Helldivers 2 was almost a free-to-play game, could've changed Sony's live service trajectory

Helldivers 2 could have had a very different effect on Sony's business as a free-to-play game.

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In a recent Discord post, Arrowhead CEO Shams Jorjani revealed some interesting details about Helldivers 2's development. The game was originally set to be a PS5 launch title (it ended up shipping four years later). Helldivers 2 was also a free-to-play title at one point, Jorjani says, before it switched back to a paid product. This offers a glimpse into a very different PlayStation live service model.

"[Helldivers II] started as a AA game, grew in scope, then pivoted to a launch title for PS5, then pivoted to F2P, then back to premium," the studio lead said in a post addressing the game's performance issues.

This little tidbit shows that Sony was floating the idea of releasing free-to-play live games at some point, possibly during the early Fortnite boom days (a big reason why Sony is even trying to make games like Concord or Helldivers 2 is because they saw first-hand how much money Fortnite was making on PlayStation).

Back in 2022, I published an opinion piece explaining why I thought Sony's live service games should be free-to-play and not require PlayStation Plus in order to play online. The reason was simple: Sony would reach a much wider audience this way.

It turns out Sony has other plans, and is trying to create a new type of live service game that mixes F2P microtransaction practices with the kind of premium content found in AAA games. It's a take on Bungie's model with Destiny 2, but applied more broadly to a portfolio of games. The result is Helldivers 2 being sold for $40 (and Concord, too, before it was delisted).

If Sony had gone with the F2P route, there's no telling where they'd be now earnings-wise...but the products themselves would have much different earnings implications for Sony's games division.

It's also been confirmed that Sony's next major live game, Bungie's new extraction shooter Marathon, will also be a premium-priced product.