Helldivers 2 Devs Comment on Installation Size and Load Times

Helldivers 2’s technical director has spoken about the game’s installation size and load times in a new blog post.

Arrowhead Game Studios previously discussed Helldivers 2’s game size reduction a few weeks ago, when the CEO stated that they had “escalated the priority” of this issue. Now, the developers have provided a comprehensive blog post that discusses the problems they face with Helldivers 2’s installation size and how they plan to address them.

Data Duplication and HDDs Are the Biggest Problems for Helldivers 2’s Installation Size

Through a new blog post on Steam, the developers addressed the game’s installation size. Helldivers 2 is 150GB on PC, which is three times the file size on consoles. The reason for that is data duplication, as the game has been optimised for older storage media (HDDs). Due to this, the developer deliberately duplicates specific files, such as common tree textures and sound effects, so that the storage media can access them quickly when loading the game.

The developers understand that the need for data duplication has largely disappeared with the advent of SSDs, as their ‘seek time’ is virtually nonexistent. However, the bigger problem is that HDD is a part of Helldivers 2’s minimum requirements, and according to Arrowhead’s best estimates, around 12% of PC players use this storage medium. However, they don’t have the exact number, which makes it difficult to realise how many players will be impacted when reducing the duplicated data.

Devs Talk About Solutions for Helldivers 2 Installation Size

The developers have outlined short-, mid-, and long-term solutions for Helldivers 2’s installation size. For the short term, the developers are looking at sweeping their “systems for unused assets and obvious problems” in the next update; however, the changes won’t be visible. After the next update, they will look at “worst offenders in terms of duplication and de-duplicating them by putting them in “very common assets” bundles which will always be loaded under set conditions (eg, specific faction/biome).”

In the long term, the developers will work towards making improvements to the engine, ensuring that we never waste RAM loading common data that isn’t needed. On top of that, they have a “bigger, riskier, more speculative project where we apply some kind of compression to the game data and potentially replicate some of the de-duplication we do on consoles.” The developers are also considering making the highest-resolution textures an optional download to help address the issue.