Helldivers 2 dev threatens to make the hardest difficulties even harder: "I think we might have some things in store for the players who coast through everything"

An offhand comment from one of Helldivers 2's no-doubt exhausted community managers has struck fear into the hearts of players who are already struggling with the game's highest difficulties (read: me). It sounds like the game may crank things even higher for the truly masochistic divers out there.

Ironically, this discussion was kickstarted by chatter over the bugged, updated, and now soon-to-be-reverted spawn rates for enemy patrols. As developer Arrowhead moves to revert a change that accidentally buried solo players and small squads in enemy groups meant for four players, one player in the official Discord server proposed saving the unintentionally high spawn rates "for Difficulty 10," which doesn't actually exist right now since missions cap at grade nine.  

Community manager Twinbeard, presumably after ominously cracking his knuckles before unleashing his fingers on the keys, responded: "I think we might have some things in store for the 1337 players who just coast through everything as well. Alas, my lips are sealed." 

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If a dev is breaking out leet speak, something's up. What that something is, and when it may arrive, is anyone's guess at this stage. Arrowhead likely has other priorities at the moment – lingering PSN clarification, 17 known gameplay issues, catching up to 12 million sales – but it does sound like even more punishing gameplay options are on the to-do list. For now, we can only speculate. Even denser enemy packs? New mission modifiers? Robot bugs? Environmental hazards surpassing even fire tornadoes – like fire tornadoes with sharks? 

Helldivers 2 led one of PlayStation's most active periods "in history," second only to the COVID stay-at-home boom.