The “Democracy T-Position,” as we learned yesterday, is a recently discovered bug in Helldivers 2 that allows players to survive otherwise fatal fall damage by performing a hugging gesture while soaring through the air like an errant (but loving) cannonball. It’s hilarious and clearly not meant to be, but some players are still hoping Arrowhead will get around to it. It turns out they have a friend in high places: Arrowhead CEO Shams Jorjani, no less.
The glitch is very uncomplicated: If you get thrown into the air by an explosion or some other bad kinetic message, you can reduce the damage you take from the inevitable impact—and thus augment your chances of survival—by holding an emote before landing. Both the “hug” and “salute” emotes work, but testing has shown that the hug is slightly more effective—and yes, Helldivers tested.
Attention Helldivers, using an emote while falling could SAVE YOUR LIFE! With r/Helldivers
Most players have come to terms with the likelihood of a fix, but some are hoping that Arrowhead will leave it alone, or at least not prioritize it. Some have even come up with a canonical explanation for the glitch that makes as much sense as anything else in Helldivers 2: The Protective Power of Super Earth democration!
Others argue more pragmatically that everything is pretty well balanced already, since when someone gets launched into low Earth orbit it’s usually because of a glitch anyway, so countering it with another glitch is only fair.
How well these arguments hold up is up for debate, but Arrowhead CEO Shams Jorjani made it clear on Twitter that he is in the “keep it” camp. “Can we please keep it?” he tweeted to Arrowhead.
can we please keep this? @ArrowheadGS https://t.co/a57PMZ4JtTJuly 8, 2024
He even came up with a way to justify surviving a long fall, although it will take some work to implement: “We’ll add inflatable jumping bags that will shoot out from under your armpits or some shit if we have to. Come on! We have the technology – where there’s a will, there’s a way!”
I think it’s a good idea. I also think it’s very unlikely to happen: throwing an emote to save yourself from fast-moving dirt isn’t a game-breaking bug, or even a guarantee of survival — it reduces damage, it doesn’t eliminate it, so if you’re in bad shape when you go up, you probably won’t fare too well when you go down, no matter how much you love Democracy — but it’s clearly a bug. Even if it’s low priority, it seems likely that someone will say, “We need to fix this,” sooner or later.
As for why Jorjani won’t just operate his powers as CEO to order the bug to continue to exist, that’s clearly not his modus operandi: when someone suggested he should force the developers to leave it alone, he replied“What a terrible way to run a games studio full of intelligent and creative people.”
For now, Arrowhead developers are likely focused on other things: “divers” recently liberated planet X-45, which means that work on the mysterious “interplanetary battle station” that everyone is eagerly awaiting will resume soon. What happens after this bad boy is finished remains to be seen, but I’m sure it will be very captivating in one way or another.
