Helldivers is the PC version of a popular PlayStation twin-stick shooter that just landed on Steam on Monday, and many gamers have taken exception to the amount of launch day DLC for the game - 14 in total for $2.99 each. Arrowhead’s CEO Johan Pilestedt has released a statement explaining it.
Pilestedt said in the missive to fans that the DLC was produced in the ten months following the PlayStation release of the title, and that it was the product of actually talking to the fans of the game. Much of it was the result of players telling them what they thought would be really cool.
”I realize that new PC players may look at the DLC and think that we produced it specifically for sale at launch, but that is wrong,” said Pilestedt in the statement addressed to fans. ”The DLC which PC players face at launch is an accumulation of work over the last ten months, all of which was produced after the launch of the game on PlayStation platforms – none of which was ever designed as a quick cash-grab. In fact, since release, the great majority of our time has been spent creating the free expansions.”
Pilestedt went on to say that Arrowhead has been and continues to be very transparent about where the money goes, and basically, most of the money goes towards paying employees and getting out the aforementioned free expansions.
In addition, the base game costs $19.99, but players can save over $20 by buying the deluxe version of the game for $39.99, which is quite reasonable since the DLC was all developed after the game’s original release and not before it.
