Once again, a lot has happened inHelldivers 2in just a few short days. This weekend, we completed a Major Order but failed another, got hints that new enemies and weapons are on the way, were given everybody’s new favourite gun, and discovered a game crashing, snowball-related bug. Also, a player made an app that allows you to monitor the war’s progress and play Stratagem Hero, and the Joel impostor has revealed himself. Strap in, soldiers.
Goodbye Tibit
Tragedy has struck. While we were able to liberate Ubanea despite the Automaton incursion on Draupnir, time has run out for us to liberate Tibit as well, meaning we’ve failed Phase 2 of Operation Swift Disassembly and lost all the medals that would have come with its success.
I go into how exactly this failure happened and its implications on the efficacy of Major Ordershere. We don’t know how this will impact the war effort, but it’s clear that Game Master Joel’s decision to throw a spanner in the works of the operation will have dire consequences. We just don’t know quite what yet.
Look! Up In The Sky! It’s A Bird! It’s A Plane! It’s… Automatons.
Upon completion of the first phase of Operation Swift Disassembly, an in-game notice told us that Super Earth Command found a transmission with blueprints for a new type of Automaton: aerial gunships. Fret not, Super Earth factories are now accelerating production of anti-air weapons.
We haven’t seen robot planes yet, but it seems they’re on the horizon (ha). Once again, Arrowhead is prompting us to change up our playstyles and accommodate for the possibility of fire raining from the air.As if killing bots wasn’t hard enough already.
Quasar Cannon Supremacy
Just last week, Arrowhead CEO Johan Pilestedt mentioned a Heavy Machine Gun that had been removed from the game just hours after it first released. Naturally, I took this as a sign that the weapon would be coming back shortly, and I was right. In the midst of the furious fights on the Automaton front, Arrowhead released two new support weapons perfect for killing bots: theMG-101 Heavy Machine Gunand theLAS-99 Quasar Cannon. Snakes.
The Quasar Cannon has made a particular impression on players. The weapon charges up huge blasts and shoots massive bolts of energy about as strong as an anti-tank rocket. As a laser weapon, it has unlimited ammo, but also sports a 480 second-long cooldown and it takes a while to charge up shots. The shots move fast and have infinite range. You can see it as an incredibly powerful sniper weapon, capable of taking down heavily armoured enemies and dropships, and perfect for destroying bug holes and fabricators. Players are hailing it as a godsend, but it’s not really that OP – the long cooldown and charge time can leave you exposed. The weapon costs 7,500 slips and is unlockable at level 18.
Snowball Fights Are Anti-Democracy
Fun fact:you can have snowball fights in Helldivers 2. Another fun fact: doing so right now will probably crash your game.
This feature has existed for a while and has largely slipped under the radar, but now that it’s a known bug, players are learning for the first time that this is something they can actually do. And soon after, players learned that they should not do it, at least not until the developers have a fix.
The Galactic War, Now On Your iPhone
A playerdeveloped an appfor iOS devices that monitors the status of the Galactic War and lets you practise Stratagem Hero, while you’re at it. CalledWar Monitor for Helldivers 2, you’re able to download it from the App Store and keep an eye on the war effort from your PC, iPhone, and even your Apple Watch.
Considering there’s no official way to keep track of what’s going on in the game without booting it up, this could be a very useful tool for hardcore Helldivers who want to keep their fingers on the pulse, or who just want to get really, really good at using Stratagems without having to look at the input sequence.It looks dope on the Apple Watch, by the way.
As a side note, another dedicated player is coming for my job andarchiving the entire Galactic Warthrough daily YouTube videos. Talk about dedication!
The Joel Impostor, Unmasked
In a great show of investigative journalism, PC Gamer staff writer Morgan Parktracked down the Joel Impostorfrom last week and asked him what his deal was. It turns out it was just promotion for the player’s boosting business, and they hadn’t expected it to go viral or even be clipped. Boosting, or hiring players to carry you through progression systems with skill or cheats, is fairly common in gaming, especially PvP games. This particular player does so with cheats that grant unlimited ammo, extra health, max damage and increased speed.
I can’t imagine this would help much in Helldivers 2, though. Sure, you can farm Super Credits, experience, and samples to unlock things faster, but as Park reports, the major pull is that it saves time for players unwilling to play as much as they need to to unlock Stratagems, ship upgrades, and Super Credits organically. But damage doesn’t scale with level increases, so you end up with tons of gear and likely a lingering skill issue. I still think it’s more fun to play the game as it was meant to be played andengage with it in a normal, healthy way, but sure.
Helldivers 2
Helldivers 2 is the sequel to the third-person shooter from Arrowhead Game Studios. This time out, the Helldivers are deep in the Galactic War, and it’s up to you to bring Managed Democracy to the masses.
