Now that we've had time to recover from accidentally electrocuting each other a trillion times in Magicka, let's move onto Arrowhead Studio's next game, Helldivers. The Sony platform exclusive is headed to us sometime this summer, so we might as well start working on those apology cards for blowing our buddies up every 15 seconds with a poorly timed grenade.
It's been a while since we've seen it, so why don't we take another gander at the announcement trailer.
Unlike Magicka's point-and-clicky playstyle, Helldivers is a dual joystick shooter. Run your Diver around with one stick, aim at fools with another. While each character starts off with a default loadout, they will offer some degree of customization as you progress through the game. The greatest departure from Magicka is in the level design. Instead of hand-crafted stages throughout your journey, Helldivers features an procedurally generated world and enemies, making exploring an area multiple times not feel like a drag.
The "Strategems" are abilities in which your Driver makes something handy drop from orbit. It could be ammo, it could be a turret, it could be new troops, or something else to shake up the flow of warfare. Given how fast-paced the games combat looks, these Strategems might be what your homies need to turn the tide of battle in their favor.
Helldivers looks a great deal more gamey than Magicka did, not that there's anything wrong with either. Magicka felt like an adventure game with light combat, where accidentally turning your buddies to mush was all part of that dumb but ultimately charming world. Helldivers looks like your commandos need to be constantly working together in order to not be consumed by the Martian threat.
Helldivers releases this summer, though no concrete date has been announced.