Cold shoulder.
The Helldivers 2 community has poured cold water all over the game's latest warbond, with more than two thirds of the community saying they'd prefer more patches to Polar Patriots, or that they simply don't like it at all.
As reported by GamesRadar, the stats derive from a poll ran on the Helldivers 2 discord, which asked "What do you think of Polar Patriots so far?" The poll offered five potential responses, ranging from "It's great!", through "It's ok, but I'd like fewer warbonds and more patches" all the way down to "I don't like it."
With more than 21,000 Discord users casting their votes, only 3% said they outright liked the warbond. 9% said they thought it was ok, but would like more content in each drop, and 14% reckoned the warbond doesn't really fit Helldivers 2's theme. A much larger portion of the voters – 27% said they'd prefer to see Arrowhead deliver more patches to the game and reduce the frequency of warbonds.
But nearly half of voters opted for a straight out "I don't like it" with more than 8,000 users giving Polar Patriots a frostbitten thumbs down. Clues as to why can be found in the Helldivers reddit, with users pointing out that despite the warbond's boreal themes, the set doesn't provide many advantages to using them in colder climates. "The fact the armour didn't come with better mobility in ice is so lame" wrote user Terrorknight141. "They had it in HD1 as a perk, they should have added it here." Indeed, user manubour points out that, while the Polar Patriots armour set has ice spikes on the boots, those spikes "do not make you not slip on ice in ice biomes".
It's an unfortunate turn of events, given studio previously asked the community whether they should release the warbond now, or wait until more time had passed following the recent PSN debacle. The community picked the first option, but it seems the warbond would have benefited from more time in the tank for different reasons.
Indeed, there's a sense that Arrowhead is pushing too hard and too fast on updating Helldivers 2. Fraser wrote about his struggles to keep up with its constant changes and additions a while back, while the studio has also become increasingly obsessive about balance in the last few weeks, sometimes to the detriment of fun. With the latest warbond proving a disappointment, perhaps the studio will ensure future updates prioritise meaning over frequency.
