PlayStation’s Helldivers 2 has been one of 2024’s biggest video game success stories thus far, but is there any chance of the game coming to Xbox Series X/S?
The video game industry is in an awkward spot regarding exclusives. The rise of cloud streaming has chipped away at the idea of what constitutes a video game platform, and the shrinking margins of AAA titles have pushed many companies to find creative ways to monetize their biggest games. One of the most obvious avenues for making more money is to simply introduce a new game into more markets, particularly new platforms.
PC gaming has reaped the benefits with major franchises including Halo and God of War making their way to Steam, but things have gone a step further. Helldivers 2 was published by Sony Computer Entertainment, but saw a day-one release on both PlayStation 5 and PC. With Xbox releasing first-party titles to PlayStation platforms, fans have cause for hope that this might be a two-way street. But is this actually the case for Helldivers 2?
Will Helldivers 2 come out on Xbox Series X/S?
Helldivers 2 may come out on Xbox consoles, but likely not anytime soon.
The Xbox Era Podcast gave Xbox owners who want to champion Managed Democracy a glimmer of hope regarding the game.
“The rumor that I’ve heard is that there may be some very, very early…very early preliminary discussions about the possibility of Helldivers 2 coming to Xbox,” Nick Baker said on the April 20, 2024 episode of the show.
Helldivers 2 is uniquely positioned when it comes to being ported to Xbox. The title is one of the few live-service titles that has launched to an almost uniformly positive reaction from fans and critics, a genre of game that Sony has been actively looking to build up on PlayStation consoles. This applies to both its own development efforts, as well as the third-party titles it heavily promotes.
Unlike single-player games which are purchased and done, live-service titles are designed to wring money out of players indefinitely through battle passes and other microtransactions. Live-service games benefit from having sizable player bases and in theory, that provides an incentive for Sony to make it as accessible as possible. Most titles of this nature have seen a wide-ranging release, with recent examples including Skull and Bones and Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.
The trouble is that even if this is the case, it may not be enough to warrant an Xbox port.
Is Xbox becoming untenable for multi-platform releases?
Weak sales for both Xbox software and hardware have reportedly seen studios rethinking releases on the platform.
While Helldivers 2 would make more money through microtransactions with an Xbox Series X/S release, there’s no guarantee it would break even on the money it would take for Arrowhead Games to port it. According to GamesIndustry.biz, notable developers were lamenting the state of the Xbox platform such that multi-platform releases might opt to simply look toward PC, PlayStation, and Nintendo.
The hope for an Xbox-branded device that lets players help spread the gospel of Managed Democracy is a handheld PC rather than an actual console. The next piece of Xbox hardware may be a Nintendo Switch or Steam Deck competitor and if it’s Windows-powered and can run Steam, then it would very likely be able to run Helldivers 2. Given how this hardware isn’t even confirmed and how Baker suggests that Helldivers 2 is still in a very early stage of development, there’s no reason to think it will come out any time soon.
