During an online AMA, Johan Pilestedt, studio lead at Arrowhead Game Studios, said additional progression options for Helldivers 2 are high on the studio’s to-do list but gave no timeline for players to expect them.
Pilestedt framed the work as broad and ongoing: "There are multiple plans and discussions about improving the existing systems such as progression, weapon customisation, DSS, etc" — a list he said stretches beyond single, obvious fixes. He repeated that "progression is very systemic" and that it "touches rewards, resources, difficulty, player motivation, unlock pacing, balance, and long-term goals."
Those comments follow a year of promises from Arrowhead about meaningful progression changes and a visible turnaround in 2025 when the developer made Helldivers 2 much better to play after its technical state had been abysmal. Pilestedt said the team has already prioritized some work but that deeper systems still need attention: "one of the areas where Helldivers 2 has the most room to improve."
The stakes are concrete for players. The community has been asking for updates that give longer-term reasons to play; the majority of daily players, the studio acknowledges, have already grabbed the game’s upgrades. Pilestedt said players "want the game to deepen" and specifically called for "more meaningful reasons to keep playing beyond the next Warbond."
Pilestedt warned that the studio has sometimes been forced into trade-offs: novelty and new content have taken precedence at times over maturing existing systems. He admitted weapon-level options were intended to help fill the progression gap, but that they were shifted down the list: "Weapon Customization was deemed as ‘not as significant’ in resolving the lack of progression… but I personally think we just need more of it."
That choice helps explain another concrete example Pilestedt offered: Arrowhead has already created an ammo system for weapons, but it remains disabled because "balancing it would be hard." He called meaningful progression work slow and delicate: "meaningful progression takes time to get right and we are working on it."
The AMA filled in some of the contours but left the central scheduling question open. Pilestedt gave no roadmap and said plainly that there is "no timeline" for when players will be able to use the deeper level of customisation. When pressed about timing he added, in an informal turn, "yeah, sometime in the future."
The friction in the conversation was not reluctance to improve the game but the tension between promise and delivery. Arrowhead has said over the last year that it plans significant progression updates and has talked about folding sequel-level features into the live game. Players, however, face a cadence of Warbonds and shorter content drops that can feel faster than the fixes, polish and systemic improvements Pilestedt outlined — a gap he acknowledged matters to the community.
Pilestedt closed by turning the calendar into a measure of credibility: rebuild of trust, he said, depends on delivered change rather than words. "It is by action alone, over time, that clearly says that we are listening and acting in good faith," he said. That is the clearest schedule he offered: not dates, but a promise that progress will be judged by what players can play.
So will Helldivers 2 get the deeper progression players want? Yes — Arrowhead says plans are in motion — but no definite date was given; for now, players must wait for the studio to show its work and rebuild trust through concrete, visible updates.
