This Week in Helldivers 2 - Major Order Successfully...Failed?

Don't you just hate it when life throws you a curveball? In the case of Helldivers 2, its curveball comes in the form of a massive fleet of blade-wielding and laser-shooting robots that come back to attack and take over unsuspecting planets. But that's just the tip of this week's Galactic War iceberg.

There were plenty of other happenings over the past few days in the Sol System, including Super Earth higher-ups beaming over a new Warbond to spend your hard-earned medals on. That, along with a highly suspicious, now-deleted binary transmission that the Ministry of Truth calls "a minor systems fault." Yeah, right. But the truth, as they say, will out, so if you want to learn more about the latest intergalactic shenanigans in Helldivers 2, we've covered what you need to know here.

Represent Managed Democracy with the New Premium Warbond

Democratic Detonation, the latest Premium Warbond from Super Earth High Command, is filled with a handful of new armor sets, emotes, and weapons that'll help you flaunt your undying dedication to Managed Democracy even more.

Some of the new gear you can get include Light, Medium, and Heavy Armor offerings in the Demolition Specialist set, the Ground Breaker set, and the Devastator set, respectively. And, of course, no Warbond is complete without guns, and this one has a few you can unlock. Now, I'm partial to fast-firing Assault Rifles and Submachine Guns myself. But you can't always get what you want because this week's new weapons include a Marksman Rifle, an Exploding Crossbow, and a Grenade Pistol. Oh, and there's also a bolt-action Sniper Rifle that can apparently take down Automaton turret towers in two (!!) shots.

You can also expect a new Booster offering called Expert Extractor and another utility weapon option in the Thermite Grenade. However, delivering devastation to every corner of the Sol System can become boring if you can't celebrate it the right way. Luckily, there will also be more emotes arriving with this Warbond, including the Courtly Bow, Boxer, and Squat, the last of which I will personally be using whenever I can.

The Automatons are Back with a Vengeance

Last week's roaring Major Order success was a ruse. The true days of robot reckoning are upon us. With the unexpected return of the full Automaton force, Helldivers everywhere are now experiencing an intergalactic version of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, but with a horde of T-1000s to fight against.

This time, instead of being asked to liberate planets from the enemy's cold, unfeeling hands (which we managed to do successfully last time out), High Command has tasked Helldivers with the successful defense of at least five planets. Sadly, it isn't going all too well for the soldiers of Super Earth.

Although we've managed to protect some planets from Automaton attacks so far, the garrisons in other areas haven't fared as well. And with barely any time left to complete the task, it may only be a matter of time before we cede control of these sectors to the never-ending machine army.

Minor Systems Fault or Majorly Sinister Missive?

We previously mentioned how the Ministry of Truth (via the Helldivers 2 Twitter/X account) is seemingly attempting to cover up a very suspicious binary transmission by labeling it as a "minor systems fault." Luckily, one dedicated truthseeker was able to decode the message, which simply contained the question, "Where is Karl?"

Following this revelation, plenty of fan theories have predictably littered official channels, with some speculating that the Karl being referred to may be a Deep Rock Galactic reference and that a crossover could possibly be in the works. For those unfamiliar, Karl is described as "an unseen character" in Deep Rock Galactic lore, which gives the decoded "Where is Karl?" binary message some sense. Plus, Deep Rock Galactic developers revealed during a stream that they reached out to Arrowhead for a possible collaboration, making an as-yet-unconfirmed crossover even more likely.

Unfortunately, Arrowhead hasn't confirmed anything yet as of writing, so you'll need to take these details with an intergalactic helping of rock salt for now.