Dec 04, 2025 22:05:00

By switching from HDD optimization to SSD optimization, the amount of data for AAA games has been slimmed down from 154GB to 23GB.

While some of the biggest games in recent years have installation sizes of several hundred GB,

Arrowhead Game Studios has managed to significantly slim down the size of Helldivers 2 from 154 GB to 23 GB.

HELLDIVERS™ 2 - HELLDIVERS 2: Tech Blog #1 - Steam News
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/553850/view/543369627969783286

HELLDIVERS™ 2 - HELLDIVERS 2 Tech Blog #2 - Steam News

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/553850/view/491583942944621371

Helldivers 2 devs slash install size from 154GB to 23GB, thanks to the help of PC port veterans — ditching HDD optimization, 85% size reduction accomplished by de-duplicating game data | Tom's Hardware
https://www.tomshardware.com/video-games/pc-gaming/helldivers-2-install-size-slashed-from-154gb-to-just-23gb-85-percent-reduction-accomplished-by-de-duplicating-game-data-an-optimization-for-older-mechanical-hard-drives

Helldivers 2 was released in February 2024, and according to Arrowhead Game Studios, the PC version's install size was over 150GB as of October 2025, three times the size of the console version. Considering the game's content, the console version's size is appropriate, while the PC version's is too large.

Steam: HELLDIVERS™ 2
https://store.steampowered.com/app/553850/HELLDIVERS_2/

The cause of this is the support for HDDs. HDDs store data on a rotating disk, and an arm equipped with a read head moves over the disk to read the data. If it takes a long time for the arm to move to the location of the data, processing will be slow, so the developers tried to speed up reading by placing copies of data that is often needed, such as general tree textures and sound effects, in multiple locations.

However, with the spread of SSDs, which do not require physical reading, the need to 'keep multiple copies of data' has disappeared. The reason why the data size of the console version is appropriate is because it is optimized for SSDs and there are no unnecessary copies of data.

Arrowhead Game Studios worked with Nixxes , a game design and porting company, to reduce the data size, down from 154GB to 23GB, an approximately 85% reduction. In testing, the only negative impact was a few seconds longer mission load times for some users using HDDs.

The scaled-down version is said to be ready to be released as a public technical beta for early adopters.