Video Games

Helldivers 2’s spicy Eagle 1 propaganda is confusing players

Is infidelity to democracy treason?

Marco Wutz

Arrowhead / Sony

Super Earth’s Ministry of Truth sometimes makes its own job more difficult as the propaganda it puts out opens up more questions in the heads of Helldivers 2 players than it answers. Take this recent, rather spicy post showcasing an attractive Eagle 1 pilot, for example. Obviously, having attractive women on propaganda posters is perfectly on-brand and we can easily imagine similar posters hanging on the walls of Super Earth outposts or Super Destroyers.

What’s confusing players, though, is the text added to the image: “Eyes up and focused on the mission, Helldivers. She's married to Democracy, and Liberty is her boyfriend.”

This is bringing up some questions in the minds of Helldivers that may be worrying to democracy officers everywhere in the galaxy, such as: “Isn’t infidelity to democracy treason?” And if it isn’t – is polyamory the patriotic thing to do? Good luck explaining that one, Ministry of Truth.

Dropping the kayfabe for a moment, this is another small and yet potent reminder of Arrowhead being fantastic at satirizing fascist propaganda. You have the hot pilot, you have the inspiring pose, you have the usual buzzwords, and you combine them in the most ridiculous way possible, contradicting other parts of the dogma. You also know that the usual crowd, who can’t separate the game’s roleplaying from reality, will be utterly confused by this.

With that out of the way, let’s get to the really important question: Is this rendition by artist Spirit now canon thanks to being reposted by the official account? 

Hard to say – it might be the “official” propaganda version of what an Eagle 1 pilot looks like, but as is the case with all propaganda, reality is something else entirely. Which essentially just means: Imagine the lady dropping bombs on your enemies however you want to imagine her. For all we know, it could be a dude using a voice changer to bolster the ground troops’ morale.

Anyway, speaking of hot subjects: Arrowhead promised to take a look at fire damage in future updates.

Published
Marco Wutz
MARCO WUTZ

Marco Wutz is a writer from Parkstetten, Germany. He has a degree in Ancient History and a particular love for real-time and turn-based strategy games like StarCraft, Age of Empires, Total War, Age of Wonders, Crusader Kings, and Civilization as well as a soft spot for Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail. He began covering StarCraft 2 as a writer in 2011 for the largest German community around the game and hosted a live tournament on a stage at gamescom 2014 before he went on to work for Bonjwa, one of the country's biggest Twitch channels. He branched out to write in English in 2015 by joining tl.net, the global center of the StarCraft scene run by Team Liquid, which was nominated as the Best Coverage Website of the Year at the Esports Industry Awards in 2017. He worked as a translator on The Crusader Stands Watch, a biography in memory of Dennis "INTERNETHULK" Hawelka, and provided live coverage of many StarCraft 2 events on the social channels of tl.net as well as DreamHack, the world's largest gaming festival. From there, he transitioned into writing about the games industry in general after his graduation, joining GLHF, a content agency specializing in video games coverage for media partners across the globe, in 2021. He has also written for NGL.ONE, kicker, ComputerBild, USA Today's ForTheWin, The Sun, Men's Journal, and Parade. Email: marco.wutz@glhf.gg

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