Helldivers 2 has been delisted on Steam in countries where PSN isn't available

[Naiad]

The thing that surprised me the most:

Antarctica has Steam players? And Antarctica has its own national flag?

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Flag of Antarctica - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It's not an official flag since it's not a country and not governed by any kind of authority. However, it's considered a de facto condominium, governed by parties to the Antarctic Treaty System that have consulting status. The icon shown represents the "True South" flag designed and proposed by Evan Townsend. It's been adopted by non-profits, research teams, and a few National Antarctic programs and was used as the 2022 marker for the geographic South Pole.

 

[RaySpencer]

You all have EA accounts, Ubisoft accounts, Rockstar accounts, Activision accounts, Blizzard accounts, Microsoft accounts, Valve accounts.....but a PSN account was apparently the hill you want to die on.

 

[Xando]

What a completely avoidable mess. Could've probably avoided 95% of the complaints and kept everyone involved by making PSN sign ins optional and offering some kind of cosmetic ingame benefit for signing up.

 

[blueredandgold]

Giant Bomb sent them a perfectly functional N64 and copy of Donkey Kong 64. That should still be keeping 'em busy.

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Not if it's NTSC region and not PAL it won't!

Fair. In my mind and impression, it's usually the only place where scientific research is always conducted.

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I was having a little joke it's all good I was gonna do the emoji ;)

 

[dom]

If it is Valve, is it to get around the refunds?

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I don't think it's valve but I do think it also has to do with refunds.
Now there's a hard stance on who should be eligible or not.

 

[HardRojo]

Doing these changes and working during the weekend certainly is a choice.

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The bank I work for just fucked up duplicating charges made in the last few days and I'm working right now on the messaging strategy between all digital channels lol, tonight ain't looking pretty for sure.

 

[A.J.]

They already are a true global gaming brand.
But they have a lot to learn about PC gaming. For example, never ever make this PSN thing optional again. It doesn't matter how bad the server issues are.

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Yeah, I agree with that at least

 

[AshenOne]

People on Reddit seemingly think this move could actually be coming from... Valve?

It's the top comment over there.

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It is not. Valve is hands off with these situations. They do not interfere with dev branches.
This is the developer making changes on behalf of the company.

 

[ThatOneGuy831]

Congrats Sony, you took your most successful GAAS game to date and are gonna burn it down to the ground on PC over an unnecessary thing like linking an account. launcher.

Edit: Forgot its just linking an account. still a dumb thing to double down on for a game thats been out for as long as HD2

 

[delete12345]

Flag of Antarctica - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It's not an official flag since it's not a country and not governed by any kind of authority. However, it's considered a de facto condominium, governed by parties to the Antarctic Treaty System that have consulting status. The icon shown represents the "True South" flag designed and proposed by Evan Townsend. It's been adopted by non-profits, research teams, and a few National Antarctic programs and was used as the 2022 marker for the geographic South Pole.

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Ahhh, I learned something new.

 

[Willin]

Why would Valve do this? This isn't the first controversial game on Steam, and Valve never delisted a game before.

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Most games don't get this amount of negative publicity.

 

[Jaded Alyx]

Let's check and see what Sony thinks about your claim that they can create PSN accounts:

Helldivers 2 has been delisted on Steam in countries where PSN isn't available

EDIT: Removed the image because it included Japan, but it seems this package was always restriced there. They have a seperate one: https://steamdb.info/sub/906469/ Please feel free to correct me if there is a misunderstanding on my side. You can still see the list down below in the change log...

www.resetera.com

Seems pretty definitive to me given that it's Sony themselves.

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I'm confused. Your link goes to the OP in this thread?

As I said, I am in a country in that list. I literally have a PSN account. I created it while living here. It's not an account for this country but one for the USA, that I've used for years. What are you not understanding?

 

[Red Kong XIX]

If it is Valve, is it to get around the refunds?

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For the listed countries, almost certainly.

Why would Valve do this? This isn't the first controversial game on Steam, and Valve never delisted a game before.

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One indication why I could see it being Valve is the inclusion of Puerto Rico in the delisting. You actually can create a PSN account there, but you have to select United States as country and then select it from the States/Territories.

 

[Jbone115]

This is one of those times that the term "anti-consumer" is actually accurate.

 

[RaySpencer]

Congrats Sony, you took your most successful GAAS game to date and are gonna burn it down to the ground on PC over an unnecessary launcher.

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Not a launcher, just linking an account. Like lots of other games.

 

[Watchtower]

This does feel like Steam's move over Sony requesting it. This move is in Steam's best interest, they don't want people buying a game they can't play then request a refund. Might as well stop the bleeding.

Sony should have accounted for this before the game released, and this is now the consequences of that.

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Yeah a lot of this really does feel more like it's coming from Steam than it is from Sony. It needs to be stated over and over that Sony has never given a shit about off-region accounts before, and in fact they actually recommend using a nearby region if yours isn't officially supported. But the internet has been saying "If you're not in a supported country you can't make a PSN account" nonstop for the last couple days and Steam is hearing that and is trying to cover their ass, ironically enforcing Sony's TOS harder than Sony ever has. Legit wouldn't surprise me if Steam just took a list of countries with PSN regions and banned all the ones that don't, given how...sloppy/rushed it comes out.

But none of that detail means anything. Perception is reality. If the perception is Sony has a ban on off-region accounts then Sony now has a ban on off-region accounts whether they like it or not - Steam if anything is being pre-emptive by delisting it outright rather than allowing people to waltz into said ban. If enough people believe it to be true then it becomes true. And so Sony now has an obligation to revoke this ban.

It is for a lot of GAAS games, but usually you actually gain something from it, it isn't just a one sided transaction designed specifically to pump up a network's numbers.

Like with Fortnite (and many other games), for instance, your Epic account facilitates cross platform progression and purchase crossover. Cyberpunk enables cross platform save transfer that way. Lots of games do it these days.

What do you get for linking your PSN in Helldivers?

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Presumably the benefits for Helldivers would also be cross-play and cross-progression, like however many other games do this.

Yes the game already has cross-play but with no account linking enforced Arrowhead's likely doing something more custom to facilitate that...which probably explains in part why it can be surprisingly janky relative to its contemporaries at times. Account linking would at least leverage the same kind of infrastructure link every other game's using.

 

[Spacejaws]

I wouldn't say no complaints, you should have seen some of the transparent fanboy shit that people were posting on GAF (and here) in reaction to mandated XBL logins. Not quite the same, and it never got this bad, but whew boy, I still remember some of those posts for how mindbogglingly fanboyish they got.

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Actually can't remember but I was kind of out of the gaming loop at that time for a few years stuck with offline PC games but I can absolutely imagine the fervor around it so I said no complaints now haha I'm sure a few blood vessels were ruptured over it in the past.

 

[Rowsdower]

The subreddit is tearing itself to pieces.

 

[romey]

Expecting a complete 180 by Monday.

 

[ragolliangatan]

This is such a PR clusterfuck for Sony

 

[Duxxy3]

Holy shit what a huge disaster this became. One of the biggest successes of the year to a big, self inflicted, negative.

 

[Res]

Hopefully those in regions without psn get full refunds

 

[gundamkyoukai]

Yep should have never backed down on this and people wouldn't have thought twice about it.

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Seem like being nice to dev and letting them do this did not work out for Sony .
Next time Sony won't be so hand off like arrowhead ceo said they were for there other games.

 

[TSM]

I'm confused. Your link goes to the OP in this thread?

As I said, I am in a country in that list. I literally have a PSN account. I created it while living here. It's not an account for this country but one for the USA, that I've used for years. What are you not understanding?

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Yes, you have an account for someone residing in the US. Now how about one for a resident of your country whom you claim can create accounts? Residents of your country literally can't create PSN accounts.

 

[Rowsdower]

This is such a PR clusterfuck for Sony

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They are not new to these waters lol

 

[asmith906]

This might be the dumbest thing I've ever seen. So people who bought the game simply won't be able to play it anymore? Am I understanding this right.

 

[St. Elmo's Fire]

The subreddit is tearing itself to pieces.

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😂

 

[DanarchyReigns]

Woooow. I was so sure that Sony would walk this back on Monday.
Instead they're going full steam ahead into a canyon.
My condolences to the people in effected countries that were enjoying Helldivers 2.

 

[ABK281]

Call of Duty, Red Dead, GTA, Battlefield, Apex, Ghosts of Tsushima Legends, Division, etc.

I'm not saying its everything, but account link and/or launchers are pretty common in the multiplayer space from publishers.

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I'll be honest, I don't count Ubisoft's games as everybody should know what they're getting into with those, they literally even make you use their launcher, or at least used to. Haven't played one in years. GTA and Red Dead of course would be covered under MP3 as it's the same garbage I assume.

The thing is, for better or worse, most publishers you're mentioning have had a presence on PC for a long time and even have a method of buying the game directly through them. I've played Call of Duty on PC but that was literally through Battlenet which I've had an account through forever, EA has also has had a presence on PC since even before Origin if I recall properly, and Origin is already old. Ghost of Tsushima is the same as this game of course.

What relevance does Sony have to the PC space outside of releasing a few games on it recently? Ubisoft for example at least has their reasons for wanting you to use their terrible app that they support and invested money into. Sony is forcing people to make a PSN account for the fuck of it.

 

[Jbone115]

Seem like being nice to dev and letting them do this did not work out for Sony .
Next time Sony won't be so hand off like arrowhead ceo said they were for there other games.

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Helldivers 2 has probably made more money for Sony than almost any PS5 game - I think it's fair to say it has "worked out."

 

[sazz]

Yes, you have an account for someone residing in the US. Now how about one for a resident of your country whom you claim can create accounts? Residents of your country literally can't create accounts.

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you can create a psn account no matter what country you are in, you just have to link it to a different countries address if psn isn't available in your country

I have a New Zealand account while never having stepped foot in the place

 

[cowbanana]

Sony stabbing their own eyes out while screaming "MAAAAUUUUUUUU!"

 

[IIFloodyII]

Lol this just get more and more stupid. Once Sony realized that a lot of regions can't even make a legit account they should just have made it optional and offer some free shit if you link it, most (including those in the countries that don't have PSN support) probably would have linked up regardless, now they just don't have any option. Great success I guess.

 

[jerf]

daaaamn

It's like Sony wants it to fail. Just nix it and take the successful live service game. Make the PSN shit a boon (like a free Cape or some shit)

 

[St. Elmo's Fire]

This might be the dumbest thing I've ever seen. So people who bought the game simply won't be able to play it anymore? Am I understanding this right.

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They can create a PSN account and keep playing.
Or they can request a refund and get their money back.

 

[Mr.Adele]

Yikes, hopefully people think twice before supporting Sony's next GaaS on Steam. And I bet they will.

 

[Cloud-Hidden]

You all have EA accounts, Ubisoft accounts, Rockstar accounts, Activision accounts, Blizzard accounts, Microsoft accounts, Valve accounts.....but a PSN account was apparently the hill you want to die on.

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It's truly baffling. Looking at Twitter you'd swear this was a matter of life or death importance. The craving for outrage is borderline pathological.

 

[hushk]

I just corrected your claim that people in those countries 'literally can't create PSN accounts'. They can, just not for their own country.

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I'm sure the scummy company who literally went back and changed text in the ToS will gladly help users who break it when they need support.

How anyone can defend this shit is unreal to me (but not surprising).

 

[Spacejaws]

Seems pretty definitive to me given that it's Sony themselves.

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This is clearly not enforced, I've not read over the ToS but have had multiple accounts in different countries going back to the PS3. Currently I used my Hong Kong account quite a bit and I have my USA account for games not released in PAL like Xenogears and I'm in the UK.

Would agree the TOS should get updated if its not enforced but not sure of other legal requirements. Sony might need to have it stipulated you aren't supposed to use other regional accounts for some kind of legal compliance but doesn't actually crack down on it which is good enough for me.

 

[Htown]

You all have EA accounts, Ubisoft accounts, Rockstar accounts, Activision accounts, Blizzard accounts, Microsoft accounts, Valve accounts.....but a PSN account was apparently the hill you want to die on.

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Are you under the impression that people like needing to have all those different accounts?

 

[Red Kong XIX]

It is not. Valve is hands off with these situations. They do not interfere with dev branches.
This is the developer making changes on behalf of the company.

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I also have a hard time believing it honestly. But on the other hand, I genuinely think just sitting it out would have been the best solution from Sony's standpoint PR-wise. I guess now they have to comment on it, so we will have a official statement soon enough.

 

[AshenOne]

This might be the dumbest thing I've ever seen. So people who bought the game simply won't be able to play it anymore? Am I understanding this right.

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No they will be able to. This change is just to stop future purchases from these countries and could just be a temporary change until they figure out a permanent solution.

I also have a hard time believing it honestly. But on the other hand, I genuinely think just sitting it out would have been the best solution from Sony's standpoint PR-wise. I guess now they have to comment on it, so we will have a official statement soon enough.

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I just told you how things work on Steam on the Dev side.

These are dev branches or Steam pages being handled by the Company making or publishing the game. These changes are not made by Valve, the owner of Steam. They 100% put this responsibility on the ones handling the games.

They are totally hands off with how the game is sold on Steam. Even when allowing refunds, it probably requires the permission of the ones making/handing the game.

 

[TSM]

you can create a psn account no matter what country you are in, you just have to link it to a different countries address if psn isn't available in your country

I have a New Zealand account while never having stepped foot in the place

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People can create accounts where ever they want, but residents of a country can't if Sony doesn't offer PSN services there. The list of countries in the OP is a list of countries where residents can't create PSN accounts.

 

[ArrogantBastard]

I'll be honest, I don't count Ubisoft's games as everybody should know what they're getting into with those, they literally even make you use their launcher, or at least used to. Haven't played one in years. GTA and Red Dead of course would be covered under MP3 as it's the same garbage I assume.

The thing is, for better or worse, most publishers you're mentioning have had a presence on PC for a long time and even have a method of buying the game directly through them. I've played Call of Duty on PC but that was literally through Battlenet which I've had an account through forever, EA has also has had a presence on PC since even before Origin if I recall properly, and Origin is already old. Ghost of Tsushima is the same as this game of course.

What relevance does Sony have to the PC space outside of releasing a few games on it recently? Ubisoft for example at least has their reasons for wanting you to use their terrible app that they support and invested money into. Sony is forcing people to make a PSN account for the fuck of it.

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Look, I don't want to go in circles on this: Requiring an account link to a publisher is pretty standard, we can argue over how standard but I don't consider it that shocking at all.

So much so that when I bought Helldivers 2 I didn't remotely even think about the problem. I scanned the QR code and forgot about it as did A LOT of others. Sony has every right to require an account link to play their games on PC, it isn't that controversial.

As more and more MS games head over to PS you better believe they will require Xbox Live link.

 

[Precious Tritium]

I'd guess this is a Steam thing. Arrowhead put a date on the change. And the only thing that's happened since then is people starting to request refunds on Steam.

 

[B.O.O.M.]

Sony stabbing their own eyes out while screaming "MAAAAUUUUUUUU!"

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You have been posting non stop about this but I don't think even you believe the nonsense you are posting. People have repeatedly highlighted how this is such a non issue overblown by whiny group of gamers that is assuredly a tiny portion of the overall game's players.

Devs fucked up. Arrowhead handled the situation terribly and in an attempt to hide their own incompetence and PR disaster they threw their business partner and the people who actually owns the IP Helldivers under the bus. None of this would have happened if Arrowhead fixed their shit with the PSN account link earlier than waiting for months to do it and go 'whoops it's not us we swear!'

I genuinely feel bad for players who are impacted that had no actual input on this from regions where PSN is not offered. It sucks.

 

[toppa]

The cod boycott meme gotcha remains really disingenuous. On steam people playing games show before those who aren't in a group. So yes the first 3 pages had people playing Call of Duty but it went on for 50 something. The series collapsed on pc for years

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Fine. Any boycott in the video game space, really.

 

[Exposure]

There is absolutely no way Valve does anything to a major company's game without their approval lmao

Like one of the most notable things about how Valve handles Steam is how they don't use their position to try forcing stuff on companies too much unless it's about something very, very blatantly fraudulent (and they generally still take a few days to be really sure about that before pulling the trigger on obvious scam games), they're not about to suddenly change their tune now.

 

[Eriol]

Nobody has the tought this move is because if theyre enforcing the psn, still having up the game available to buy on those regions could case more issues?

 

[Rowsdower]

At this point all parties are at fault here. Sony, Arrowhead, and "the gamers". It's a shitshow from everyone.