In a shakeup following the massive debacle Arrowhead Games faced last month regarding PSN account linking, they’ve appointed a new CEO and announced Helldivers 2 updates would slow down.
In a move that shakes up the leadership at Arrowhead Games, founder and former CEO Johan Pilestedt has stepped down to become the Chief Creative Officer and Chairman. Former Paradox Interactive executive Shams Jorjani will take up the reins as CEO, freeing up Pilestedt to focus on the development side of things.
In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Pilestedt and Jorjani explained the new pecking order on the Arrowhead Games masthead, and they both appear to be on the same page. Johan first explains the issues with being the developers of PlayStation’s fastest-selling game of all time, saying, “With Helldivers, we made the strong decision that we’re not going to go with the status quo. We’re going to place ourselves outside of that by making a lot of mechanics that are generally not seen in games,” regarding the decision to keep friendly fire on. Dealing with these mechanics becomes player accountability, he explains.
Pilestedt believes outside-of-the-box thinking is what allows Helldivers 2 to succeed, and while the success has been huge for Arrowhead Games, Pilestedt realized he had to take a more developmental approach and have someone like Shams Jorjani come in to take over the business side of things.
Jorjani echoed Pilestedt’s statements, saying, “The goal of the studio is to make really great co-op games. We really want to turn Arrowhead into a flagship studio, where people who want to make these kinds of games say to themselves, ‘I want to work at Arrowhead.’ When we were growing up, we really wanted to work at Blizzard; it was one of the bucket list places to work. I think Arrowhead has the potential to be that.”
It’s worth mentioning Arrowhead Games has also dropped the news today on fellow Helldivers 2 players, updates will start to come in more infrequently. PCGamer reports that following patches and updates for Helldivers 2 (including new warbonds) will drop at a slower rate. Community manager Thomas Petersson who posts on the community Discord as Twinbeard, said the next patch will come “when it’s done”. He then went on to clarify that a slower cadence of updates, releases and patches will be beneficial to the developer and the game.
So while leadership has changed at Arrowhead Games, it appears the studio is still on the same page. Pilestedt says, “The humbleness and the desire to just make great games is the only reason we exist.”
