Arrowhead Game Studios and PlayStation Studios today announced that the fight for democracy continues in Helldivers 2’s first major content update, Escalation of Freedom.
The struggle to save democracy will take the battle to new fronts and against new enemies in a variety of new ways come August 6. Helldivers 2 has been out for six months now and developer Arrowhead Game Studios is ready to drop the first major content update. So many citizens have answered Super Earth’s call to arms, and now all citizens are being called upon to answer a new challenge in the Escalation of Freedom.
Review: Helldivers II
Does Helldivers II provide enough fun experiences to keep players coming back to fight for liberty, or is Super Earth doomed from the start?
Dialing up the difficulty
As the title of the content update suggests, Escalation of Freedom is escalating the difficulty to provide players more challenge. Combat Rating 10: Super Helldive aims to deliver the most challenging dives yet for experienced divers. In addition to increased intensity on the battlefield, completing these super difficult dives results in greater rewards. Of course, you’ll need to unlock access to the Super Helldive difficulty by completing earlier missions.
To add more variety, several new mission objectives and larger enemy outposts arrive with the update that’ll add new Super Sample rewards and make unlocking higher Combat Rating missions less tedious. All these new missions will be available for earlier difficulty levels.
Things are about to get a bit swampy
The swamp biome is getting a massive makeover in this update. Expect to see rolling fog and trees so tall they obscure light from the sun and moon. Dangerous flora and acid storms cause adverse effects to both you and your enemy. Of course, a new biome isn’t complete without a host of new enemies to watch out for.
Joining the Terminid ranks is the Impaler. A popular enemy from the original Helldivers, this Terminid utilizes tentacles to trap players and prevent them from escaping. Also joining the ranks are the Spore Charger who utilizes fog to hide its location from players, and Alpha Commander, a Brood Commander that is far more vicious than a standard commander. Over on the Automaton side, players will have to deal with the Rocket Tank.
A push to end griefing
Helldivers 2: Escalation of Freedom launches with a slew of quality of life changes with the most prominent being an attempt to curb team kicking aimed at griefing others. To help curb this, Arrowhead has implemented a system that allows kicked players to spawn into a new session and collect all the loot from their previous session. The team doing the kicking will receive a message saying that loot remains unchanged. Arrowhead hopes this change encourages players to cooperate more and grief less.
Helldivers 2: Escalation of Freedom launches August 6 as a free update for all owners of Helldivers 2 on PS5 and PC.
