Arrowhead Game Studios previously stated that potential Helldivers 3 hopefully years and years from now since the developer is mainly focused on extension and support Helldivers 2 as long as people are interested in it. CEO and creative director Johan Pilestedt even hinted The thought is that Helldivers 2 could one day turn into Helldivers 3, and now we have some idea of what that will look like.
When asked about the “sequel-level features” he'd like to see in the game before it's ready to escalate into a proper sequel, in a very low-key conversation with the studio, Pilestedt said that “there's actually quite a few, and I think the community has a pretty good handle on where they want the game to go, given a sort of sequel-style approach to it.”
“Eight-player missions will be one of them,” continued Arrowhead's director of operations. “Large open world maps where you might meet other Helldiver teams to tackle bigger challenges together. Operations that impact other teams will also have this level of functionality.”
In fact, Pilestedt explains that the sequel-level features are pretty much everything that “really highlights the Galactic War and the scale of the conflict that players are involved in.” Large maps with more divers (and possibly more bugs/bots/squid) are definitely one way to do this. And rather than abandon Helldivers 2 and immediately build Helldivers 3 from scratch, getting major updates with features like the ones above seems ideal.
Pilestedt didn't give a timeline for when we can expect said changes in the size of the sequel (or even if – this wasn't an official confirmation of eight-player missions, mind you), but the next four arcs of the game are already being discussed.
