This would make sense if it was a studio without experience, and without any external help, but their publisher is Sony Interactive Entertainment, which also provides development help when needed, especially optimizations and especially for PS hardware. SIE seems to have been deeply involved with Helldivers 2, doubling the budget and doubling the total development time. Obviously it was a good choice by SIE, it paid off, and of course there is always 100s of more important tasks to do before launching a game, but your comment reads like these sort of problems were to be expected because the team started out small and inexperienced or something.
Sony also published No Man's Sky.
I'm not sure having the support of Sony is that gold-standard imprint that people think it is.
>but your comment reads like these sort of problems were to be expected because the team started out small and inexperienced or something.
More or less nothing is optimized these days, and game prices and budgets have gone through the roof. Compared to the other games available these days (combined with how fun the game is) I definitely give HD2 a big pass on a lot of stuff. I'm honestly skeptical of Sony's involvement being a benefit, but that's mostly due to my experience regarding their attempts to stuff a PSN ID requirement into HD2 as well as their general handling of their IPs. (Horizon Zero Dawn is not only terrible, but they seem to try to force interest with a new remake on a monthly basis.)