After Helldivers 2 stole its thunder, Starship Troopers: Extermination is now cribbing from Arrowhead's worksheet by adding airstrikes in its next update

Imagine how awkward it would be to end up trapped in a lift with Starship Troopers: Extermination and Helldivers 2, what with the latter taking the themes and ideas behind the former's licence and implementing them in a way that massively stole Extermination's thunder. Sure, Helldivers 2 deserves its success, but Extermination's developer, Offworld, must be a little green watching Arrowhead's bug-blasting, fascist lampooning sci-fi action game gallivant off with all of the money.

Hence, it would only be fair for Offworld to copy Arrowhead's homework a little, which appears to be the case for the cooperative spinoff's latest update. Update 1.8 will primarily introduce a Company progression system to Extermination when it arrives later in November. But I'm more intrigued by its tertiary feature—in-game airstrikes.

Now, these work a little differently from Helldivers 2's airstrikes. Where Arrowhead's game lets you deploy them as a Stratagem, they form a side-mission in Extermination, something you can take on alongside the primary objective of building/defending your base. Specifically, players must defend new objectives called Fleet Relays out in the field, successfully doing which will facilitate bombing runs on the arachnid hordes. A bit of extra spectacle certainly wouldn't go amiss in Offworld's game. While it can definitely deliver on the fireworks, it also can't match Arrowhead for raw audio/visual exhilaration.

As for the company progression system, this allows player-created groups to level up through 50 tiers and unlock cosmetic rewards along the way. Which I suppose is a pleasant bonus for those involved in companies, though I've always been slightly baffled by the emphasis Extermination places upon them, given isn't player base isn't exactly vast. Finally, the update will also add a new map for the Critical Strike mode called Boreas, which is set in a gleaming, frozen wasteland. The most interesting feature, though, is those airstrikes.

The 1.8 update is due to arrive sometime this month, though Offworld doesn't specify precisely when. The studio does reveal what we can expect after 1.8 lands, though. In-development features include a new enemy—the Hopper Bug—plus two new weapons— the smart rifle and the Morita 3 assault rifle, which is, if you'll excuse me, an absolute chonker. Most excitingly, Offworld plans to add the M11 Babar mech suit, which should help give bug splatting an extra dimension.

While it is ultimately a lesser game than Helldivers 2, Extermination has its merits, as I discussed in my Starship Troopers: Extermination review. While the single-player campaign was rubbish, and general play was undermined by technical hitches, its multiplayer was novel and thoroughly entertaining, as was creating enormous piles of dead bugs. If you're weary of Helldivers 2's cycle of it's so over/we're so back, I'd recommend giving it a whirl.