Helldivers 2 boss casually drops stealth hint with 'subsonic ammo, suppressor' tease

With servers finally stabilizing, Helldivers 2 can focus on its future content and bug-wrangling updates. Arrowhead Studios CEO Johan Pilestedt teased one potential content direction, dropping that he was playtesting “subsonic ammo and suppressor” at some point in development—a prospect that turned heads fast.

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Pilestedt is no stranger to tweeting about Helldivers 2 and is not worried about hiding his plans for updates about the game. On Feb. 24, on X (formerly Twitter), Pilestedt responded to a video on basic stealth mechanics in Helldivers 2 with some pretty specific equipment name-drops.

I know!!! I used to rock subsonic ammo and suppressor and do this quite a bit during play tests.
— Pilestedt (@Pilestedt) February 24, 2024

The mention of “subsonic ammo” and a suppressor caught the attention of avid Hell Divers since neither option is currently in Helldivers 2 in any capacity. Many players asked Pilestedt if this was confirmation of the ammo type in question—or weapon modification as a whole. The CEO has not responded to these questions on X.

Getting spotted by enemy patrols during higher difficulties of Helldivers 2 usually leads to a wave of dangerous enemies spawning on your location, which leads to chances of death with no chance of extra reward—outside of a higher kill count on the leaderboard. Killing an enemy encampment before the little guys can spawn in more enemies is an important strategy. The TikTok video Pilestedt responded to shows how sneaking and pistol-whipping small robots can be handy, preventing these additional spawns from occurring.

The Peacemaker pistol in Helldivers 2, in the Secondary weapon selection box. The tip of the Breaker and Incendiary Grenade are shown on either side. — This is the teaser that weaker weapons, like the Peacemaker, have been waiting for. Screenshot by Dot Esports

With his response, Pilestedt may have confirmed that what is shown in the video—and what you can currently do in-game—might only be the beginning. A full implementation of these playtested subsonic ammunition and suppressors would make stealth-based Hell Diver teams significantly more interesting and easier to bring to extraction. This could be a great change to standard loadouts by allowing several lower-caliber weapons to become relevant or making sniper builds more realistic.

That’s not all that players got from this tweet, though. Weapon customization might be in the cards if you can augment ammo and add a suppressor to a gun. Helldivers 2’s customization system is currently very limited, both for armor and weaponry. We’ve already learned that armor alterations are in discussion from previous CEO tweets—altering how we spray bullets seems feasible.

Even a glimpse of an update that means we won’t drag a Breaker to every mission is welcome. But since this is an unconfirmed tweet about a playtest, we’re not going to get our hopes too high.