Sony has announced that new players of Helldivers 2 on PC will have to link their PlayStation Network account to Steam to play the game starting May 6. For those who already have the game, the deadline is June 4.

In its announcement in the game’s Steam community, Sony said that PSN tethering was planned since the game’s release. Due to technical problems with the game’s servers, the link was optional for a long time, but now that the problems have been resolved, it is necessary to protect players.

For those who don’t have a PSN account, Sony left a link to the registration form and added that it’s not difficult at all.

“Account linking plays a critical role in protecting our players and upholding the values of safety and security provided on PlayStation and PlayStation Studios games. This is our main way to protect players from griefing and abuse by enabling the banning of players that engage in that type of behaviour. It also allows those players that have been banned the right to appeal,” Sony said in a statement.

Johan Pilestedt, CEO of Arrowhead, has not yet commented on this change, although he is usually quite verbose.

On Steam, the game has already received over 3000 negative reviews in less than a day since the news was announced.

Updated: Sony has officially stopped selling Helldivers 2 in countries where the PlayStation Network service does not work.