Hell divers 2 is a fun game, with great physical comedy that comes naturally from the robust, friendly fire mechanics. It’s also a challenging game that pits extremely spineless Helldivers with limited resources against endless waves of massive bugs. But few people talk about what it is like sometimes terrifying game thanks to the Automata.
On Monday, however, Helldivers rejoiced in a decisive and collective victory over the Automatons and their claimed territory. These Terminator-style robots are clearly designed to be evil. They patrol around, buzzing in binary code and surveying the land with glowing red eyes. If that’s not enough to convey “evil” in visual language, Arrowhead Game Studios has thoughtfully added skulls impaled on spikes attached to their exo-skeletons. The first reaction my primal brain has when seeing a vending machine is ‘NO’.
I didn’t think much more about it because my friends and I were too busy following Major Orders from Super Earth Command on the galactic map. We failed to free Tibit, fought for Malevelon Creek, and faced gunships on multiple planets. I always thought the robots were much rougher than insects, but I learned new strategies and it was very satisfying to drive the Automata off the galactic map for good. We all knew they would return because that’s how Arrowhead runs the game. We just thought it would take longer than two days.
Somehow the Automata returned.
As suspected all along, the previous Bot force was merely a vanguard. A massive fleet has now begun an attack on Cyberstan and the surrounding planets. Helldivers, stop this unprovoked invasion. The fight continues! pic.twitter.com/2DzEued7mm
— HELLDIVERS™ 2 (@heldivers2) April 9, 2024
Players were just getting back to fighting bugs when the Automatons suddenly showed up with a new fleet, leaving us with two new sectors to defend. They’re making a huge step towards Cyberstan, and the Helldivers are the only thing standing in their way. And the more time I spend fighting these guys, the more I realize that they are actually deeply, existentially scary.
If the player pays attention to dissident propaganda and reads between the lines of Major Orders, they will learn that the Automatons were created by the Cyborgs, an enemy faction from the first game who are enslaved in the mines of the former Cyborg capital Cyberstan . . The Automata are just trying to reclaim the city.
This moral complexity is not particularly surprising at the meta-level; Hell divers 2 is not subtle about Super Earth secretly being the bad guys. But it certainly changed my perspective…until I came across all the corpse desecration.
The Automata don’t just commit the necessary amount of murder; they go above and beyond. Their camps are littered with dismembered Helldivers and SEAF troops displayed as trophies. They’ve also built shrines to harvest brains – perhaps to fuel their endless conveyor belt of murder? Suddenly the Super Earth propaganda about them stealing children feels much more plausible.
Even if the worst case is true, and the Automata actually use human brains and nervous systems to create endless soldiers for their war, aren’t they at least somewhat justified? In some ways, as a player, I sympathize with the Automatons, but I can’t muster that same sympathy when I’m in the middle of a battle with them, facing tanks, missile destroyers, and gunships.
The Automata are back and I’m going to fight them (because I want my Major Order medals, thank you very much). But I don’t have a good feeling about it. In fact, deep in my bones I’m terrified.