The Illuminate may be gone for now, but the Galactic War rages on in Helldivers 2. After stopping the Meridian singularity in its tracks, the newest major orders have redirected the community’s gaze to the automaton and terminid fronts, which had fallen to the wayside in the wake of the ongoing story surrounding the Illuminate’s return and the black hole that apparently brought them back to the known galaxy. Of course, it’s obvious the faction will return, and likely with greater numbers/more units, but for now there are other major orders to focus on.
One of the most recent major orders, however, has been plagued by something of a game-breaking bug. There have been a few of these so far, which is understandable. Helldivers 2 was never anticipated to be the juggernaut it turned out to be and the staff at Arrowhead needed to pivot to meet higher than expected demand. And to the team’s credit, these bugs are usually sorted out fairly quickly. But when the bug causes the planet involved in the major order to vanish from the galactic map, handwaving it away becomes a little trickier. Unless the developers get clever and write the bug into the game’s ongoing story.
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Helldivers 2 Should Use the Major Order Big as an Opportunity to Destory Tien Kwan
Destroying Tien Kwan Gives the Illuminate Another Door to the Galaxy
Before the Illuminate were driven from the galactic map, a major order required players to deploy heavily on the planet Tien Kwan, but the operation encountered significant issues. Every time players made an attempt to start missions on the planet, the game would crash. This obviously turned the major order into a major issue and the order was impossible to fulfill for a short time before getting fixed by the developers. This was a bit of an embarrassing moment for Arrowhead, but the studio has the chance to cheekily reference the bug from an in-universe perspective.
The developers are no strangers to this, often sending out in-game messages writing off glitches or bugs as the enemies of democracy sabotaging Super Earth’s logistics systems. It’s all in good fun, in keeping with the satirical nature of the game's world and played mostly for laughs. But this presents a great opportunity to both address the glitch in a good-natured way, while also foreshadowing the inevitable return of the Illuminate.
Arrowhead should lean into the glitch, straight up removing Tien Kwan from the galaxy entirely. The Meridia story line the team has been building up over the last few months proves that the developers are not afraid of taking planets off the board. Eschew the cheekiness of previous references and just have the planet’s disappearance play into the evolving narrative. The Illuminate made their return to the galaxy through the Meridian Singularity. That black hole is just about neutralized as a threat after several major orders focused around it. It only makes sense that, for the squids to make their inevitable reappearance, another planet is destroyed and a new black hole is created.
The Automatons Destorying Tien Kwan Can Remind the Community of the Threat They Pose
The destruction of Tien Kwan presents another unique opportunity because of its location on the automaton front. All the planets that have been destroyed thus far have been on the terminid side of the map. Due to the ongoing focus on Meridia and the initial Illuminate invasion, the bots have fallen a little to the wayside in the eyes of the community. And truthfully, it makes sense given that they’ve always been the least popular faction to fight, with player counts on automaton planets only ever reaching significant numbers when a major order is directing the community there.
Having the automatons destroy Tien Kwan and give the Illuminate another channel into the galaxy would not only be a cheeky way to reference the bug, but it could also give the automatons a newfound narrative importance after the months they’ve spent by the relative wayside. The bots are a whopping ⅓ of the overall threats in the game, and it’s high time they started giving the community some Malevelon Creek flashbacks.
Helldivers 2
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 83 /100 Critics Rec: 91%
- Released
- February 8, 2024
- ESRB
- Mature 17+ / Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, In-Game Purchases, Users Interact
- Developer(s)
- Arrowhead Game Studios, Nixxes
- Publisher(s)
- Sony Interactive Entertainment, PlayStation Publishing
WHERE TO PLAY
The Galaxy’s Last Line of Offence. Enlist in the Helldivers and join the fight for freedom across a hostile galaxy in a fast, frantic, and ferocious third-person shooter.
URGENT BROADCAST – SUPER EARTH ARMED FORCES
Freedom. Peace. Democracy. Your Super Earth-born rights. The key pillars of our civilization. Of our very existence. But the war rages on. And everything is once again under threat.
Join the greatest military force the galaxy has ever seen and make this a safe and free place to live.
BECOME A LEGEND
You will be assembled into squads of up to four Helldivers and assigned strategic missions. Watch each other’s back – friendly fire is an unfortunate certainty of war, but victory without teamwork is impossible.
LOADOUTS
Rain down freedom from above, sneak through enemy territory, or grit your teeth and charge head-first into the jaws of combat. How you deliver liberty is your choice; you’ll have access to a wide array of explosive firepower, life-saving armor and battle-changing stratagems… the jewel in every Helldiver’s arsenal.
REQUISITION
Super Earth recognises your hard work with valuable Requisition. Use it to access different rewards that benefit you, your squad, your destroyer ship and our overall war effort.
THREATS
Everything on every planet wants you dead. That’s what we’re dealing with. Each enemy has distinct and unpredictable characteristics, tactics, and behavior – but they all fight ferociously and without fear or morality.
THE GALACTIC WAR
Capturing enemy planets, defending against invasions, and completing missions will contribute to our overall effort. This war will be won or lost depending on the actions of everyone involved.
We stand together, or we fall apart.
- Engine
- bitsquid
- Multiplayer
- Online Co-Op
- Cross-Platform Play
- All platforms
- Franchise
- Helldivers
- Number of Players
- 1-4 players (online)
- Genre(s)
- Third-Person Shooter, Extraction Shooter, Action, Science Fiction
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, PC
- OpenCritic Rating
- Strong
