Almost every element of Helldivers 2 is dripping with satire. The voice lines, story, and even individual armor pieces parody patriotism while telling a story of what could happen if corrupt governmental systems ran amuck. Well, everything except the music.
"It's jingoism, but it's amplified with uplifting modern synth productions, and without suggesting any nuance other than the valor of the soldiers' fight," said Helldivers 2 composer Wilbert Roget, II during a talk at Game Developers Conference 2025 in San Francisco. "The satire works because the music believes it's a pure patriotic love without irony or criticism."
Roget dove into the techniques and thought processes behind his musical work in Helldivers 2, breaking down how he created music for each alien race, the extraction theme, and other songs from throughout the game. He spoke on his approach to scoring Call of Duty: World War 2, where his goals were to establish the World War 2 setting while conveying the emotion the protagonists felt as real people experiencing the fear and adrenaline of war—a dichotomy he called the memory of war and the reality of war.
- The United Nations asked Helldivers 2 studio Arrowhead if it'd give a talk on psychological manipulation: ‘Could we brainwash an entire community to fight for a fascist state? … Would we be okay with that? Turns out, yeah’
- Helldivers 2 CCO Johan Pilestedt says the industry's got it backwards by putting features over fundamentals: 'We talk way too little about the core philosophy'
"The sequence transition from the top-down camera [in Helldivers 1] to the over-the-shoulder camera and close up angle [in Helldivers 2] gave us the opportunity to simulate the life of an individual soldier," Roget said. "Helldivers 2 incorporated even more over-the-top jingoism in the world design, environment, art, and even the dialogue. So I adapted the memory of war concept into what I might call Super Patriotism."
This methodology led to several songs within Helldivers 2 sounding like they would fit within any dramatic retelling of World War 2 with the nationalism cranked up to eleven. Roget mentioned how Ode to Liberty, for example, pays homage to military films scored by Jeremy Goldsmith, like Patton.
Roget is a veteran composer of videogames and more, having served as a staff composer at LucasAarts on projects like Star Wars: The Old Republic and Star Wars: First Assault before going independent. Recently, he composed the music for Helldivers 2, Star Wars: Outlaws, Mortal Kombat 1, and Call of Duty: WW2.
The other half of Roget's approach, dubbed reality of war, communicates the horrors of actually being a Helldiver. He emphasized that the personal experience of each soldier was filled with unimaginable horrors—swarms of gigantic bug creatures, bloodthirsty robots, and squid-like humanoid aliens. The music had to reflect the intense emotions felt by soldiers while fighting those enemies.
"Combat against automatons is more strategic as their enemy architects all have guns of their own," Roget said, adding that he needed the music to sound completely different from the visceral horror inspired by the Termanid music. "Eventually, I just started stomping around my apartment while pretending to be a giant robot."
Roget's stomping, combined with metal clang percussion, pitched metals, granularized factory noise, prepared piano rhythm, and other elements became the musical backdrop for the Automaton Legion.
Roget's third priority was to represent the fun players are meant to be having while mowing down aliens—something he called the fun of war.He mentioned that the extraction theme, No Diver Left Behind, was the game's way of communicating that players had earned the right to hear the superpatriotic music again. Players actually have to make it out alive to hear much of the extraction theme, and once they do the song reinforces the idea that these soldiers sincerely believe that the war they are fighting is good and necessary.
"While the story and dialogue are clearly satirical, the music of Helldivers 2 takes a sincere stance," Roget said. "It depicts a terrifying war against some unfathomable alien enemies, and when paired with the ruthless difficulty of gameplay, the goal is for players to completely lose themselves in the fiction, becoming a part of something bigger than themselves. So the music attempts to be as authentic and sophisticated as possible without judging."
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
