Helldivers 2's new patch kicks the AFK players obstructing democracy after they've been idle for 15 minutes

A new Helldivers 2 patch will kick players who are AFK for 15 minutes.

Earlier this week, we reported how Helldivers 2 players were begging developer Arrowhead to kick AFK players. It turns out players had been proudly camping out in the game for hours, and sometimes even days at a time, in an attempt to preserve their spot on the game's servers, which had just recently reached capacity.

Now, those prayers have been answered. "Implemented a functionality that will kick players who remain idle for 15 minutes back to the title screen," read the patch notes from Arrowhead, in an update that is going live for Helldivers 2 on all platforms today, February 22.

This should seriously help Helldivers 2 players actually get into the game that they paid for. Players camping out in the game to preserve their spots understandably infuriated the player base earlier this week when it was uncovered, so this fix should go a long way to stamping out the issue and getting actual players into the shooter.

Additionally, there's also a litany of bug fixes and crash fixes in the new Helldivers 2 patch. There's crash fixes for when players would join another player's ship, for example, as well as a remedy for an issue where certain online missions were unavailable on the Galactic War chart.

The patch also includes a fix for issues where GameGuard and Window's Firewall just wouldn't work with Helldivers 2 and a fix for an issue where the game would crash when you exited aiming down iron sights. There are also fixes for a bug that trapped players in the defrosting animation on their ship, as well as a crash that would occur when you failed to buy Super Credits.

Helldivers 2 players might be in for mechs, and even an entire new faction, based on teasers from Arrowhead itself. We're busy fighting off the Automaton and Terminid threats all over the galaxy, but apparently there's no rest for the Helldivers.

Head over to our Helldivers 2 tanks guide if you're having trouble despatching those lethal Automaton vehicles.