Arrowhead Game Studios Deploys Easy Anti-Cheat, Players Flood Steam With Negatives

Arrowhead Game Studios deployed Easy Anti-Cheat in Helldivers 2, prompting a flood of negative Steam reviews that shows no sign of abating.

If you check the stats, the title recorded 728 negative versus 293 positive reviews in the past three days, a 71% negative ratio that dwarfs its early-stage reception.

Daily counts were modest through October 19, with 25 and 19 negative reviews on the last two days, until October 20 erupted with 1,667 negative reviews against 265 positives.

The surge persisted on October 21 with 1,282 negatives and 197 positives, and on October 22 still recorded 735 negatives versus 174 positives, confirming sustained backlash.

Players say Easy Anti-Cheat now blocks the game on unmodded installs.

One reviewer wrote, “Easy Anti-Cheat blocks the game on an unmodded install. No fix works.”

According to reviews, the update also ripped out mod support, forcing community-created quality-of-life fixes back into the developer’s hands.

Another reviewer lamented, “Cracking down on mods instead of fixing issues we have requested for two years is a real kick.”

Arrowhead’s own explanation, posted on Steam the morning of October 20, is that cheat mods had gone beyond single games, with the studio saying some players were “even going so far as to manipulate the war itself.” The only follow-up so far is hotfix 7.2.1 on October 22, which fixes a crash when players join or leave a squad and says nothing about mods.

Longstanding bugs such as stratagem ball bounce, Hellpod steering lock-ups, and inconsistent enemy collisions remain unpatched despite mods that had previously worked around them.

Players argue Arrowhead’s resources are spent policing cheats rather than polishing core gameplay, a strategy that erodes trust faster than any cheater could.

Deploying a cheat detector while killing mods is a textbook way to lose goodwill.

If you bought Helldivers 2 this week, players say you should expect it to refuse to launch with script mods installed, and what they want is simple: the anti-cheat fixed, mods back, and the long-standing bugs finally gone.

Steam reviews, day by day

Source: Helldivers 2 on Steam, user reviews, and Arrowhead’s announcements on Steam. Figures checked 2026-10-27 13:29 UTC.