‘They talk like we’re actually soldiers’

It took GantztheDemon 10 days to be able to play Helldivers 2 again. On Feb. 21, TikTok user AJGaming shared a video featuring Gantz killing them. The sequence went viral overnight, garnering 4.8 million views as of this writing. A subsection of the Helldivers 2 community, hung up on the politically charged satire theme of the online shooter, labeled the player as a “traitor” and began inciting others to shoot on sight. Alongside dozens of TikToks campaigning for a witch hunt, Gantz’s PlayStation account was temporarily banned after receiving hundreds of reports.

  • Tedrow@lemmy.worldEnglish
    47·
    10 months ago

    I’m just seeing a huge amount of people drama farming around Helldivers. The game is great and so is the community overall. Easily one of the most open and accepting communities I’ve seen.

  • arudesalad@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    29·
    10 months ago

    All this means is that the satire is fine until people don’t see it as satire. It was all funny until people started killing him on sight and mass reporting him. It’s just the Internet being the Internet, someone will always take it too far and ruin it for everyone

  • Funderpants @lemmy.caEnglish
    24·
    10 months ago

    I feel like the targeted killings are funny, but the reports on the PSN and the doxxing are way too far, just ugly stuff.

  • Zahille7@lemmy.worldEnglish
    17·
    10 months ago

    Maybe if you want a satirical fascist regime to fight for, stick with Starship Troopers Extermination? Idk, but it seems like that community is more meme-y than HD2.

    I just think back to the OneyPlays video where they kept coming across the guy who kept saying “you apes wanna live forever?!”

    • Bimfred@lemmy.worldEnglish
      25·
      10 months ago

      If Starship Troopers had the player numbers of Helldivers, these articles would be about that game instead.

    • Funderpants @lemmy.caEnglish
      11·
      10 months ago

      What an amazing piece of dialogue, it invokes a paradox. The way to achieve eternal life for a trooper is to die in glorious combat. So the answer is both yes and no.

      What a great film, too bad there were no sequels.

      • Kushan@lemmy.worldEnglish
        5·
        10 months ago

        There were several sequels, but they were all terrib-ohhhhh, I see what you did there

  • SteelCorrelationEnglish
    16·
    10 months ago

    Maybe I won’t play the game. Every time I hear something about this community, it’s toxic shit like this. And here I thought the Destiny community was annoying.

    • JJROKCZ@lemmy.worldEnglish
      36·
      10 months ago

      The media latches on to anything like this for clicks. I have like 60 hours in HD2 and have seen nothing toxic beyond people saying sorry but they’re gonna kick me to make room for a friend that crashed and is rejoining, and that’s not really toxic

    • wahming@monyet.ccEnglish
      26·
      10 months ago

      According to the article the community is actually pretty welcoming in general, there’s just outlier assholes like in anything with millions of people. I’m not a player myself, so I’m just quoting the article

    • Aussiemandeus@aussie.zoneEnglish
      19·
      10 months ago

      I’ve got 20 hours in and the only issue i have run into is getting kicked when joining a game.

      It’s good fun and i play by myself. I imagine if i had friends who played it would be an absolute riot

      • Mac@mander.xyzEnglish
        5·
        10 months ago

        i imagine if i had friends … It would be an absolute riot

        I think this about life a lot.

      • Tech With Jake@lemm.eeEnglish
        2·
        10 months ago

        Assuming you’re in Australia from the instance, so time zones might suck but I’m always down to play HD2 with others.

    • Kyrgizion@lemmy.worldEnglish
      9·
      10 months ago

      Yeah same. One of my coworkers was trying to get me into it but every single time I keep coming across shit like this. No thank you.

      • SteelCorrelationEnglish
        3·
        10 months ago

        Yeah, and last I heard, it was people getting kicked or killed for not having meta loadouts or some shit. Garbage. I’m already put off by the game because I don’t have friends, and seeing how the community reacted to a seemingly normal balance patch has really dissuaded me.

    • Tedrow@lemmy.worldEnglish
      7·
      10 months ago

      This article is literally discussing gamer drama that happens in any game. It’s just analyzing around Helldivers specifically. The game is great, don’t let this deter you from playing.

    • Chozo@kbin.social
      3·
      10 months ago

      As somebody in both communities, these people are outliers, by far. I’d say 95% of the randoms I play with in either game are decent folk who aren’t trying to ruin other people’s fun. Even if the random player is way too underleveled for the mission and picked 4 support weapon strategems not knowing what they are and keeps getting stuck in respawn loops, everybody has been friendly and helpful, because that’s the democratic way. Anybody who tries to make the lives of their fellow players miserable is a dirty traitor and will be court-martialed.

  • Vik@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    9 months ago

    It’s a shame to hear people take this idea too far considering how on point the memes are from the community.