We're still waiting to find out what the next title from Helldivers 2 dev Arrowhead Game Studios will be, and it sounds like the studio itself is still working that out too. Sadly, it seems we won't be getting a sequel to Magicka, the game that put Arrowhead on the map, this time around. It's not that chief creative officer Johan Pilestedt doesn't want to do it – he's just a little afraid to.
Today, Pilestedt offered a heartfelt "thank you" to the entire Helldivers community for being so kind to all the new players coming in with the game's Xbox launch, echoing similar comments from CEO Shams Jorjani earlier this week. As part of that post, he also mentioned that he's overseeing "direction of the next game" in his current role.
That prompted one fan to ask whether "Magicka 3D" is next. "I wish I could make it at some point," Pilestedt responded, "but Magicka scares me.... it was made by the founders group in a time where we basically lived together... and all the jokes are derived thereof. I would like to do it at some point though."
Magicka was a bit of a cult hit when it first launched in 2011, and much of its DNA is still alive in Helldivers 2. It's an isometric co-op game very much dedicated to making you live with the consequences of friendly fire. You combine elements into spells, similar to how you input Helldivers 2 Stratagems, and a big part of the fun is experimenting to see what all the different combinations can do.
We already got a Magicka 2 in 2015, but that was developed by a separate studio known as Pieces Interactive under publisher Paradox. (Sadly, Pieces Interactive shut down last year after the tepid response to its Alone in the Dark reboot.) The idea of "Magicka 3D" would probably be similar to the jump from Helldivers to Helldivers 2, turning an isometric game into a full 3D title with a much more expansive scope. But whatever Arrowhead's next game is, I'm sure a little bit of the original Magicka's spirit will live on within it.
Helldivers 2 studio CEO says Arrowhead's eventual next game will start pre-production with a smaller team: "HD2 started with a big team and that was baaaaad."
