Helldivers 2 to get 'biggest update yet' - everything you need to know

Arrowhead Game Studios, the developer behind third-person multiplayer shooter Helldivers 2, has announced the "biggest update yet" for its hit game on PlayStation and PC.

Helldivers 2 is the fastest selling PlayStation game of all time, shifting 12 million copies in its first 12 weeks and it continues to be pretty popular among its fanbase.

Arrowhead continues to update its live service shooter and the new update called Escalation of Freedom, releasing August 6, is its "biggest yet".

Katherine Baskin, social media and community manager at Arrowhead, said: "We've watched our forces expertly handle every conflict and challenge we've thrown their way, from flying enemies to the Terminid Control System, to saving the children of Super Citizen Anne's Hospital.

"Now for this major update, it's time for us to give back something big to the community and welcome in even more players to the Helldivers universe."

Here's everything you need to know.

Is there a new combat rating?

There is indeed a brand new, harder combat rating - the previous hardest difficulty was nine but developer Arrowhead has put it up another one to 10 called 'CR 10: Super Helldive'.

It's described as the "most challenging, most relentless dive difficulty level yet".

The harder difficulty has better rewards for players who can best it.

Are there new mission types?

Arrowhead has added a bigger range of mission types for players after hearing feedback about wanting a bigger variety.

These are available on a number of different difficulty levels.

Are there new enemies?

There are a number of new enemies in the update, including the Impaler; he's described as the "big guy from the original Helldivers" who "creates some new challenges".

A Spore Charger is being added which shrouds itself in fog to obscure its location until it's right there.

There's also a Terminid Alpha Commander, which is a supercharged Brood Commander that's bigger, meaner and calls in other bugs for backup.

With the Automatons, there's a new Rocket Tank along with mysterious "bot surprises".

The swamps are being made spookier too.

Is 'grief kicking' being fixed?

Yes, it is. This new update tackles a problem that's plagued players since launch where some are using team kicking to grief others.

Baskin said: "To help improve this we have implemented a system where if a player is kicked, they will spawn into a new session as the host with all of the team's loot from their previous session. All items can now be picked up by the player before extraction. The squad doing the kicking will see a message in the chat widget that a player has been kicked, yet their loot remains unchanged.

"With these changes, all players have the opportunity to leave with all loot collected on mission, with no one Helldiver losing out. We're committed to making changes that will improve the player experience and encourage healthy, cooperative gameplay."

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