Sony Pulls Helldivers 2 from Steam in 170 Countries

Soly has recently pulled the new Helldivers 2 from Steam in more than 170 countries that do now offer access to the  PlayStation Network to its users.

On Friday, Sony announced that everyone playing the game on PC would need to link their game to an active PlayStation network account or they’d lose their access to the game. While linking the PC version to the PSN had been optional since the game’s launch, it was not a requirement.

According to Sony, linking is necessary to help developer Arrowhead Game Studio and Sony crack down on bad actors in the online game.

With that being said, this announcement has pretty much led to the game being pulled from the Steam store in countries where PSN is not an option. PSN is presently only available in 90+ countries.

Steam’s parent company Valve has reportedly decided to offer refunds to its customers in the affected regions, even if they have played the game for some time now. In the past Steam only offered refunds for games that had only been played for two hours or less.

The move, especially those refunds, is likely to be a huge blow to Sony. Helldivers 2 was released earlier this year and is one of PlayStation’s all-time greatest sellers, thanks in large part to the PC version of the game.

As of May 1st, the game was one of Arrowhead’s best-selling premium games of 2024 and it was Sony’s seventh highest-grossing game ever in terms of lifetime sales and it had only been on the market for just a couple of months.