Don't be fooled by a fake Joel: Helldivers 2's game master probably didn't drop an unreleased vehicle into a random player's game, but someone did

pcgamer.com:

The Helldivers 2 community took the latest in a series of surprised gasps this weekend when a video emerged purporting to show Arrowhead game master Joel joining a random player's game, dropping an unreleased vehicle onto the battlefield, and then leaving so he can «get back to work.»

After Joel's departure, the remaining players are able to hop into the vehicle and drive around. The clip, shared by a fan account on Twitter that reposts other people's Helldivers 2 content, has racked up over a million eyeballs in 24 hours.

While it'd be on-brand for Arrowhead to reveal a major new feature by making something randomly appear for players, unfortunately, that's probably not what's happening here. Judging by what we already know about vehicles in Helldivers 2, and what little we know about Arrowhead's mysterious dungeon master, it's much more likely that we're dealing with a Joel impersonator who should be reported to the Ministry of Truth.

The fact is that the «Joel» in the viral clip could be anybody. A quick Steam search reveals several accounts currently (or previously) named "[AH] Joel" who've also played Helldivers 2 recently. Any of these Joel imposters could be among the group of players that's been spawning unreleased vehicles into unsuspecting Helldivers 2 lobbies for nearly a month. It's believed that they're gaining access to the APC seen in the video, as well as a faster buggy vehicle and a few unreleased weapons, through cheat software. The same thing happened with mechs weeks before they were officially released.

So what seems more likely: that Joel himself dropped in to personally deliver the first official Helldivers 2 APC, or that someone with cheats installed was having a bit of fun?

«Joel: Please take this»WHAT?!!#Helldivers2 #HelldiversII pic.twitter.com/zoOSpd1I57March 24, 2024

We can't categorically rule out that Arrowhead's shadowy string-puller isn't at work here or won't pull a similar stunt in the future, but it's telling that the official