Remember the Illuminate? Those alien lads from the first Helldivers that everyone was convinced would come rushing into Helldivers 2 through that black hole the forces of Super Earth turned Meridia into a few months ago. Well, it looks like they’ve just briefly made a cameo on the game’s map.

As spotted by players on Reddit, a section of the lower portion of the Galactic map briefly turned purple yesterday, suggesting that it was under the control of force which wasn’t the Automatons or the Terminids, before returning to normal.

Naturally, folks could only come to one conclusion – the Illuminate popped in, and they’re apparently fans of hide and seek. Especially since at least one of the occupied sectors looks to have shown what looks a lot like the Illuminate’s logo when highlighted.

Arrowhead, however, disagreed with that assessment. “Fake news,” tweeted CEO Shams Jorjani, while an in-game message deployed after the purple area had disappeared provided a perfectly rational explanation for the occurrence.

“Some Helldivers may have noticed a recent service outage in the Major Order Communication Display,” it read, “The issue has since been resolved.

“Cause: Organic tissue degradation on electronic equipment. Discussion: Comms. Technician #R-2342 became stranded in server farm. Cause of death: exposure. Resolution: Electronics replaced. Family of deceased fined for damages.” That was the end of the report, and it’s the story the studio appears to be sticking to.

Whether you believe it is up to you, and some players look to have already penned essay-length posts explaining why they do think this is just the ruse Arrowhead’s suggested. Then again, given how many teases like this that could just as easily be genuine mistakes by devs and which are then integrated into Helldivers kayfabe, there’s always a chance the faction is on the way imminently.

Do you think the Illuminate will properly rock up in Helldivers 2 soon? Let us know below!