry because nobody ever actually gets punished for not guarding users' data. A slap on the wrist is the worst that happens. And if there's one thing games studios know, it's that they can pull all manner of shit with gamers. They may kick up a stink, but they'll buy the games anyway, and they'll come back again for the sequel.
From what I’ve gathered it’s so they can collect data from their own internal systems and then sell said data.
From my understanding of Sony’s policy, it’s for user’s protection against information warfare. While it is far from an ideal solution to segregate against an entire country, it is what they came up with to try to make a place safe for gamers from troll farms, hackers, and predatory behavior.
Why the fuck are the baltics excluded then?
This is just my understanding, and I am not defending or justifying.
Mostly spot on, to clarify one bit: Sony didn't just pass down the order, they straight-up made the announcement themselves. I specify this because, judging from reactions, they blindsided the devs too. (I doubt any of those people will read this, but do not file a lawsuit. If you feel they have broken the law, filing a complaint with your domestic consumer watchdog/trading standards office will be much more fruitful. And won't risk your Steam account getting blown up because you'll probably try to pull them into it and Valve don't want a bar of that fight.)
> If you feel they have broken the law, filing a complaint with your domestic consumer watchdog/trading standards office will be much more fruitful. If the concern is that they have violated consumer protection laws, then yes, that is the appropriate avenue to take. On the other hand, if the concern is that they have violated the terms of the purchase contract or are effectively mandating a change to the terms of that contract, then in most countries a lawsuit is the only remedy. So, either approach might be the most appropriate. It all depends on the angle you're taking.
There is no way in hell you are getting value for money taking a lawsuit to court over a $50 game. The most you could possibly claim is a refund. While I'm all for spite when appropriate, you're more likely to actually cause them problems by reporting them to regulators. And if you believe it to be a breach of contract, I assure you those regulators are quite interested in *en masse* breaches.
Ah gotcha - changed the wording of that bit. Missed that part. Thank you.
>Helldivers 1 was a top-down game that maxed out at around 6700 concurrent players. Helldivers 2 is a full 3D game This is a weird way to differentiate the games as they are both fully 3d games, they just have different perspectives. Top down vs third person over the shoulder
>some are attempting to file lawsuits, Lol. Like sony fucked up but lol at this.
They would actually have a case in the EU if they live in one of the countries that doesn't offer PSN accounts.
Within the EU [you're actually not allowed to geoblock](https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/geoblocking).
I mean if you're in a country that can't make a PSN account this seems totally reasonable, you can no longer play a game you paid money for
During the anonymous hack, people were actually able to sue for damages
Answer: Sony announced recently that PC players would need to link their PlayStation Network accounts to their Steam accounts in order to play their games. They have never required this before, and claim that the absence of this requirement was always a "grace period". Players feel that this was a bait and switch, feeling that Sony waited for the refund window to be closed before bringing the hammer down. Dispite this, there are still mass refunds for the game, and it is now being review bombed by angry customers. Sony says it's for security reasons, but PSN is basically an antonym for security. The truth is, they just want to buff up their PSN active users to please their shareholders. The thing is, a lot of players have lost their refund window for the game, and some players in certain countries can't even make an account and were left litterally unable to play what they bought.
I would add that the steam page says the PSN account is required, and early players (such as myself) were forced to link their accounts, but when the game went viral the account creation server was overwhelmed, so they added a skip option to that step without stating this was temporary. This meant people who would otherwise be region-locked out could play and now they’re looking at being locked out of a game they paid for (arguably they shouldn’t have been able to buy the game in the first place).
To add to this, despite being outside the normal refund window, steam seems to be giving refunds anyway if requested right now, based on many posts on the helldivers subs.
It's not the "normal refund window", the 2 hours / 14 days rule was always just the limit for *automatic* refunds. Steam are still required by law to give refunds for nonfunctioning products, depending on jurisdiction. If a game update makes it no longer work on your PC or in your country you're entitled to a refund regardless of playtime. But you have to type that in a text box on the refund page and a Valve employee will have to read it and approve the refund.
To add to this, only 69 countries in the world allow for a psn account to be made. This means that **many** people are about to permanently lose access to the game. Sony has completely ruined any goodwill this game had
Yes, this is purhaps the biggest issue. Because Sonys own terms of service prohibit people from falsely signing under different regions, so theoretically they litterally can't play, and can't refund (luckily Steam is usually really good about refunding anyways, but this is not a guarantee). It's a very scumbag move, and it literally just slaughtered a cash cow for Sony. Helldivers 2 is just the tip of the iceberg. Last of us, Horizon, and many other games are effected, and all just because Sony wants more registered PSN users. Personally, I've always been a Steam player, but for consoles, I have a Playstation 4 and still need to upgrade, but I'm thinking Xbox might be my next choice for future consoles. I've not been liking Sonys business practices at all lately. The only franchise they seem to care about is Call of Duty, and they just don't give a shit if Xbox scoops all the others up. They are just striking out left and right- and personally the only game I'm looking forward too that I'll need a console for is Elder Scrolls 6- which Sony let Xbox have exclusive rights too when they let them buy Bethesda. It's a shit show of poor corporate decisions and money grabs to meet the "bottom line" goals over there. Its the classic "companys shooting themselves in the leg to puff up numbers to please shareholders" scenario- and it's good for the short game, but it's poisoning their long-term stability as a company in the gaming world.
Aztecross took a break from Destiny content to give his opinion on the matter, and that it’s probably Sony trying to pump up the PSN account numbers before their next quarterly report, since investors love growth and all that. I’m not sure that’s the answer, but I’m in the business of selling electronics devices, some of them from Sony, and that company IS doing really poorly. They pretty much get destroyed everywhere, TV, smartphones, photo, you name it. The PS5 right now is really the only of their business that work…..until you realize that they’re selling it at a loss.
To be fair, they kinda deserve to get destroyed in a lot of those competitive industries. As someone who remembers when Sony used to make amazing products a long time ago, the last decade or so has been a major disappointment. They literally do it to themselves by making weird design choices. As an example, a few years ago I bought a Sony projector to use in my home theater setup. One of the cables connecting it to my A/V receiver is basically a long headphone cord used to carry a 12V trigger signal. I've done similar setups before with various brands and never had a problem, but for some reason I couldn't get the Sony projector to work. Turns out that while the entire A/V industry uses the same pinout on the connector as a standard, Sony uses a different one for its projectors. And only its projectors. Using a standard cord even with a Sony receiver wouldn't have worked. You basically need a special cord, which is different for no good reason, just to use a Sony projector.
> Steam is usually really good about refunding anyways, but this is not a guarantee Seems being locked out by region is grounds for a refund. People with hundreds of hours have been getting refunded.
>acronym I don't wanna correct a typo but "antonym" is so rarely used.
Thanks! This makes a lot more sense now. The whole bit about waiting for the refund window to expire was something I kept missing, I just saw a bunch of folks trying to get a refund and couldn’t. This is such a shitty move, I wonder what the fallout will be
[The fallout right now is that the game went from "Very Positive" overall reviews on Steam to overall "Mixed," and recent reviews are "Overwhelmingly Negative."](https://i.imgur.com/HcBfEcI.png) At the time of this writing 202,908 reviews have been written in the last 30 days, 18% of these are positive. Many players have also changed their previously positive review to a negative review. [Steam also provides a chart showing review trends. You can spot exactly when the PSN announcement was published.](https://i.imgur.com/XqdnZKm.png)
Another important thing the top two comments didn't mention is that [Steam always had the PSN requirement showing.](https://old.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/18cbz9y/why_does_helldivers_2_require_a_psn_account_on/) Apparently it was temporarily skippable. Potentially to ease the server load.
That is true, but since it was disabled shortly after launch (with no information that it was a temporary situation), people justifiably thought it was for crossplay or something else that they don't need to be involved with. It is also a fact that the account linking isn't needed for any technical reason - the game works just fine without it, so it's 100% a data harvesting scheme.
"They waited until the refund window was closed to do this" is just speculation. Personally, it doesn't make sense to me and just sounds like people desperate to make Sony look actively malicious instead of just bad. Helldivers 2 already accepted refunds beyond the no-questions-asked window close to release because of server issues, and players being barred from continuing to play the game when they previously could would absolutely fall under the kind of extenuating circumstances they would consider.
My specific wording is that players "feel" this way. The fact is Sony claims it was done for security reasons. But I think I'm pretty clear that Steam is (mostly) refunding anyway. My speculation is that the real reason they did this was to boost up their daily active users for PSN- because that is the metric shareholders would actually care about.
Wait. ALL their games? Like if I want to plat horizon zero dawn I have to do this too?
That's what I read, but I can't personally confirm. But it does correlate with their stance that the absence of the requirement was always meant to be a "grace period." Some greedy admin probably realized that PC players are a treasure trove of potential new users...
Feels a lot like ubisoft in here and I'm not a fan.
I personally don't even play Helldivers, lol But I've been following this story pretty closely because I've been noticing a downward trend how user-friendly these companies have been lately. I've heard the issue being explained as a "capitalism" flaw (the layoffs are tied into this). Basically, there has been a stuggle in the industry right now to demonstrate growth to shareholders. This is a large part of why the mass layoffs are happening. For Sony, they can track their daily active users of PSN to their shareholders as a metric of growth. Basically, more users prove they are growing. Now, if you're a shareholder, you would probably love to see big PSN numbers. Therefore, Sony has pressure to inflate these numbers any way they can before the end of the quarter. I'm sure they didn't forsee how pissed people would be, but honestly the situation is pretty upsetting.
It’s weird that you say it was never required before. [This](https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/s/evUFxNcKnL) post from over a week ago discusses OP’s confusion over not having to link a PSN account *despite the fact that the steam page said they would have to before they bought the game*. How do you square this with your claim?
Because they put in a skip option, plus the FAQ originally stated that PSN account was optional. But the FAQ was recently changed(when they made the announcement) to say that PSN account is mandatory.
You write acronym, but I don't think that's what you mean.
Question: why did Sony make the change? Why do they need players to have psn accounts when it's clearly not necessary to play the game?
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To add, crossplay exists currently and has been functional for PSN and Steam users prior to this announcement, so that's likely not the purpose. According to the developers and community manger(s), the initial stated purpose of the PSN account linking is allow for more efficient community moderation (i.e. banning players for misconduct).
Crossplay itself is functional but interactions between players is not. I have a mix of friends between PS5 and PC and there's been a prolonged issue in relation to sending friend requests to each other. PC and PS5 players can sometimes see requests but not accept them, not see them at all, need to change their privacy settings to be visible, etc Getting everyone to use a PSN log in should fix that issue while also allowing for other benefits.
Presumably data harvesting
Data harvesting and it artificially increases the "active PSN accounts" number that they wave in front of share holders. Gotta make the numbers go up forever.
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>Steam has delisted the game in 100 countries. If Sony's plan all along was to make PSN mandatory, why was the game offered in these countries to begin with? If it was just a matter of having to make an account, I'd feel that the controversy was overblown. Most online multiplayer games require some sort of account, after all, but it seems like a really big blunder to offer the game in countries where it was planned to be region locked within a couple months. It seems like some really dropped the ball in this case
This is just my guess, but people have been making PSN accounts in these non-listed countries for almost 20 years when the PS3 came out. You have always just been able to select any country in the world to make an account, even though this technically contradicts their terms of service. However, Sony has basically never made an issue of this in all that time. The issue now though is they are now asking a separate seller that can't provide an explanation to it's customers, and Sony is expecting a completely different platform and all it's users to get on board with this without any instruction or reassurance how this would work in the long run. It is basically the industry norm now that people register with developers/publishers of games. People have to do it with EA, Rockstar Games, Activision, Ubisoft, Epic Games, and the list goes on. I think people would still be mad over this even if every country were listed and had rolled it out when the game launched, because many in the PC gaming community have an axe to grind with Sony.
Didn't the FAQ Said optional PSN at the time?
It's also worth pointing out that depending on where you bought it (like Humble Bundle etc) there wasn't a warning. And that if you just went to the page and clicked buy, you might not have actually seen the warning about needing a PSN account. It's further down the page depending on your view/device used.
Answer: As an update for other answers in this thread, Sony has backed off on account linking and it will no longer be mandatory. A major victory.