Recent reviews by Cherry Cheshire

DO NOT BUY! I repeat DO. NOT. BUY.

Update:
As of 2024-05-10 Sony added 3 more countries to the purchase restricted list. Their message on social media about dropping the mandatory PSN link has been a ruse to get people to shift their opinion and stop the bad reviews.
Bad number go down, good number go up, we happy, we continue our ways
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Sony forced the developer to make linking to a PSN account mandatory after 3 months of release, hoping to boost their numbers by feeding off the game's success like a parasite. Their response to public backlash was to double down and de-list and block the game in 177 (!!!) countries, making people that bought the game prior unable to play. Their corporate greed has led them to destroy a great game, and potentially a great studio.

Arrowhead Studios urges all Helldivers to save managed democracy by leaving negative reviews so they have more leverage to use against Sony to undo this change.

Ok disclaimer: I -REALLY- enjoy this game, despite it's flaws. It's got potential to be a great game, we just have to be a little patient to get the field-test to yield some good results.

Despite all of the things mentioned below i have enjoyed this game very much and still am enjoying it a lot. Please Please PLEASE be patient with these people. I really want them to go on and work out all the kinks, support them and help them fix it so it can become a sim even veteran studios will be jealous of. And as we all have NO way of seeing how their bosses and publishers were treating and handling them we as a crowd could be at least a little bit nicer right? For all we know the game was scheduled June 2019 and the company said "No, september!".

I played mainly using the Kamaz and Renault Sherpa trucks, but i did catch a couple of things.
That said, there is quite a bit that could use improvements and many of them have been mentioned before.

+ I love that they included trucks, i really hope more teams manage to send their vehicle specifications for them to add.
+ They tried something new, whichever way you put it and no matter how much ♥♥♥♥ you give them. They went out there and just did it.
+ The little information that goes along with the drivers, nice to learn some about them.
+ I like the music.
+ Vehicles look great.
+ Rookie and Competitor mode are GREAT learning tools.
+ FIA roadbooks, i dream of someday driving a rally raid myself in real life. This is a nice way to learn.
+ Legend difficulty, maybe once the game is more polished this could have an addition that you can't restart races and withdrawal means restarting from stage 1.

- Trucks go -WAY- past their noted top-speed, managed to get both trucks at 187kph on flat surface without decline. Their top speeds are 165 for Kamaz and 140 for Renault.
- AI is not that skilled at the game, you can often find them running into things and having troubles with vehicle controls.
- AI seems to be popping in and out of existence at random, might be the LOD setting but it's a little unsettling to overtake a MAZ and then seeing one pop in a few Km's in front of you.
- Damage system is very basic, there's no such thing as a tire puncture and instead of elements breaking it's more of a wear and tear percentage.
- Repairing between stages is OP, if i were to trash my truck to have everything at 3% there is no chance in life the mechanics can fix that up.
- Very unclear damage mechanic, some dips trash you while a 400m drop from a dune is fine.
- Small poles, Flags (finish, start, 30km checkpoint), chainlink fences, signs are immovable and godlike strength objects. You crash, you trash.
- I have a feeling the scale of the stages changes in between, the estimation of 500m differs from time to time.
- Very impatient navigator, especially when exiting the vehicle to apply recovery boards.
- Navigator could use some more work, sometimes not understanding i don't get up a certain dune and have to retry a few times or go around. Sometimes only speaking a couple 100m after i triggered a waypoint, and other times right as i should turn.
- Online is broken, unplayable. Crashing every time a race ended / loaded the next stage and telling me i didnt finish the race when i was spectating.
- Steering wheel issues, i had to figure out a workaround in order to get my old G25 working or playable at least.
- Physics are wonky. Trucks feel way too light and bouncy and when getting stuck in the mud they jostle around like mad
- Truck hitboxes extend past the body on the sides.
- Could use some more competitor in-game. I understand there's a lack of teams in the truck department, but usually you can also encounter the slower competitor from other classes.
- Framerate drops, graphical glitches, poor LOD popping.

Again, i love this game. Dakar 2019 will be pre-order as well whenever it hits!