Helldivers 2 has been growing in popularity ever since launch, which is both good news and bad news for developer Arrowhead Studios. While any developer out there would kill to have the player base that Helldivers 2 is currently enjoying, the unexpected explosion in popularity is currently too much for the game's servers to handle. It's forced the developers to implement a limit on how many players can log in at once, in hopes of steadying the ship while work on expanding the servers continues.
It's a good idea on paper, but there's one wrinkle in that plan, and that's the lack of AFK timers in Helldivers 2. Almost like the early days of MMOs such as Final Fantasy 14 and World of Warcraft, there are quite a few Helldivers 2 players refusing to log out at all, leaving their consoles or PCs running while they're sleeping or working in order to avoid potentially not being able to log back in when they next come to play.
Most online games boot players from the game if they're away from their console or PC for too long to stop this kind of behavior, but there are no systems in place in Helldivers 2, most likely because the developers didn't expect the amount of players the game has managed to amass. There are several reports of players admitting that they're staying logged in to avoid losing their spots on the servers, and it's causing players to call for AFK timers.
An image of several people on Discord is being shared around currently, including people claiming they've not logged off for days to avoid losing their spots or having to queue up again. With limited server space and quite a lot of people abusing the fact there are no AFk timers, you can see how tricky it might be for people to actually log in and get some game time.
Thankfully, Helldivers 2 creative director Johan Pilestedt has responded to calls for some kind of auto kick or AFK timer on Twitter, explaining that he has "already mentioned this to the team". There's no mention of when we'll possibly see a system implemented, and most of the work right now will likely be on improving the game's servers, so we'll probably have to put up with these people for now. All you can do right now is remember to log out when you're finished playing to let another new recruit spread democracy in the name of Super Earth.
