Helldivers 2 has seemingly shown signs of a third enemy faction showing up on the map, which some players noticed before they quickly vanished from sight.
The latest development suggests that players will soon have a new war to fight as The Illuminate faction could be coming to the game in the near future.
Talks of a new enemy attack began after some players observed strange behavior on the in-game Galactic War map.
Helldivers 2's Third Enemy Faction
This is where the circle layout usually only shows two factions, the Automatons and Terminids, and their progress as represented by red and orange colors. However, they then saw a third, purple color, gaining ground in the region.
One user on Reddit, Helldiver343, was among the first players to share their findings with the community and he posted a screenshot of the updated map before the changes "vanished." The image that the user posted suggests that a third enemy will soon be revealed, according to IGN.
However, despite the image, many players were quick to write off the speculations as coming from merely a glitch, mistake, or even a fake update to the map. Later, some people grew more suspicious when more reports of purple map progress began to surface.
For now, developer Arrowhead Game Studios is keeping silent about the strange new sightings in Helldivers 2, which is adding to the confusion across the community.
Another Reddit user, MoonlitSaiyan, said that they no longer "know what to believe" before an in-game message suggested that the studio was already aware of players' concerns.
The message used in-game lore and seemingly explained what happened to shed light on what players saw on the in-game map.
It said that some Helldivers may have noticed a recent server outage in the Major Order Communication Display, which it noted has been resolved, said Forbes.
Explaining the Issue
It also explained further the details of the issue, saying that the cause was organic tissue degradation on electronic equipment. The message said that Comms. Technician #R-2342 became stranded on a server farm and noted that his cause of death was "exposure."
The message is a typical cheeky response from Arrowhead Game Studios but it is currently impossible to know whether or not the studio is actually teasing The Illuminate's imminent arrival to Helldivers 2.
CEO Shams Jorjani went to social media to respond to reports of recent sightings of the third enemy faction, saying that it was simply "fake news."
However, this was something that Arrowhead Game Studios had done in the past shortly before the Terminids' arrival to the game, according to Eurogamer.
