Helldivers 2's Terminids can now officially fly

Good grief. Super Earth’s finest just can’t seem to catch a break, as players discover that Helldivers 2 now plays host to flying Terminid creatures, of all things. Indeed, following the recent hotfix, which made Chargers manageable, the developer Arrowhead appears to have snuck in a pretty big force multiplier.

This force multiplier takes the shape of huge, bat-winged Terminid creatures that live in towering mushroom-looking constructions, visible from pretty far out. To attack, the flying Terminids swoop down at Helldiver forces to turn them into shreds of long pork using their razor-sharp appendages.

It’s a whole thing, really, and it drastically changes the pace of missions where flying Terminids are found, as players now need to deal with threats from above as well as the ground-bound hordes of bugs. Arrowhead CEO Pilestedt, however, has been trying to refute the players’ reports by saying that “Bugs can’t fly.”

Well.

Helldivers 2 introduces a flying Terminid, despite what the Super Earth would have you think

The whole schtick is, of course, just another example of Arrowhead Studios’ approach to organic, player-driven storytelling. It is, perhaps, worth remembering that there’s a huge in-game operation ongoing at this time that has Helldivers activating a special Terminid suppression agent on select planets. The appearance of flying Terminid nests has definitely got nothing to do with that, we’re positive.

The presence of mushroom nests, of course, implies that players can deal with Terminid flyers in much the same way as they do with the invisible Stalker bugs. This is, indeed, the way to go from the looks of it, as nests can be splattered from afar using explosive implements and the like. Flyers do have a pretty long sightline from what we’ve seen in practice, however, and Helldivers should now keep one eye on the sky at all times: just in case.

Whereas Chargers, Bile Titans, and the like have been the Terminid’s most potent force multipliers up until now, it’s clear that this remarkably adaptive species has plenty more tricks up its proverbial sleeves. Sure, the Helldivers do get mechs now, but we’ll need way more than that to deal with all the other monsters Arrowhead Studios has in store for us down the line.

Helldivers veterans will know that the Terminid species is just one evolutionary step removed from the original game’s “Bugs,” following the Super Earth’s attempts to farm the creatures for their lifeblood, E-710. The appearance of flying Terminids is the biggest departure we’ve had yet from the original game’s roster of bugs and a clear signifier of the sort of leaps Arrowhead intends to make in elevating Helldivers 2 to all-new heights.