Helldivers 2’s first major update cranks up the difficulty

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Helldivers 2 — Escalation of Freedom Announcement Trailer | PS5 & PC Games

Helldivers 2 has received a bunch of updates since it launched in February, but developer Arrowhead Game Studios is about to release its biggest yet. The studio announced Tuesday that the upcoming update, Escalation of Freedom, will launch on August 6 and seeks to add more challenges.

One of the top changes is the new difficulty. Now players can move from difficulty 9 to 10, which will be the toughest in the game. It’ll come with the usual difficulty scaling, such as more enemies and tougher enemy types, but you can also get new rewards, including Super Samples.

And for people who don’t want to go to what is essentially nightmare mode, fear not: There are plenty of new enemies that will surely kill you over and over again. First, is the Impaler, a Terminid enemy from the first Helldivers that comes up from underground to block your movement or attack you with its tentacles. Then there’s the Spore Charger, which will charge at you from a constant cloak of fog that surrounds it. There’s also the Terminid Alpha Commander, which is basically a bigger, more terrifying Brood Commander.

The Automatons haven’t been ignored here, and have enlisted new Rocket Tanks that can fire rockets into the air for a helldiver barrage. And knowing Arrowhead, there are way more enemies they haven’t announced yet.

Beyond just enemies, Arrowhead has introduced a new eerie swamp biome that features rain that can reduce armor on both helldivers and enemies, along with a new objective that requires you to escort a crying larva in a backpack that can attract more enemies.

In the one advertised change that doesn’t make the game more difficult, there’s a new system that the developers hope will help with grief kicking. Instead of just being booted back to your ship, the kicked player will spawn in a new session with all the team’s loot, and the team that did the kicking won’t lose anything either.

Helldivers 2 has been