Helldivers 2 players have been having a rough go of it lately, falling short of a few major orders, but things look to be swinging back in their favor. This past weekend, the community managed to rally despite the innumerable odds against them and completed a major order. Their reward? An ominous black hole where a planet used to be…
If you go to Meridia, the previously embattled planet that was a Terminid supercolony until a few days ago, there’s no longer really a world there. Instead, you’ll now find a world-shaped black hole. You know how players hated Hellmire so much they wanted to outright glass the whole thing? Well, I think Helldivers 2 players have mastered the art of manifesting and leveled a planet, and it’s as awe-inspiring as it is deeply unsettling.
Over the weekend, the Helldivers 2 community began to notice that Meridia looked very different after the completion of the major order to pump the planet for “dark fluid.” One player managed to document the very moment that the major order was completed, showing how the planet was outright erased from the galactic map and replaced by the current anomaly. Funnily, they can be heard muttering “oh shit” as the change occurs before their eyes. Another simply posted their character staring into the void and asking, “What in liberty’s name did we just do?”
Some have recorded themselves looking into the void, and if you stick around long enough, it apparently makes some appropriately weird sounds. But the single biggest thing happening right now is the theorycrafting. One theory, which seems to hold particular credence due to an in-game line, suggests that Super Earth just tasked the Helldivers 2 community to tap a planet that was a source for warp fuel. Things might’ve gone too far and we might have opened up a giant wormhole instead.
Naturally, this has led the community to posit that the Illuminate, a third enemy faction from the original Helldivers, is set to arrive in the game imminently. I could believe it. This is the first consequential event to happen in Helldivers 2 in a long while, and it does feel like at some point, the galactic war story needs to pick things back up. What better way to do so than a new enemy and a three-pronged war effort?
The major order, and subsequent black hole-ification of Meridia, has accomplished something that Helldivers 2 has struggled with of late: it’s created a moment that unites its players in awe. Already, some are bemoaning the fact that they missed out on the in-game event, and I’m sure those players are now doubling down on being around for the next one. When Helldivers 2 hits, it still hits better than most live-service games on the market right now, and if its developers at Arrowhead can just keep that momentum going, the team could restore its good name after a turbulent period.
Regardless of whatever does or doesn’t come out of that thing, it’s safe to say that Helldivers 2 players may be about to reap whatever the hell it is that they sowed down on Meridia. From the look and sound of it, it ain’t gonna be pretty.