While the likes of Fortnite and Call of Duty can collaborate with pretty much any celebrity, brand, or IP they want and come out the other side untroubled, for the majority of games, caution is required. A crossover needs to be cool or authentic enough to win players over, and even then, it needs to be sensibly priced and obtainable. With Helldivers 2’s new Killzone crossover, it nailed step one – the cosmetics look great and don’t feel totally out of place. Plus, the hankering for anything Killzone related is always strong, given we’ll probably never get a new game in the series. Step two, however, was a different story. As a result, it is now giving away the second wave of its Killzone collection for free.
I’ve seen plenty of egregious cosmetic monetization in my time – just take a look at the $250 gacha skins League of Legends is trying to push these days. In comparison, the Killzone cosmetics didn’t seem too bad initially – especially seeing as many Helldivers 2 players are used to paying for premium Warbonds. However, the community really didn’t like Arrowhead’s approach, claiming that the price of both batches of skins (which equates to about two premium Warbonds) was too high and that exciting crossover content like this should be cheaper. There were also concerns that Arrowhead was trying to whip up some FOMO, with the Killzone skins only being in the space game for a few days.
Having heard all the criticism, the developer has now announced that, after discussions with Killzone creators Guerrilla Games, it will be giving the second wave of cosmetics away for free to all Helldivers 2 players. The first wave is still purchasable for the price of one premium Warbond. Those freebies are being sent out to players today, December 19.
Arrowhead also says that the first batch is going to stay in the store for longer – instead of five days, it’ll now be there for ten. To further prevent that feeling of FOMO, it also says it’s “investigating solutions for how we can bring these items back permanently in the future.”
A new major order is also going live in Helldivers 2 which will allow players to earn the new W.A.S.P. stratagem.
“As this was our first crossover offering, we’ve been listening to the response, and the feedback we’ve received from our community surveys is that crossover content is really high up on your wishlists. At the same time, some of you are not happy with the prices of the items and we will revisit this,” Arrowhead says.
I really hope that we see more crossovers in Helldivers 2 – if they can strike the same tone (and look as great) as the Killzone skins, that is. However, it’s clear now that Arrowhead won’t be able to monetize them quite as hard as it originally anticipated. Whether that will affect the studio’s ability (and its desire) to scout out more collabs remains to be seen. Nevertheless, I’ve got my fingers crossed it can create some more compelling crossover content but avoid the controversy next time around.
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