The votes have now been counted, and what could be more democratic than Helldivers 2 being presented with the prestigious Console Game of the Year title at the Golden Joystick Awards 2024.

Helldivers 2 follows the managed democracy of Super Earth, as it sends out endless waves of troops to drop from orbit onto surrounding planets and protect their interests from all enemy threats. By fighting off the Terminid bugs and robot Automatons, players can watch the battlefield evolving in real time on their maps of the Second Galactic War.

In 2024 the Game of the Year categories for PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo have been combined under a unified Console Game of the Year heading, where Helldivers 2 had to fend off solid challenges from Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, and the other Golden Joystick Awards 2024 nominees in this section as follows:

• Astro Bot
• Dragon’s Dogma 2
• Final Fantasy VII Rebirth
• Helldivers 2 (winner)
• Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown
• The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

Initially players weren’t sure what to expect from a sequel almost a decade after the original top-down shooter launched, but as word spread it quickly rocketed to become Sony’s fastest-selling title ever, shifting 12 million copies in just 12 weeks and meaning there were already more Helldivers enlisted online than Swedes in developer Arrowhead Game Studios’ home country.

In our Helldivers 2 review back in February we praised it as a “fiercely challenging and visually breathtaking cooperative shooter where failure is funny and success feels magnificent,” while acknowledging that launch instabilities and server issues did initially frustrate.

While those have been largely resolved, the evolving battlefield continues to throw out new challenges, and it’s hard to tell if the recent situation where the new Democracy Space Station is killing so many Helldivers that the devs are giving out free shields and extra lives is actually parody or a genuinely unforeseen consequence of bombarding the planet you’re currently fighting on with friendly fire. With no end to the Galactic War in sight, and increasing rumors of third faction the Helldivers 2 Illuminate joining the battle in the future, there’s plenty more fighting to be done in the name of managing democracy.